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As we launch this fund-raising effort today, on May 10th, 2013, it is 240 years to the day since the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, the unjust tax on the American colonies that was the proverbial "straw that broke the camel's back" for the colonists, and led to the American Revolution.
In response, Americas FIRST progressive organization, The Sons of Liberty, met in secret at the Green Dragon tavern on Union Street in Boston to plan a show of defiance in protest. From there they rode to Boston Harbor where, disguised as Mohawk indians, they boarded 3 docked ships the Eleanor, the Dartmouth, and the Beaver, all owned by Britain's East India Company, the company whose lobbying of Parliament led to the Stamp Act on the product they most monopolized, tea. And from the decks of the Dartmouth, the Beaver, and the Eleanor, they hurled the cargo of tea into the sea, before riding back to the Green Dragon to celebrate, raise a glass of beer, and many a toast to liberty!
Our name, "The Beer Party" is a tribute to those heroes of the American revolution, who hurled the hated tea into the sea before bending their elbows to down a frosty draught beer for democracy. It's a reminder of just how wrong headed the so called Tea Party is.
"Taxophobic, Xenophobic, Homophobic schmoes..."
More than 2 centuries later, American liberty is once again threatened by a cabal of the greedy and corrupt, by corporate lobbying, by classism and racism. A new group calling itself the Tea Party has arisen, but they are not progressives. They are an afront to the history they pretend to salute. Backed by billionaires with a fascist agenda, they are a coalition of the brainless and the brainwashed, the clueless led by the corrupt. Their goal, it is increasingly clear, is nothing short of undoing all the progress of American history. To undo the progress of the past in favor of a fascist future where they, the wealthy, are all powerful. To destroy democracy, silencing the people, and thus ending the fairness the people demand, replacing it with an austere, authoritarian approach to government.
BUT WE MUST REMEMBER THAT IT WAS LIBERALS, PROGRESSIVES LIKE US THAT MADE AMERICA GREAT!
As "The West Wing" pointed out years ago, liberals & progressives not only founded this nation, we made it great, as we are the ones always striving toward that more perfect union, against conservative opposition all the way.
http://youtu.be/zTFp7WG9J-E
We who stand against them are the heirs of the progressive tradition that won the freedom of the American people, and built this country into the great nation it has become. And yet, using the old ploy of projection, they claim we are the communists, the socialists, conjuring up images in the imagination of the gullible of gulags and iron curtains. Meanwhile, they are the ones who build secret "black site" prisons, and hold people without due process. They are the ones who start wars to steal resources & claim they are expanding democracy abroad, even as they stifle it at home. They are the ones who torture and kill on the presumption of guilt, and consider coerced confessions to be proof of that guilt. It is they who seek to silence our speech, to violate our vote, to pulverize our privacy. It is they who decry "death panels" even as they push to leave the elderly to languish in poverty, and the sick languish in agony, until the only mercy for either is death.
WE MUST FIGHT THEM!
"Ordinary folk, no brother's Koch, no backroom dealing!"
Those were the words famed political satirist Roy Zimmerman chose to describe us in his song "The Beer Party Anthem" (a tribute to the Beer Party, which we've adopted as our official anthem).
http://youtu.be/8eknuukdPr4
It's very true, we don't have any backing from the Koch brothers, or any other rich benefactors. Since we started 3 years ago, we've been taking the fight to the Tea Party on pure grassroots power... and now we're ready to take it to the next level!
'Taking it to the next level' means taking on some new projects to expand our ability to fight the tea party extremists. It also means taking some legal steps, and some expenses to cover...
We need to pay some legal and filing fees, so that we can set up a non-profit corporation and our own PAC. That way, future donations can be tax deductible, and we'll be able to legally donate to progressive candidates.
Why is this so important? Lately, it's become clear that the Tea-publican agenda goes way beyond just class war. It's about much more than just dismantling the progress of the last century or so. It's about dismantling our democracy, our liberty.
http://youtu.be/Irqj87lNL9E
As John Stewart recently pointed out on the Daily Show, it's begun to seem that the Bill of Rights is under attack, and EVERY right guaranteed to the American People is currently under assault! And that means they're not only after the progressive accomplishments of the last 100 or so years of American history, they're after the progressive accomplishments of ALL of American history!
HELP US FIGHT THEM!
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