As .Sean at Fired Up notes, former Speaker pro Tem turned lobbyist Carl Bearden is the point of contact for the Tea Party protest in Jefferson City. Can you smell the astroturf?
That’s not the only “movement” Bearden has headed up in Missouri. From Carl Bearden’s Wikipedia entry:
Recently, Carl has come out in support of former Senator Fred Thompson for president. This development has drawn national attention in such blogs as Real Clear Politics and Robert Novak’s Human Events. Support for this movement can be voiced at draft.thompson@carlbearden.org and his personal blog.
Clearly this entry hasn’t been updated in a while. How did the Fred Thompson movement work out, Carl? Fred dropped out after placing a distant third in South Carolina, his best showing in the primaries.
…is Carl gonna fly to the protest in a plane? Just asking.
Indeed — and big time too. It’ll be interesting to see media coverage of these “grass-roots” protests.
It sure is funny to hear the right talking about teabagging, but it’s also interesting in a way – I was just listening to an episode of The Joan Kenley Show (progressive Bay Area podcast) called The Media: What’s True, What’s Not that addressed how the right-wing corporate media will use catch phrases (like “socialism”) and single-line branding to manipulate the information we hear. After getting in touch with all the ways that’s worked for them, it’s a relief to see this entry about a way it clearly is working against them, in that we are all now aware of Fox News’ role in the teabagging.