Conservatives Must Avoid Circular Firing Squads

Evidently I have had my head in the sand since my budget had to downsize my cable ability to watch the FOX News channel. (I almost cringe to watch the big three network news shows.) Evidently around September 20th or so some big dog Conservative pundits chased after a liberal bone tossed from the Mainstream Media (MSM) pertaining comments made by Glen Beck about Senator McCain’s run for President. Once the bone was out there the Conservative big dogs began some backbiting.

I actually became aware of this from an Our Country Deserves Better (OCBD)e-newsletter. It seems the Beck controversy has crept in other ways within the Tea Party Movement. Apparently there is some Tea Party Movement back biting and OCDB sent the e-newsletter to set their position about the back biting and to extol the Tea Party Movement with a call for unity.

JRH 10/2/09
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Conservatives Must Avoid Circular Firing Squads

Our Country Deserves Better E-Newsletter
10/02/2009 03:10:27 am

The past week has seen some intense behind-the-scenes discussions in various quarters of the conservative movement over a series of comments on cable TV news shows regarding Glenn Beck, Mark Levin and Joe Scarborough.

Scarborough, who has a morning news show on MSNBC, had put a call out for every potential Republican presidential candidate to denounce conservative radio and TV host, Glenn Beck.

Soon all sorts of pundits and commentators from Kathleen Parker to David Brooks were weighing in with their views about the matter, including sharing their thoughts on comments Beck had made in an interview with CBS's Katie Couric.

Amidst all the noise, we felt our heads begin to spin. And we also felt a case of déjà vu setting in. Hadn't we seen this taken from the media's playbook once before? Oh yes, we had and it was Katie Couric once again stirring up trouble for another prominent conservative, Gov. Sarah Palin - and watching with glee the conservative in-fighting that commenced thereafter.

The liberal media continues to enjoy their role in sparking a dust-up in the conservative community. Whether a deliberate effort to distract from the failings of Barack Obama and Congress (under Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid), or just for the fun of attempting to injure the conservative movement, it doesn't matter the reason.

The point is the media got their wish. The left-wing media spin group, Media Matters, even produced a video showing all of the shots being fired in the conservative circular firing squad. You can watch it - HERE.

Normally we wouldn't even be giving attention to any of the misleading propaganda produced by Media Matters. But we wanted you to watch it so you can see how this game is played by the media and the Left. We want you to be aware of the fact that this is how they define and control the news cycle - again, especially when things aren't going so well for their political idols in the White House and Congress.

Like we said, the feeling was one of deja vu for us this week. Our minds took us back to early March when RNC Chairman Michael Steele made a series of denigrating comments about conservative radio talk giant, Rush Limbaugh.

The media tried to turn the back-and-forth exchange of comments into a giant firestorm of debate on the news shows. At that time we made the same plea to fellow conservatives as we are doing now - don't fall for the media's trap! Here's what we wrote on March 2, 2009 regarding that dust up:

The bottom line is this: Rush Limbaugh is right when he rallies conservatives to fight for their principles and oppose policies and ideologies that we believe are harmful to the nation and that go against the sacred trust of individual liberty and freedom.

The Republican Party is searching for its soul right now, when it should be easy for it to find its voice in opposing taxpayer bailouts, trillions of dollars in spending when our nation is already in debt, and opposing higher taxes.

That the Republican leadership are not doing this loudly, succinctly and uniformly is what has so many conservatives concerned.

Michael Steele and Eric Cantor have fallen for the Democrats' trap. They want to see Republicans fighting each other instead of their liberal agenda.

And if that wasn't enough, this week's infighting even extended into the tea party movement.

In the days leading up to the August 28th launch of the Tea Party Express (which the Our Country Deserves Better Committee organized in conjunction with several other conservative organizations and local tea party groups across the country), an aggressive activist in the tea party movement then attempted to convince local tea party groups not to cooperate with the Tea Party Express. This individual thought that he should decide what takes place in the tea party movement and did everything he could to defame the Tea Party Express.

Thankfully, he failed!

Nonetheless, he accused us of being shills for the GOP, which if you read our comments about the Michael Steele-Rush Limbaugh dust-up as printed above, you know is quite laughable. We're conservatives first, and will speak up for those who support these principles, and we will speak out against those who don't - even if they are Republicans.

