Back in April 2009, Daily Show host Jon Stewart summed up the Tea Party movement, "I think you might be confusing tyranny with losing." His description, it turns out, was exactly right. Tea Partiers complained they were "Taxed Enough Already" despite virtually all receiving tax relief from President Obama and America seeing the total federal tax burden at its lowest level since 1950. They decried "Obamacare" for its nonexistent "death panels" and "government takeover of health care" even as the Affordable Care Act would cover 30 million more Americans and reduce the U.S. national debt. And after pocketing millions of dollars in funding from the usual right-wing sugar daddies, the Tea Party's Republicans in Republicans' clothing duly voted Republican in the 2010 midterm elections.
Which is why the leading lights of the Republican Party are so quick to denounce the Occupy Wall Street movement now spreading across the country. Its platform and ultimate political impact may not be clear. But unlike the Tea Party, its populism is authentic.
