I suppose the main, unifying item of the Tea Party agenda, is taxes.

Yup - they want to get something for nothing.

"Taxes are what we pay for civilized society." - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

in Compañia General De Tabacos De Filipinas vs. Collector of Internal Revenue, 275 U.S. 87, 100 (1927)

Holmes was hardly a member of the "far Left"