It's the Constitution, stupid: What the Tea Partiers really want

From Ron Futrell at Big Journalism:

... Saturday on CNN, Don Lemon had political consultant David Gergen on and they wrestled over whether the movement was racist because they only saw one black person in the crowd at the Sarah Palin speech before the Tea Party Convention. They should’ve invited Kenneth Gladney on the show and asked him. Gladney was the man who was smacked around by SEIU thugs at a Tea Party rally in St. Louis. The activist old media doesn’t know Gladney’s story because he’s a conservative minority Tea Party participant and they don’t want that story. I met Gladney at a Tea Party rally in Las Vegas and found him to be a fine man with a fascinating story. I bought a couple flags from him that I proudly hang in my office. The activist old media might want to ask him what this movement is about – warning – be prepared, he will give you the right answer, but it will not be the answer you want to hear. I know, I asked him.

With that, let me tell you what the Tea Party movement wants. I will make it simple and straightforward and easy for all to understand — I will put it in all CAPS and type slowly:

THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT WANTS AMERICA TO RETURN TO CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLES.

There it is. I said it, one simple sentence.

The Democrats and its activist old media want to find “leaders” for the Tea Party movement. They feel that the only worthwhile political movement must have direction from a man (or woman—but mainly men). They saw the movements led by Stalin, Hitler and Mussolini and feel that there must be a dynamic personality for people to follow in order for it to be significant. That same game plan was followed in the 2008 presidential election: find a dynamic leader who fits with the values of larger, more intrusive government, and follow him.

They also want a “leader” of the Tea Party movement so that they can destroy that person. ...

Read it here. The political classes and their media lackeys have been desperately trying to discredit the Tea Party movement. Key to that strategy is identifying and destroying its leaders. Once those leaders are identified, will anyone be surprised if SWAT teams of "investigative reporters" are deployed to rummage though their trash in hopes of finding some salacious detail around which to wrap a campaign of disinformation and deceit to destroy that person and his or her family? If you doubt that will be the old time media approach, just ask Sarah Palin.

The key to the Tea Party's resiliency will be its ability to remain distributed, hydra-like -- cut off one head and two will take its place. Centralization in this case will likely be a death sentence to the movement, because centralization is susceptible to an effective decapitation strategy. Distributed organizational structures, with elements capable of autonomous action towards their strategic objectives, have an innate resiliency to this type of attack.