Walter PattersonAmerica’s credit has been downgraded by Standard and Poor’s and guess who is getting the blame?  
You are correct.  The Tea Party. The Democrats have managed over the last three years to spend our future, our children’s future, our grandkid’s future, and then they have the audacity to blame the Tea Party.  One writer said that this was like blaming the Betty Ford Addiction Center for alcoholism.
Never let it be said that liberal Democrats have no audacity.  Somewhere from the deep recesses of their convoluted minds they can always come up with another absurd excuse for why their “tax and spend” policies fail.  
This blame that is being heaped on the Tea Party would be hilariously funny if the consequences of what the Democrats have done to our country were not so dire.
Mr. Obama himself has weighed in on the Tea Party claiming that  they, and they alone, are responsible for the credit downgrade. Then he blamed Republicans. Then he blamed the nuclear accident in Japan, then the European markets, then the lack of manufacturing coming out of Japan, and finally, the Arab Spring.  
Remember that the audacious Senator John Kerry, that great American war hero, and Joe Biden called the Tea Party representatives “terrorists.” John Kerry even suggested that news media refuse to cover the Tea Party and just ignore it. “Its ideas are  irrelevant,” he suggested.
You know you have arrived at the “show” when the big boys start to take shots at you. Folks, the Tea Party has arrived, and not a moment too soon.  
But what is the Tea Party? Who is a member of the Tea Party? Not one member of the newly elected House of Representatives has “Tea Party” in parentheses after his or her name.
The Tea Party, for all intents and purposes, is a figment of the left-wing Democrats illogical minds. But they know one thing for sure. The Tea Party is a force in American politics.
The Tea Party is a spontaneous creation of  likeminded conservative, clear-thinking people who want to see this country survive as a great nation. Tea Partiers can be your neighbor, your father, your daughter, or your son. They all have a vision for this country that starts with significantly curbing government spending and reducing the size of government so that our basic freedoms are not threatened.
Make no mistake, our freedoms are threatened.  For example, Obama’s DOT recently proposed a regulation that would mandate that tractor drivers possess a commercial driver’s license before they can operate a tractor. How out of touch with reality can these people be? Every day there are other regulations that directly affect our lives, and in most instances, our paychecks.  
Take the CAFÉ Standards for work trucks. Obama just mandated that work trucks must improve their fuel consumption to levels that require the manufacturer to downsize everything from pickup trucks to tractor-trailers.  What a brilliant man.  These regulations are sure to improve the economy and put lots of people to work.
The Tea Party is an enigma that has so riled the socialists among us that they are doing everything possible to discredit it. The only thing wrong with their efforts is that it’s hard to find a card-carrying Tea Party member to blame. The Tea Party is a movement – not a political party, and this blows the warped minds of people like Harry Reid, John Kerry, and Little Dickie Durbin, all of whom live, it appears, on another planet.
But we have Tea Party detractors living among us, and these “brilliant” writers and thinkers often write in our State’s largest newspaper. Last week, one wrote, “Republicans must do something about their Tea Party problem. There is no solution without new revenue and adamant positions against any tax changes are unrealistic.”
I wish I could be more diplomatic, but this type thinking is simply irrational.
Another “wise” man wrote, “Today, there is much unbalance in America and little apparent concern for mutual benefit. Such imbalance opens the door to both anarchy and tyranny ... we must balance cuts to the budget with revenue enhancements.”
What these great Democrat thinkers fail to realize is that a “sea change” has begun.  No longer will the American people allow corrupt and short-sighted men to drive our country over the proverbial cliff.  No longer will people who seek to be our masters be elected to congress.  So liberals, socialists, statists, Democrats all, blame the Tea Party.  Go right ahead.  
The quicker you show your colors, the quicker we can replace you.  “The times, they are changing,” and the Tea Party is showing some audacity of its own.
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Walter J. Patterson is a columnist for The Yazoo Herald. He can be contacted by email at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .