Dear Readers: One of my favorite collection of conservatives is excited this morning because Starbuck’s CEO Howard Schultz is supposedly promoting the idea to halt political donations until our representatives have their act together. In fact, they attribute Schultz’s action as some sort of business epiphany: uber-lefty, Obama-supporting Schultz now sees the wisdom of embracing a fiscally responsible smaller government.
I say that there is a darker purpose to this — darker than deep roasted, extra-bold Columbian Supremo beans. The Goddess of Flaming Capitalism is not amused.
Here is the take-home statement from the article announcing this grand Schultz plan: What does that mean? No more political donations — not for anybody.
Schultz wants to make it trendy and cool not to give a damn dime to anyone. I believe the intention is to put a crimp in the grassroots donations that have propelled a number of conservative, Tea Party-oriented representatives into office. Personally, I have donated to Senate and Congressional races in Massachusetts, Delaware, New Mexico, and Arizona — as well as to local propositions and races. I do not plan to stop, and I would like to awaken my conservative friends to this attempt to undermine one of the key approaches we in the “County Class” have been using to go around elites like Schultz.
I can’t say I will personally boycott Starbucks. I don’t much care for their coffee, and I stopped going when I had a bellyful of quasi-socialist pap printed on their cups. I will recommend the coffee at McDonald’s most highly. It is the best coffee short of the Mystic Monk coffee I special order. BONUS — you can push-back on First Lady Michelle Obama’s attempt to demonize McDonald’s with your dollars.
In fact, I am going to make a specific FLAMING CAPITALIST DONATION DIRECTIVE today, and say: Virginia Tea party founder Jamie Radtke for the US SENATE.
Here a link to a podcast from Tammy Bruce, who interviewed Radtke. Tammy, the Shrine’s most favored profit prophet, says:
We know 2012 is going to be a continuation of the Tea Party Revolution we began with the 2010 midterms. One of the more important races will be for Virginia’s US Senate seat, which will be open due to Sen. Jim Webb not running again. Running against big-spending GOP establishment dinosaur George “Macaca” Allen for the GOP nomination is Virginia Tea party founder Jamie Radtke. She’s terrific and exactly the sort of Tea Party Patriot we need running against establishment hacks like Allen.
And just to let Schultz and the rest of his “Ruling Class” know, we are on top of all the key Senate races. Here is a list of races we Tea Party peeps will be following closely –
Democrats/Independents retiring (6 seats)
- Joe Lieberman of Connecticut (Independent)
- Daniel Akaka of Hawaii
- Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico
- Kent Conrad of North Dakota
- Jim Webb of Virginia
- Herb Kohl of Wisconsin
Democrats/Independents seeking re-election (17 seats)
- Dianne Feinstein of California
- Tom Carper of Delaware
- Bill Nelson of Florida
- Ben Cardin of Maryland
- Debbie Stabenow of Michigan
- Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota
- Claire McCaskill of Missouri
- Ben Nelson of Nebraska
- Bob Menendez of New Jersey
- Kirsten Gillibrand of New York
- Sherrod Brown of Ohio
- Bob Casey, Jr. of Pennsylvania
- Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island
- Bernie Sanders of Vermont (Independent)
- Maria Cantwell of Washington
- Joe Manchin of West Virginia
I am sure there will be a few GOP seats that we will be working on, too, during the primary season. (Yes, Orrin, I do mean you). The SLOBs wil be triaging these races at the next Beer Summit, and dividing this group up so that the important campaigns get the needed grassroots attention. As Boxer won re-election in California, and I don’t see the state Republican Party making any significant strides toward competence or competitiveness, I will be urging my California Tea Party peeps to contribute to the purple/maroon area races in which their money can make a difference.
I will shortly be creating a new blogroll entry: Flaming Capitalist Donation Recommendations. Besides Radtke, Carl DeMaio for Mayor is the other current entry. There will likely be more.
It is obvious to anyone with eyes that Team Obama’s support is collapsing. GOP politicos are rapidly expediting 2016 plans up to 2012, in light of this fact. We citizens need to stay engaged in the primary process, as well as contribute to key Senate, Congressional, and local races to ensure the “Country Class” views on smaller, fiscally-restrained governance is supported.
Meanwhile, Starbucks and Schultz can kiss my Tea Party Posterior.
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George Allen would be crippled by the Democrats the first time he tried to play at being fiscal conservative. His debt ceiling and spending votes, his earmarks and subsidies(especially ethanol: Democrats will blame him for rising corn prices and world hunger), and his refusal to help Republican Sen. Hagel regulate Freddie & Fannie.
We need to go with a true conservative like Jamie Radtke. She has the strength and conviction to hold on to her core fiscal conservative values.
Jamie Radtke will fight for Virginians and Americans. George Allen fought for himself and was voted out of office because of it. George Allen doesn’t deserve a 2nd chance to ruin things.
Britt: Thanks for stopping by and giving us additional insight into an important race in the 2012 election. Please keep us posted, as the primary season will be a critical one for Tea Party peeps!
I do not know why my fellow conservatives are so down on President Obama. He voted against the debt ceiling as a U.S. Senator and that means he is a fellow “Tea Party terrorist”…doesn’t it?
Hooray for Mystic Monk coffee!
Define irony: I can’t choke down a McDonald’s burger but they do indeed have outstanding coffee.
Nice insight, Leslie. Figures this pseudo-populist Coffee party stunt would originate from those cafe’ Marxists at Starbuck’s.
Are you really concerned that a missive from Starbucks will affect the dittoheads that give to conservative candidates? It sounds to me more like blue-on-blue fratricide.
Today’s San Diego Union-Tribune has an article, “Issa Comes out fighting against New York Times.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/aug/20/issa-comes-out-fighting-against-the-times/
The NYT published a hit piece (not referenced here) on the Congressman who chairs the committee that is probing the “Fast & Furious” gunrunning fiasco, and the piece has some errors that should have been easily and routinely avoided. Earlier in the week, the U-T had published a letter from a reader who found the article online, and chided the U-T for failing to publish the original, erroneous article.
This week also, the Dallas Morning News also responded to a series of incorrect factual assertions made by Education Secretary Arne Duncan, which slandered the Texas school system.
http://dallasmorningviewsblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2011/08/robert-scott-fi.html
We should encourage our regional news sources to respond to inaccurate “news” stories.
These two articles are important to people in this state, because there are people in this state struggling with the current budget crisis, who are being told that the only rational way to preserve California’s favorable class size is to pass tax rate increases, that tax rate increases are needed to save public education in California.
They have been told that 1) Issa is corrupt and 2) the Texas budget process has resulted only in increased numbers of low-paid jobs (untrue – see this article at political math http://www.politicalmathblog.com/?p=1590) and ruination of the school system (also untrue).
I ask the readers here to write to the U-T and to encourage them to fact-check articles they receive early and often.
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