Tea Party head cases?

How many acts of violence have been perpetrated by Tea Party members?

The answer is "zero."

Hello Stacey - there are a dozens of cases of violence (rapes, murders, vandalism, attempted bombings) associated with OWS. I haven't heard of a single documented case of criminality at any Tea Party event. Can you enlighten us as to what you are talking about?

Chester, You are correct
Vandalism, bombings and destroying property OWS, they are protesting and want their fair share. Tea Party will not want to destroy property or vandalize is they own it and earned it, is the difference : )

I agree Stacey. A bunch of head cases.

You're comparing The Tea Party to Occupy???? The Tea Party wants less taxes and Occupy wants total Anarchy. You need to stop watching MSNBC so much.

@Chester: So the TeaBag nutjobs bringing semi automatic weapons to tea party events held where Democratic lawmakers are speaking is not in itself a threat? How about spitting on congressmen they disagree with? Not to mention a case which was confirmed by the FBI where a tea party activist posted the address of Rep. Perrielo brother's house urging fellow teapartiers to pay him a visit--- which they did and cut his gas lines to his house.

Sorry Stacey, Tea Party folks and those like them do not advocate violence, possess weapons or explosives ilegally and / or conduct themselves as the OWS movement members have and do.

Funny Joe. I thought that Occupy didn't know what it wanted and the Tea Party wanted anarchy, or absence of government.

Anyone who equates the Tea Party with the OWS people are either unaware or are deliberately spreading falsehoods. The Tea Party has, and continues to be, a peaceful law abiding movement.

Ridgewood Mom, tell us when the Tea Party advocated anarchy or the absence of government.

I know you like dictionaries Bill. What do you think anarchy is?

And Bill, do you deny that Tea Party members openly advocate for allowing private citizens to own "assault rifles and other firearms" based on a fundamentalist belief in the second amendment?

Ridgewood Mom, they believe in the 2nd Ammendment, although it's not really a pillar of their movement. Again, tell me how the Tea Party advocates anarchy. Or do you believe that anyone who believes in the 2nd Ammendment advocates anarchy?

Bill, the Tea Party wants "limited government" and "free markets." Occupy wanted the government to get involved in regulating wall street. Anarchy means the absence of government and "freedom" of the individual, as a political ideal. You do the math.

Tea party candidate Sharron Angle on second amendment remedies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tynfy7j7zSA&feature=related

So, Ridgewood Mom, "Free Markets" and "Limited Government" means anarchy to you. I really have no response to that. But, yes, dictionaries, and getting out of the house now and then, are useful.

Bill, I doubt that either group wants true anarchy. Everyone wants a big government when it is doing what they want it to and a small government when they see it as getting in their way. But if you scroll up 12 posts you will see that I was responding to Joe's comment that "The Tea Party wants less taxes and Occupy wants total Anarchy." If you believe that occupy leans more toward the notion of anarchy then the tea party does then you haven't put much thought into it.

Ridgewood Mom, you're the one who mentioned that the Tea Party wanted anarchy and then tried to defend that by saying they believe in the 2nd ammendment. Actually, they believe in the entire Constitution. Hardly the mark of anarchists. The Tea Party has always been a peaceful, law abiding movement. It has successfully defended itself from unsubstantiated accusations from people such as yourself.

Bill, you are being disingenuous.

Ridgewood Mom, people can read our little post string here and decide who's disingenuous. Again, you're not interested in honest debate.

The Tea Baggers don't need guns to rob. They do it with pens.

He pissed me off everytime I saw him with that sign. BYW my theory is he targeted the lady he lived with on the internet in order to move into a quiet area. And another sided note. I wonder if he was the person responsible for leaving briefcases and boxes in town and calling it in. Was he testing response time or something?

Many of the occupy people are mentally ill. They are dangerous. Look at what they did in Oakland and the hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage they inflicted. Of course the tax payers had to pick up the tab. And how dare the Tea Partiers say, "Taxed Enough Already!" In 2009 the top 1% paid 37% of all income taxes. The top 5% paid 59% of all income taxes and the bottom 50% paid 2% of all income taxes. But of course the TaxPayers (only those that pay taxes) have to pick up the tab for the Occupy hoodlums.