During our launch event for the Tea Party Express this individual's wife kept harassing speakers and urging them to not even mention the Tea Party Express. Finally she went so far as to push and kick one of the rally organizers in an attempt to stop one of our tour's singers, Diana Nagy, from performing her beautiful song, "Where Freedom Flies" prompting the Capitol police to escort this tea party activist's wife away.

This is no way for people to work together to advance shared causes, friends. Kicking people to keep them from singing because your own ego resents attention being given to a patriotic singer? Telling people which tea party events they should and shouldn't go to?

Now that same individual is out again emailing people and telling them they shouldn't support the Tea Party Express - yet again, as he feels he should decide what happens within the tea party movement. His actions even got a liberal alternative newspaper to write up a blog entry that was headlined "Discord in the Tea Parties?" The report was written by a writer who has described the tea party movement as "fringe" and derided Fox News Channel's coverage of the tea party movement.

When this liberal reporter showed his ignorance of our efforts in the tea party movement we eagerly set the record straight - HERE.

The tea party movement is a grass roots movement of the people. There is no one leader. We certainly are not that leader. Instead, like you, we are just one part of this massive coalition and growing movement.

Infighting by conservative commentators or among tea party activsits (sic) is not helpful, friends. We simply must make sure that ego and ambition do not undermine our conservative movement.

The same self-determination, drive and ambition that is part of our free society, and that compels us to do the best we can to provide for our families, achieve success at the workplace, and personal gratification for excelling at our hobbies and interests, can sometimes also have a dark side: ego and jealousy. It's part of human nature, and it is understandable. But our conservative movement must not allow these feelings to be played like instruments by a waiting and willing media and left-wing political machine that is just itching to turn us all against one another.

It is for that reason that we've never told you about some of the behind-the-scenes drama in the leadup of the Tea Party Express, and why we won't print this hostile individual's name here now, either. We're not out looking to perpetuate the differences of opinions and hand ammunition to our ideological enemies. In fact, when one of our principal's at the Our Country Deserves Better Committee vented on his blog about this matter we even asked him to take down his post, which he promptly did. Not because it wasn't tempting to tell the truth of what happened, but because it wouldn't serve to help anyone but our political adversaries on the Left.

We here at the Our Country Deserves Better Committee have great appreciation for the contributions made to the conservative cause by a whole host of people, groups, leaders, spokespersons and radio talk hosts. We believe this conservative movement must have a place for voices like Glenn Beck, Mark Levin, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Hugh Hewitt, Mike Gallagher, Michael Reagan, Lars Larson, Laura Ingraham, Dennis Praeger, and many others.

Each of these folks reaches people in their own ways - and they each serve a valuable role in helping to encourage the advancement of conservative thoughts and principles. We won't tell you who YOU should or shouldn't listen to, and we will always stand resolute against people like Katie Couric or the folks at Media Matters when they cook up their stunts to compel conservative figures to fight one another as a means to advance their own liberal cause.

We have a nation to fight for, friends. America faces the gravest threat from left-wing policies that she has in decades. This administration and Congress are attempting to reshape America into a very different country than our Founding Fathers envisioned.

They are pushing forward in an effort to enact a redistribution of wealth, socialistic economic policies, massive deficits and a giant growth of government power and influence. They want to control your health care, what kind of car you can drive, what kind of energy you can use to heat or cool your house, and on and on.

This fight will require a strong, united conservative opposition. We are proud to join you in this fight, and we are proud to work in tandem with dozens of other conservative organizations in this effort.

Let us all be dilligent to never fall for the media's trap and lose focus on what unites us, instead of what small differences we might have with one another at times - either be they based on tactics or personality.

Here's what we can accomplish when we work together - it's a Fox News report on the Tea Party Express, that was LIVE from our Flagstaff, AZ rally. Please take a moment to watch it [SlantRight Editor: I am unsure how long the link will last], as it is a testament to what we can do when we all work together, instead of against one another:

WATCH FOX NEWS REPORT ON TEA PARTY EXPRESS - HERE

Now, onwards to the fight ahead, good friends! We'll be posting updates over the coming week on the "Tea Party Express: Countdown to Judgment Day" at the Tea Party Express website: http://www.teapartyexpress.org/