Tom Leppert In a "House Full of Patriots"

• Their campaign consulting team is, at the moment, furiously scrounging for receipts of any kind to give to the FBI.  They don't have time to piddle with this nonsense at the moment. (please send any receipts you have laying around the house to them.)

• You all have to realize, the Tea Party, as you know it, is two distinct and often opposed groups.  The original movement was very focused on its key issues, cut wasteful government spending and reduce government intrusion.  There was already a party for that, the Libertarian party, but they got their movement going independently for some reason.  One of the organizers of this movement either got co-opted by the Reps, or always was one, and started pushing to lead the whole shebang off into slack-jawed, mouth-breathing, white trash land, while the other group continued on its merry way. Of course the group with all the loud mouths got all the press, so that is what many see as the 'Tea Party'.  I'm not real clear what has become of the others, as I quickly stopped paying attention to them at this point.  I just go on my own blissful libertarian way, trying to meld the news I get from both left and right into some palpable truth.

• Even if any of what you said was accurate, and I do not beleive it is, I would not want the bunch of idiots called the "Tea Party" leading my country anywhere! Their only course would be toward world war.

• Actually, what Jesus taught would be pure communism, which is why churches celebrate communion. Unfortunately, most people today equate communism with the J. Edgar Hoover uneducated definition, which was actually dictatorial, totalitarian socialism being called communism.

• The Tea Party is the American Taliban. They want a religious thocracy of their own definition running things here like the Muslims do in the Middle East. They ignore the Constitution because they are too illiterate to understand what it says or means. They surround themselves with other equally stupid people because birds of a feather flock together. Now, I have no problem with what they are doing. In fact, I would defend to the death their right to do it because the right to do what they are doing is Constitutionally guaranteed in our Bill of Rights. And you gotta admit that it is great entertainment and cheap thrills. If you look at recent election results they are NOT taking over Congress. They are fighting amongst themselves and causing the entire GOP to split, so what they are doing may actually be good for the country. What the rest of us has to do is continue being educated and involved, and make sure that we exercise our right to vote, but we also have to continually let our elected leaders hear from us as to what we expect of them, and we have to remove them from office when they fail us. We get the government that we deserve because We, The People of the United States of America, elect it!

• If you put the entire Tea Party movement in one room, and then started adding up IQs you would not get a double digit number. That is why the group is so easily swayed by bullshit and hyperbole. Fearmongering is their only recourse. They are shrill and loud, but they don't say anything meaningful. Somebody like Palin or Bachmann, who has a very low double digit IQ, seems brilliant to them.

• You are confusing candidates that have adopted some Tea Party items and get support with the actual Tea Parties.  You can use Google to find story after story about complaints in 2010 from religious groups complaining that Tea Party activists will not work for their agenda on the issues you cited.  It's very likely many of the Tea Party activists to believe in that agenda as do many of its candidates.  They simply and intentionally screened the Tea Party from that agenda.

• Dallas: our <strike>village idiots</strike> former mayors are world class!

• Unfortunately, I'm pretty broke right now. None the less, I would be happy to donate $5.00 to the tea party if they could ever construct a concise and consistent mission statement in keeping with their actions. ie- "we like to hang out in our lawn chairs waving old glory, insert the word constituation in every other sentence, and wear straw hats". Bam! here is your 5 bucks.

• Sounds very familiar to the popular misinformation that Mayor Rawlings was CEO of Pizza Hut. He wasn't because the position did not exist. He was in charge of the Pizza Hut business dvision for Yum brands And, oh, BTW, most of its stores are franchised, so it's not like he has executive experience of a major sized corporation. He was PH's marketing and finance guy, and according to Yum's annual reports his financial performance was mixed at best, and trended down during his tenure. Maybe Mike's and Tom's campaign consulting team can explain why those mayoral candidates had resume bloat?

• "I was privileged to serve as mayor of Dallas for four years."  Can the man move his lips without lying?  Doesn't he remember that he cut-and-ran, oops resigned, before his four year term was up?  

• I've been on lots of planes and they didn't make me grope anyone. No one told me it was a mandate, next time I'll just grab someone and grope away.

• Taking and responding to are completely different things.

• Bullshit. They elected Cheney president twice, and he said deficits don't matter, started multiple wars to funnel cash to his employer Halliburton, then quashed civil liberties by having people arrested for wearing t-shirts he didn't like. Bloated the government with Medi-part D as a giveaway to Pharma by forbidding negotiations on price, and mandated groping of old people and children to get on a plane, while also forbidding you from bringing a drink on board. Then, Halliburton up and moved to Dubai to escape paying any taxes on their war pofiteering. Only when a black man got elected did all those old fucks freak.

• ......and a terrible mathematician. He says he was Dallas Mayor for four years. He must have been working off of the Incan Calendar or something.

• The one that collects the most donations, of course. Preachin' is an expensive business. Those fountains don't just build themselves.

• I thought Jesus was a fudgepacker. At least the one I met was. Hot Latin boys, Oooooh Yeeeeaahh.

• When I read the headline, I thought he was hanging out at T.J.

• That isn't true. Most of their highest profile candidates/current officeholders support amending the constitution to ban gay marriage. They agree that it's a state's right issue, for now. But they'd prefer that it not be. Seriously, this information is not hard to find. Use Google.  Also, if something is theoretically possible, but in practice could never be achieved, is it even worth discussing? It's theoretically possible to redistribute the world's wealth in such a way that would raise the living standard of every human on the planet but that will not happen, so it's not really worth anyone's time.