LOL. Occupy is a peaceful, non-violent "movement"???

I say this as a liberal, the Occupy Wall Street movement is very stupid, it is the Democrat's equivalent of the Tea Party, except worse because they are all young, while most Tea Partiers are a bunch of old farts with their brains in a vegetative state. If most Tea Partiers were able to cause this crap they would. Sort of hard to throw your crap at police cars when you're using a walker.

I am not going to wade into the debate on who is nuttier or more violent in comparing the OWS and Tea Partiers. However, Richardo's comments re: who pays what in income taxes loses sight of the reality that the bottom 90% of taxpayers take in only just over 50% of total income while the top 1% nabs close to 20%. (See http://huff.to/13wIQKx) So if you believe in a progressive system of taxation, then this outcome logically follows. Second, as highlighted in the NYTimes blog post (http://nyti.ms/12YnqoW) from a few years back, when payroll and other taxes are added into the mix the results are decidedly more balanced.

"Although low-income Americans pay little, if any, individual income tax, much of their income does go toward payroll, sales, property and other taxes. When all taxes are considered, most income groups pay taxes that amount to roughly 20 to percent of their income."

Again, if you believe in a progressive system of taxation, this outcome should be a cause for concern.

Ridgewood has always had crime it is just the level of violence and extremism that has gotten worse across the country.

It's not the country it used to be either, I suspect that here in Texas most of those charges wouldn't exist because there are no such crimes. I also doubt he really possessed an "assault weapon" as those are characterized by their mid power cartridges and their ability to fire either fully automatically, burst mode, and a single shot ability, and all the assault rifle clones on the civilian market don't have those capabilities. In fact if you dressed them up in wood they aren't significantly different from many arms used during World War II over 70 years ago. If our government feels threatened by WWII designs perhaps they should consider WHY.

Of course. in the land of the blind the one eye'd man is King, it's just the Pols of New York want to make sure its plain to the citizens that only they can have eyes or teeth. Texans don't suffer ritual defanging on entering our state.

Further what is a "large quantity"? A large quantity to the government could be a gallon of bleach and 5 lbs of complementary chemicals. That could be as much as found in any households cleaning closets, and the rest could be gardening supplies. If the guy had C4 or Claymores that would be an issue, but what EXACTLY they said doesn't add up to "arsenal". Not even close. The other charges may or may not be bogus, but the last three aren't even crimes in most of this nation.

Agree. grew up in ridgewood then moved back. now moved out. tooooo liberal. why can't rwood keep a superintendent or principal...they had enough. so did i. the scholls are living on my generation of families and students. Admin only wants the top students to succeed so salaries stay high. Not all teachers but now most. growing up there in the 70's and 80's we were number 1 or number 2 school in NJ. 2nd usually to princeton west windsor. tops in country. where did it go?? a shame.

Well S. Evans. Nothing personal, but I'm glad I don't live in Texas.

Hmmm.... I'm not aware of an Tea Party violence. I'm also not aware of any Tea Partiers that were discovered with bomb making materials. If you repeat a lie long enough, people do believe it....

There are ZERO instances of Tea Party violence. AND the only racist signs that were help up by people at the Tea Party rallies were held up by left wing plants by orgs like Move On.

Gee, I wonder if any Tea Party members collect guns and explosives in their homes. I wonder if any of them are obsessed with the idea that they have a right to do so based on antiquated amendments about well regulated militias. Probably not. Most of them are tree hugger types. My mistake then.

Yeah, because guns which only fire when the trigger is pressed (and the safety is off) are just as dangerous as volatile chemicals which could explode at any second and take half the block with them.

If you have flour in your pantry and fertilizer in your shed you've got bomb making ingredients.
Tea anyone?

This isn't even a legitamate website. This is the equivelant website of the KKK trying to telling the world that you are a racist.

You have to check your sources. If this was real, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, Fox and others would have really taken them to task.

That appears to be a very reputable website. Think Lisa, it does you wonders.

THAT'S the website you cite? Wow, you must be a 15 y/o girl.

Lisa, aside from the site you reference being vulgar and laced with four-letter words by its authors, it's factually incorrect. Mike Vanderboegh, who they claim was a tea party leader and charged with weapons is neither a tea party leader or charged with anything.

