Okay...tax protesters?  "Tea Parties?"

Give.  Me.  A.  Break.

Who are these rich suburban white soccer moms that are 'unrepresented' in our government?  Who are these shallow, ignorant, and banal Fox News zombies that actually believe there is anything in the least about American life in 2009 that is in any way comparable to the life of the Colonists in the 18th century?  Perhaps more importantly, why are they 'protesting' - and I use that word loosely, as it generally implies there's something worthwhile to bitch about - this president, after letting the previous administration make a complete mockery of the American Ideal?

What is it that you people want?  A private parking space on Capitol Hill?  A personal assistant to submit bills for you while your elected REPRESENTATIVE reads them into the record?  Where were you when American's of middle-eastern or even hispanic descent were being harassed by...well, YOU?  What representation don't you have?  

Let's get something straight, mouth-breathers:  there is a very large and very important difference between 'no representation' and 'your ideas suck hard and are shunned by logic and clear thinking.'  No, you won't have 'representation' to keep gays from getting married (well, you actually DO, but you shouldn't) because your rights do not include the right to prevent People Not Like You from enjoying the same rights, freedoms, and privileges you do.  No, you won't have 'representation' to lower your tax bill so you can afford to strut around playing 'patriot' because you've got a Chinese-made US flag covered in Korean-made paint and slapped on a magnet made of iron mined in Russia on the side of your european-built SUC...er, SUV that burns billions of US dollars a year in middle-eastern oil.  No, you won't have 'representation' to help you continue to live a life of willful ignorance and active reality denial just so you can have a movie theater in your basement and an exercise room and a media room and a sun room and an extra bedroom where you can carry on a polite suburban affair with the pool boy without leaving extramarital wet spots on the wedding bed.  No, you won't have 'representation' to ensure your precious little spawn can carry around a five hundred dollar cell phone and mail pictures of her crotch to her friends, so you can then (rightfully) bitch about the abusrdity of it being a crime for a human being to see a photo of another human being's genitals when that photo was taken and distributed willfullly.  No, you will not have 'representation' to protect you from the inevitable results of your own avarice, selfishness, greed, and self-absorption.  You will not have 'representation' to ensure you get a good parking spot at the mall, you will not have 'representation' to ensure that the tax code remains convoluted and broken such that only those with enough money to hire specialist accountants to cook your books and find loopholes can get away without paying taxes.

You are a collection of whining, petulant, selfish, ignorant, crybabies; the very worst this country has to offer, the embodiment of What Doesn't Work About Democracy.  I'm sitting here wishing I could MAKE enough to even HAVE to pay taxes most years, and you're bitching because 200 thousand or 500 thousand or a million dollars a year isn't enough for you, that the 'big bad gubmint' is taking away your 'hard-earned' money?  Bitch, please.  Most of you knuckle-draggers aren't competent to operate an etch-a-sketch, and the very fact that you are employed at all is a scathing indictment of our entire system.  I've seen you for years, sandbagging and ass-dragging your way through the carrot chase, sucking down a few score thousand a year for sitting on your useless ass and doing as close to nothing as you can manage.  Some of you even OWN businesses, because you stole ideas or screwed partners who trusted you, and now you screw your employees with crap wages for doing the real work while making sure that you've always got enough to keep yourself rolling in hookers and blow, and keep up with the good ol' boys.

