First of all, I ain't afraid of the Tea Party people any more than I was afraid of the Klan... I knew people who were members of the Klan back in the 60s and 70s and they didn't individually scare me in the slightest... Most of them were just loudmouths who unless they were with their buddies were purdy wimpy...

It's when these folks get into a mob they can be dangerous... My mom never went into that town meeting because of the Tea Party outside playing mob... Lots of other elderly people who came to speak or to just listen turned around as well... My mom was 90 at the time so I'm glad she didn't try to push her way thru the rednecks... She, however, in her day didn't back down and was arrested several times in civil rights demonstrations...

As for generalizations??? There are occasions when common sense takes over and generalizations work in keeping you safe... There are places that folks just don't need to be... I mean, back when I was working at Rubicon North in Richmond I worked every other weekend from Friday night until Monday morning as SOD (Staff on Duty)... Rubicon North was a drug treatment half-way house and was at the the corner of 2nd and Calhoun which was right in the middle of one of the roughest neighborhoods in Richmond... I knew lots of people and would sit out on the sidewalk sometimes and play geetar or just talk with people well past midnight... The operative word is that people knew me... All kinds of people knew me... Pimps, hookers, ripper 'n runners... So I was relatively safe unless I got shot by accident from a stray bullet...

There are 2nd & Calhouns in cities across the country where today, even though I have a good amount of acquired black dialect, rhythm and mannerism I wouldn't be safe getting out of the car at 3 in the morning... I mean, generalizations do serve learned people well in certain circumstances...

So, yeah, like me not wanting to get out of the car like 5 blocks from Temple University in Philly at 3 in the morning or 5 blocks from Johns Hopkins in Baltimore at 3 in the morning, my mom went to a town meeting and was met by a mob of rude people... Were all these people rude people??? No, probably not... But enough were so that common sense + generalizations told her to turn around...

That is the problem with mob (herd) mentality... Things can get out of hand and people hurt... That's why when I heard some of the   things that Sarah Plain was saying at rallies which brought people to yell "Hang him" it was clear to anyone with common sense that had Obam been at that rally then maybe one of the folks would have tried to either kill or harm him... When I hear people saying that it's time for 2nd amendment remedies these people are giving permission to others to do just that... There have already been acts of violence carried out by people associated with the Tea Party so it isn't some figment of one's imagination that these acts could escalate or be repeated...

Bottom line: The Tea Party has put out threats and backed them up... They have tacitly given permission to any wingnut out there with a gun that killing is okay if you are defending some policy position of your party...

This is dangerous... This is un American... This is a deterrent to compromise, democracy, discussion, etc...

The Tea Party has never, to my knowledge, denounced these tactics or apologized for using them... Until they do, they are not unlike the Taliban in the way they try to get their policies in place... In other words: terrorism!!!

Like it or not, that is what it is... Let them denounce these tactics and apologize and maybe a new ball game... Until then, they do try to scare people and that ain't what democracy is all about... That what dictators do...

Bob