And yet the tea party condones precisely the sort of weapon ownership that is the basis of this article about Roberto Rivera that we are all discussing.

Ridgewood Mom, the Tea Party has never condoned illegally owning weapons. Gun ownership is not even a significant movement within the Tea Party. You remind me of the Congressional Black Caucus who falsely claimed Tea Partiers yelled the "N" word 15 times after the signing of the healthcare bill. Fortunately, multiple audiorecorders at the event and a $100K reward for evidence put the lie to them.

Bill: "the Tea Party has never condoned illegally owning weapons."

The Tea Party has condoned owning weapons and fought to make them not be illegal.

Bill: "Gun ownership is not even a significant movement within the Tea Party."

Please refer to the many links directly to the Tea Party web site that I have provided in the comments section of this article. I would be delighted to hear that gun ownership is not a significant issue for you. I know that you prefer to drink juice at tea party meetings anyway. But gun control is certainly a very significant issue for many prominent and regular tea party members who pronounce so vocally on the tea party web site, at mass public tea party "town" events, on television and in actual political actions.

Here are some of those articles linked down below:
http://www.teapartypatriots.org/2012/08/should-assault-weapons-be-banned/
http://www.teapartypatriots.org/2012/05/whats-a-girl-supposed-to-look-like/

Ridgewood Mom, you keep showing posts from the same site and claiming it's widespread. No, the Tea Party is not about gun ownership as much as you and other detractrors like to claim it. Just as you claim that the Tea Party advocates anarchy because it believes in limited government. You are not interested in an honest debate.

In fact, I keep showing posts from the "tea party's" web site and claiming they represent tea party views.

I did not claim that the Tea Party was "about gun ownership." I agreed with Stacey and others that both the "tea party" and the "occupy" movement represent "head cases" as she put it. Joe then argued it was inappropriate to compare the two organizations, stating that the "tea party" was about lowering taxes and that the "occupy" movement was about anarchy. I correctly pointed out that the tea party, by definition, is more so representative of a move toward anarchy.

My main criticism of the "occupy" movement is that it represents more of an expression of anger without meaningful political mobilization. But if we were to criticize the "occupy" movement for its lack of acceptance of inequality as it sees it, it would make more sense to regard them as statist or something otherwise to the contrary of anarchist.

By definition, anarchy is the antithesis of big government.

My points about the tea party and its views on gun and weapon ownership were clear evidence to this point, and also illustrative of the mistake of correlating both weapon ownership and the notion of anarchy with the "occupy movement." Similarly, it is ludicrous to confuse Roberto Rivera's actions with the motivations and message of the "occupy" movement. "Big government leftists" are usually criticized by persons on the right for wanting to restrict such things as private weapon ownership.

Ridgewood Mom, you've shown one website, TeaPartyPatriots.org, which is by no means Tea Party's central site. The single example of tea party lawbreaking (Mark Meckler) was of a licenced gun owner, although not licenced in the state he was going to, with a gun in a locked box. Doing no violence to anyone. And with that, you paint the Tea Party as head cases. And, no, advocating small government is not akin to anarchy any more than a moderate christian is akin to atheism. But you know this. Again, you arent interested in honest debate.

Nobody will answer questions today. We're trying.

Tea Party has nothing to do with your rant. There is not one verifiable instance of violence with the Tea Party Movement. If there were and crime committed, it would have made national news.

joe raich
bombing and protests at planned parenthood clinics have been around for along time way before any Tea Party. Even as far back in 1994 Massachusetts,

This article is about a man who was arrested for possessing weapons in his basement. Most "occupy" types oppose private ownership of weapons and support such measures as increased gun control. On the other hand, the tea party openly advocates for acceptance of such things. From their web site:

http://www.teapartypatriots.org/2012/08/should-assault-weapons-be-banned/
http://www.teapartypatriots.org/2012/01/nra-is-the-problem/

"Although the Tea Party prefers to concentrate on a three plank platform of Constitutionally Limited Government, Fiscal Responsibility and a Free Market, many Americans are in agreement with the NRA and other 2nd amendment supporters regarding the freedom to defend oneself with a firearm if necessary"

http://www.teapartypatriots.org/2012/05/bank-of-anti-america/
http://www.teapartypatriots.org/2012/05/whats-a-girl-supposed-to-look-like/

And yet there's no tea party members, that im aware of, who have been arrested for illegally having guns or committing any gun violence.