The hookers, now, they lack representation.  I lack representation.  My people - the artists, creators, musicians, thinkers, philosophers, changers, dreamers - we lack representation.  If we didn't, I can assure you that your lives would be very, very different...and mostly in positive ways, although you're collectively ignorant and bigoted and self-righteous enough to not understand that, or even care, unless it means you can personally make money from it.  Where's the 'representation' argument for the homeless, for the returning soldiers with mental health or physical issues who are lost in a broken and underfunded support system?  Where's the representation for the abused kids who have such apathetic parents and communities that they don't even have the tools to recognize that they're being abused?  Where's the representation for a lonely girl in Portage, Michigan, whose parents are so detached and filled with denial that they have no idea she's booting smack out of dirty needles in their basement while they're off collecting 'Citizen Of The Year' awards?  Where's her representation?  Where's the representation for the thousands of gay teenagers who commit suicide every years because their ignorant, horrible parents are so hateful and bigoted that they leave their kids convinced that if they came out, their parents would hate and abandon them?  Where's the representation for the gay man who has no legal right to visit his lover while he lays dying in a hospital, just because they're gay?  Where's the representation for the guy who just wants to smoke a little grass, have a little vegatable garden, and stay the hell away from you idiots?  Where's the representation for the native americans forced off their land and lied to for decades or even centuries by a government acting in YOUR interests, representing YOU, leaving them trapped in a cycle of poverty, self-loathing, and mental health issues?

Where were your protests when our former president lied his evil ass off to start an unjustified war while deliberately ignoring, and allowing to thrive, the radical nutjobs who inflicted 9-11 on us?  Where are your protests when we have the highest percentage of population incarcerated in all the western world - most of them minorities?  Where were your protests when Dick Cheney implied in one sentence during the VP debates in 04 that Iraq and al-Qaeda were inextricably linked, and five minutes later claimed that he never said such a thing?  Where were your protests when the execrable PATRIOT Act, which made confetti out of most of the Bill of Rights, was gleefully shredded by the previous administration?  

Oh, that's right, you didn't protest those things because hey, who cares if a couple of 'fags' can't get married, who cares if some black guy spends the rest of his life in jail over a quarter-ounce of weed, who cares if the government is listening to your phone conversations or reading your e-mail or LYING TO YOU FOR PROFIT?  As long as you've got your Escalade and a pool, what's the problem, right?  Hey, if you don't break the law, you won't have anything to worry about, right?

Of course, there have been times and places when 'breaking the law' meant things like 'voting if you were female,' or 'being jewish or gay or romani' or 'criticizing the government,' but in our smug complacency - which 9-11 ultimately didn't do a damn thing to change - those things don't matter, because hey, I'm not female, I'm not jewish, I'm not gay, I'm not a gypsy, and I'm not criti...whoops.

People need to get a sense of perspective and lose their sense of entitlement.  No democratic government owes it to anyone to oppress anyone else.  No democratic government owes it's people bread and circuses, and the current financial crisis in this country and around the world is a direct result of the ignorant belief that so long as "I get mine," the world is saved.

When just one of you idiots does a couple of decades in prison for a crime you didn't commit, gets harassed by the police for being black or having long hair or being female or just not 'looking like' you can afford the car you're driving, then maybe we've got something to talk about.  When one of you is prevented from inheriting your spouse's estate because the government says your love is not as good as someone else's, when one of you serves time for ingesting a naturally-occurring, unprocessed, easily-maintained substance that happens to give you a buzz and does no other documented harm to anyone...then maybe you've got a bitch.  Until then, get back in your Escalade, drive to the nearest Starschmuk's, and have a skinny fat mocha loca venti tall short latte with a biscotti at $6 a cup and a side order of shut the hell up.  You make me sick.

EDIT: In response to the insipid remarks offered in response to the article at this page, I have offered the following response, edited here for typos and to complete some thoughts.:

Oyyyyy.

First, the idea that these leash-led media children have anything in common with the tax protests of the 18th century is ludicrous, insulting, and ethically bankrupt.

Second, the demonization of words like "liberal" and "socialist" is merely a less offensive demonstration of the classic right-wing position in this country:  "You ain't from around here, are ya boy?"

Third, NOBODY who claims to support the same Republican party who gave us George W. Bush has the slightest credibility in attacking Obama's intellect.  You twits elected a guy who set science policy based on his religious beliefs AND DID THE SAME WITH FOREIGN POLICY, and you're complaining about anyone's intellect?  Sorry, I try to avoid the now-cliche attacks on Bush, but let's get real - the Insane Clown Posse have more intellect than George W. Bush...and that is emphatically NOT a positive comment on the intellect of ICP.