• "Tea Parties don't have positions on abortion, contraception, desegregation, gay marriage, etc. " Might want to let the Tea Partiers know about that.

• If you don't have a position, you don't filter your support of candidates if they do have one.  A Tea Party could logically support a black/Muslim gay politician that believes in gay marriage at state level by referendum, non-government subsidized abortion, low taxes, protection of Medicare, reduction of benefits for state/Federal workers and elimination of state support of illegal immigrants (school, health).  I don't think such a candidate exists, but that's not the Tea Parties' fault. 

• Contrary to popular perception (which Leppert never chose to correct) Turner Construction never actually moved to Dallas.  What Leppert did set up here was some sort of holding company called Turner Corp., which employed a grand total of 14 people and served as an intermediate entity sandwiched between HOCHTIEF AG (an international construction services provider) and Turner Construction (a large U.S. construction company headquartered in NY).

• How many jobs did he create in Italy when the steel was made for the signature bridge?  And how many people are working/worked, total, on the hotel?  And how many permanent jobs will be available at the hotel?  The number may possibly be over 2,000. And don't forget the jobs from the corporate HQ of Turner Construction, before they moved back to NYC.  But that certainly is a stretch over what he implied about job creation.

• I don't actually agree with most of what you said, but even if it was true, the money that was required to get them organized and elected came from people who are at best indifferent to US growth and at worst, profit disproportionately when jobs are shipped to lower cost countries.

• If the Tea Party does not have a position on abortion, contraception, or gay marriage, it is doing an awful job of putting forward and promoting candidates who share its positions.

• Commenters and probably Mayor Leppert should read the study/book by Theda Skocpol.  You'll find that theology, cited here for some reason, has almost no place in Tea Party politics.  Like race, theology may appear on the edges and in comments, but it does not drive the activists' actions.  Fundamentally the Tea Party to this researcher is about people that worked for what they received, feelings by activists that they are in that group, and the Other, non-producers taking away an unfair share.  A black, gay, Muslim welder working two jobs and making his way ranks higher than a white, straight, Baptist husband sitting in a beautiful home not making mortgage payments for years scamming the foreclosure process.  Immigrants legal and illegal working 10-12 hours a day are good, illegal immigrants getting in-state tuition at state schools are bad.  Social Security and Medicare are good because they are "earned." You don't get them for just showing up.  Taxes and spending are issues because the former takes what they earned and the latter seems focused on giving more to the Other.  You might say the impact of those actions disproportionally impact poor people and people of color.  Maybe so, but I would not call them racist. Tea Parties don't have positions on abortion, contraception, desegregation, gay marriage, etc.  They do have positions on government spending money to support those or other activities.  In their minds, it is a difference.  To someone that believes government's role is to rectify wrongs, maybe the impact defines the actor's true beliefs.

• same thing here...first thoughts.....pathological liar and who is he throwing under the bus now. is this what they call branding?

• I don't believe they evil, or trying to create a theocracy, or that they hate anyone who doesn't look like them. I think they're scared of the value of our currency evaporating, scared of jobs being exported faster than our domestic growth, tired of double digit growth of government, government debt, and unemployment. And I believe they rightly determined that until they organized, no one in government gave a shit what they thought. And of course they were correct about that. Now they are everyone's scapegoat for all of the bullshit going on in this country. I am certainly not one of them, and I don't agree with much of their platform, but....I understand where they are coming from. Now....rag my ass some.

• A blessing If I may use the term is they might end up wiping each other out as they fight amongst them selves as to which brand of Christianity they are going to come after the unwashed with.

• pathological lying IS a prerequisite.

• Schmuck is too kind of a word for this idiot.

• C'mon folks Facts are not necessary in politics. all that it takes is to make you believe that I am what I think I am in my own mind.

• Right, but on theocratic principles as they interpret them. Government based on the "true" principles of Christianity would more or less be called socialism. Love thy neighbor, rejection of material wealth, that which you do to the least you do to me, etc. You can claim the most important thing that came out of the Bible was that being gay is wrong, but that doesn't make it so.

• Another lie: "I'm comfortable taking any and all questions." I'd also like to see detailed numbers regarding this claim: "I literally created thousands of jobs."

• They are after a theocratic government, based on evangelical principles.

• Aint that the truth.  Except I think I know what they are after -- 1953.  Before Griswold v. Connecticut, before Brown v. Board of Ed, before the Voting Rights Act, before the Civil Rights Act.  Just before.  Or in other words, before modernity.  Kinda like the Tallaban.

• This brings to mind the issue I have with tea party folks. Although, I'm liberal, I totally respect others who wish for a more conservative or libetarion approach. And if they win elections by obtaining more votes, then fair enough and more power to them. However,  anytime I see a tea party crowd, I don't get the vibe that their true motive is for less government  What they are after, I can't surmise.

• But you know he's got a political consultant somewhere who told him that primary voters will not bother to fact check. Their due diligence consists of listening to soundbytes. The only hope is that someone who wants to beat Leppert will make the reality of his tenure as mayor abundantly clear.

• "Got out of some things ...."  Really?  Really?   And the sad thing is he's pitching to a crowd and announcer too lazy and stupid to ask the easiest of followup questions -- exactly what Mr. Leppert did Dallas get out of when you were Mayor?  Or how's that hotel working out for ya?

• I am not copying you , but my first thought was also ' pathological liar' . How do these people not get screened before they get into office?

• Not gonna lie: When I was writing this, I thought, "You know who'll get a kick out of this? Wylie H." Boom.

• Amazing... even by political standards. Leppert is truly a pathological liar.

TotalComments: 42