Mark Meckler ring a bell?

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/13/nyregion/tea-party-leader-mark-meckler-pleads-guilty-to-gun-charge.html?_r=0

Again, owning a gun which fires at a single target when the safety is off and trigger is pressed is not the same as owning and improperly storing volatile chemicals that could destroy half the block if a spark went astray.

That's fine RidgewoodResident. But this article is discussing a man who is alleged to have had some sort of chemicals, a gun with ammunition and a stun gun in his basement, and oddly tacks this all of this on to the "occupy" movement based on that man supposedly having had some sort of affiliation that was entirely unrelated to his alleged possessions. And then we are discussing the actual view of the tea party movement regarding such weapons possessions.

Feel free to argue that Roberto Rivera has more radical views on keeping weapons at home then the mainstream of the "tea party" or "occupy" movements. But then understand that the "tea party" mainstream has far more radical views on private weapons ownership then does "occupy," which doesn't even have a stance or anything at all to do with the issue (or sadly, much less of anything else).

Rivera was charged with second degree recklessly creating a risk of widespread injury or damage; fourth degree failure to mitigate against recklessly creating a risk of widespread injury or damage; third degree unlawful possession of a destructive device; fourth degree unlawful possession of a stun gun; fourth degree unlawful possession of a large capacity ammunition magazine; and second degree unlawful possession of an assault firearm.

No one hates Warren Buffett or Bill Gates..

Barney, do you assume that people who are rich or white are good? Do you assume that people who are poor or live in Newark are evil?

I'd like answers as well. To all of the above.

And they will never report it. It is just too easy and too convenient to paint him as some kind of wild-eyed anarchist.

Totally agree. Why not label him "Ridgewood Bomb Doctor." Or how about, the "PSE&G-Took-Too-Long Bomb Doctor." Or maybe the "When-Will-They-Pickup-My-Leaves Bomb Doctor?" Or the "My-Taxes-Are-Too-High Bomb Doctor?" My point is any of these issues could also likely be associated with this guy (and anyone who lives in Ridgewood) and unless the bomb materials can be associated with any of them, it's not accurate to draw that connection so clearly in a headline.

Perhaps it will be shown that this man voted for Obama and he will become dubbed the 'Obama' doctor.

And what idea do you think is stupid? That the country should not be run just for the 1%? That the so-called "job creators" are doing no such thing but are instead parking their money off-shore? That companies are the biggest welfare queens in the country?

They are parking their money off-shore. Exports are down now too. The smart money has no confidence in this country's economic leadership. Our government has treated them with disdain, including the largest corporate tax in the world, and they're leaving. Maybe the OWS can produce jobs. http://professional.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324595904578123593211825394.html?mg=reno64-wsj

What is stupid about OWS? What is so stupid about it is that they are against the foundations of our civilization. Not to mention that it seems to me, having walked by them and, to my misfortune, smelled them, 1/2 of them are professional protestors, 1/4 are freeloaders and 1/4 are rich kids from college getting their tuition made by their parents protesting because its the "cool" thing to do.

Which civilizational foundations are you referring to Ridgewooder?

"The Tea Party is the most violent movement in modern American history." Really? Can you name any of thei violent movements? There have been accusations that have always been found false, like the Congressional Black Caucus claiming that the tea party hurled the "N-word" at them 15 times. Yet none of the many recording devices present picked that up. a $100 reward was offered by a tea party member for any evidence. Still hasnt been claimed. I dont believe there's been a single substantiated event of violence from a tea party activity. They left the D.C rally area cleaner than they found it. The Occupy movement caused millions in damages in NYC alone.

BTW, the good doctor was found with illegal assault rifles and a stun gun.

The Black Panthers, the Weathermen and the KKK, among many more would be insulted that you think the Tea Party is the most violent movement in American History.

I did mean a $100K reward to show evidence to substantiate the Congressional Black Caucus' lies