Fourth, the "fair tax" as it is so cynically called is a pure scam, relying on stoking the indignation of the of the credulous for the profit of their corporate masters.  There's nothing 'fair' - and certainly nothing 'grass roots' or 'little guy' - about it.  The guy who invented this scam is a billionaire.  Do your friggin research.

Fifth, there is no value on either side in these insipid, ridiculous 'witticisms' like "lieberal" and 'conservatard.'  It's lazy and ignorant, and belies, again, the "You ain't from around here, are ya boy" mentality.  I don't care which 'side' it's coming from, it's stupid, reflects poorly on the speaker, and has no place in an intelligent discussion.

Sixth, flaming a typo is the last refuge of a man with no meritorious argument.

To continue - The "some of my best friends are handicapped" argument from Kantbelieveit is meaningless.  I could care less if there were people in wheelchairs, in uniforms, or in frocks at these stupid and insulting 'tea parties,' all that proves is that people in wheelchairs, uniforms, and frocks can be self-serving credulous idiots too.

Speaking as one who has organized and participated in anti-government rallies from Iraq I to warrantless wiretapping, from legalizing marijuana to allowing homosexuals the same basic rights as everyone else has, I have this message for the 'tea party' crowd:

You are not 'without representation,' however in any democratic process there is the potential that a selfish, bigoted idea will not pass.  I'm not particularly interested in either affluent white suburbanites who care more about the size of their television than about the quality of the lives of their fellow human beings attempting to lecture anyone on ethics in government.  This is not a tax protest against big government - that's just the smoke you're blowing up your own tailpipes so you can sleep at night, and fortunately for your sleep you are as capable of believing your own lies as you are those of platform-enabled twits like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh.  

This is a selfish and self-serving protest against your loss of affluence - a loss that YOU have created and enabled by allowing your petty avarice, selfish and obnoxious interest in the sex lives and personal habits of others, and mostly the religions you so loudly lean on when you need a crutch in an argument and so completely fail to live up to in any way, shape, or form, to supplant logic and critical thinking skills in regards to what constitutes good government.

We have indeed become a nation of whiners.  Gimmegimmegimme, but make sure the gay lady or the black guy or the native american fella or the public school student don't get mine.  Make sure there are no potholes to disturb me as I parade around in my faux-patriotism, with my US flag made in china, magnetized by Russian iron, painted in a third-world sweatshop, and pasted on the side of my european or japanese-made SUV that sucks down 50 or 60 gallons of middle-eastern oil per hour, but you'd better not even think about asking me to pay for that maintenance.  Make sure that everyone has the right to speak their minds, so long as they agree with me and don't offend my religious or personal 'beliefs,' which are in most cases no more 'beliefs' than the 'belief' that "you ain't from around here, are ya boy?"

And yes, the war in Iraq was and still is a lie.  No immediate US security need was met or resolved by removing Saddam Hussein from power; there was no immediate threat, and there was and remains no evidence of any building threat from the Hussein government.  That doesn't mean I think he was a nice guy, or even that I'm not glad he's gone, but it does mean that I refuse to allow my government to get away with lying to me, even if I like the results.

You want to protest something?  Protest the trillion-plus dollars spent on a smoke-and-mirrors war in Iraq, while the real perpetrators of 9-11 and the twisted ideology behind it run free.  Protest the 4,000+ US lives wasted in Iraq to perpetrate a shell game on YOU.  

Protest the "leaders" - on BOTH sides - who allowed the banking and financial industries to become deregulated, thereby removing the safeguards that helped prevent the current situation from happening for 70 some-odd years.  

Protest the disgusting hypocrisy displayed by these thumb-twiddling idiots who for eight years have been screaming 'love it or leave it' and 'we must not allow the president to be criticised,' only to do a 180 the minute 'the president' "ain't from around here, are ya boy?"

But most of all, look in the mirror and protest yourselves, folks, because *you have allowed these things to happen*, and in your selfish, self-righteous, and pathetic co-opting of a meaningful and justified chapter of American history, all you are doing is working your hardest to ensure it happens again, and again, and again.

Remember, America:  the bruises just mean he loves you.