Tea Party family feud

Tea Party movement members seem more interested in fighting each other lately than battling our communist president. There’s a “First National Tea Party Convention” next month in Nashville that’s raised more than a few eyebrows, as well as the wrath of many other tea party fans.

First of all, the convention is charging people $549 to attend the event, to be held at a swank hotel — an odd move for a group that celebrates ordinary grassroots Americans. FreedomWorks, the nonprofit group led by former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, which launched the Tea Party movement, isn’t attending the convention, saying through a spokesman, “”We would strongly oppose any person or organization becoming the movement.”

In addition, The Tea Party Patriots, another Tea Party faction, is irked that the Tea Party Express — which is strongly tied to a Republican consulting firm – is attending the convention. The Patriots, though, don’t mind working with FreedomWorks, which is backed by billionaires Steve Forbes and Richard Scaife as well as ExxonMobil.

Meanwhile, the convention organizers, affiliated with the Federation for American Immigration Reform, have announced that the convention will be closed to the press, specifically speeches by Rep. Michele Bachman and new FoxNews commentator Sarah Palin. Admission to Palin’s speech, by the way, will be an extra $349. RNC Chairman Michael Steele will also be attending, along with a number of Republican members of Congress — which has led some Tea Partiers to complain that the GOP is trying to co-opt “the movement.” We all saw the ill temper and whining at last year’s Tea Party events on Tax Day, but now you have to wonder if these guys can get along with anybody.

This article appears in Jan 12-18, 2010.