Chicago, IL – What’s an Orthodox Jew doing with the tea party?” It’s a question I often confront, though I’ve never been asked it by fellow Republicans, or anyone involved in the tea party itself.
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The questions typically come from folks who have bought the line that the tea party is an extremist cult—a Ku Klux Klan rally “without robes and hoods,” in the words of Rep. Steve Cohen (D., Tenn.).
Here’s my story. When I learned that my representative in Congress, Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D., Ill.), had called the tea parties “shameful” and “despicable” merely for protesting the stimulus bill, I suspected that the lady doth protest too much.
At around the same time that Ms. Schakowsky made these comments, I had a confrontation with Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass.) at Harvard University. “How much responsibility, if any, do you have for the financial crisis?” I asked him at an event, prompting an angry response.
The confrontation became a YouTube hit, and people back home encouraged me to challenge Ms. Schakowsky. I decided to do so after attending her health-care town hall last August, where organizers paid by a group called Health Care for America Now were brought in to suppress questions.
From the start of my campaign, I’ve encountered many tea party activists. Two of the first people I met ran into me at a café in Washington, D.C. Walter and Joanne Jones are from Illinois; they had come to town for the big tea party rally on September 12. Mr. Jones had just retired from his job as manager at an electronics factory and had become politically active for the first time.
I caught up with Mr. Jones again last month. “When we decided to go to Washington,” he recalled, “it was about the spending. After we went to Washington, it’s also about the control that the Democrats are trying to put on the American people right now.” He added that he was angry that Congress had ended a successful school voucher program in Washington, D.C. “Those are the kinds of things that drive me nuts,” he said.
Mr. Jones is like many of the tea party people I have met since then—not opposed to the government as such, but against a political establishment that is determined to expand its control and limit the choices of ordinary people.
In the past several months, I’ve met other tea party activists in Illinois, people like Denise Cattoni, a mortgage broker who started paying attention to politics when the markets crashed in September 2008. “I spent October through February trying to keep people in their homes,” she recalls. “They came up with the TARP funds and it didn’t help anyone. The banks never helped homeowners, and they still haven’t to this day.”
Ms. Cattoni organized local opposition to the Obama administration’s attempt to transfer terror detainees from Guantánamo to Thomson, Ill. A majority of Illinois residents oppose the transfer, but there has been no formal attempt to stop it other than these kinds of grass-roots efforts.
Then there is Caitlin Huxley, a member of the Log Cabin Republicans who found a new outlet in the tea party movement. “As a fully ‘out’ lesbian, I was a little worried about whether I’d be accepted,” she told me. “But everywhere I went, I was nothing but welcome,” she said.
I’ve been endorsed by the tea party, and I’ve seen nothing to substantiate the allegations of racism or homophobia—quite the opposite. It brings people together who feel their votes have been silenced by their elected representatives. The tea party has been met, on occasion, with violence, and it faces the condescension of the political class. Yet it continues to grow and win the support of Americans from all walks of life.
Those wishing to understand the tea party should revisit Alexis de Tocqueville. He observed of citizens in a democracy: “They love change, but they dread revolutions.”
The American people voted for change in 2008, and they will do so again in 2010. The first tea party started a revolution; the second tea party is determined to end one.
Mr. Pollak is the GOP congressional nominee in the 9th district of Illinois.
The tea party is a fascist network. They want to repeal the health care bill. Appearantly they do not wish to help pay for a program that will improve the health and welfare of many human beings. These people are unhappy because they wont be able to buy as many gumballs with their earnings!
Good for you…if I could move just to vote for you I would. But I suspect you’re too gentle to get elected. You need to toughen up & be more specific when you talk about issues & people like Frank…what exactly was his angry response?
Tea Party people ARE ordinary folks who are worried about the way the country is going. We want to protect the Constitution & provide opportunities for all; “all” meaning LEGAL RESIDENTS. Congress/Democrat/Marxist politicians are afraid, that’s why they are so violent, vehement, & corrupt. They’ll do anything to stay in power. Now let’s hear from Charlie Hall, who blindly supports anything Pelosi & Obama say & do. He is in for a real shock come November.
Pollak seems oblivious to the white racists and anti-semitim who have found a fig leaf of respectability under the broad umbrella of “teabagers”. While a small number in percentage terms, they are a real threat that Pollak seems to feel he can ignore. He is a well-meaning yid who seems to be frustrated with the establishment but ignores the reality of those whose company he keeps.
Nothing in his bio indicates he is frum. Why do people like to claim they’re Orthodox when they’re not (e.g., Sacha Baron Cohen)?
All of this rhetoric. We are eventually heading towards Libertarianism. Drastically reduced taxes, shrunken government, civil liberties strengthened and all of the stupid party positions of extremism on both sides tossed out.
Where have you heard about ANY antisemitism quotes from the Tea Party? The liberal media attends every one of the rallies and would report anything. They would be on it like a fly to garbage if there was one utternace of anti semitism. When will you Yidden WAKE UP and realize that conservatives, republicans and evangelical X-stians are our best friends, and that the left harbors a deep deep hatred for Jews, Israel, and Hashem.
I just gave Joel’s campaign “chai” dollars, I encourage every single Yid on this website to do the same!
WAKE UP!
I gave up on the tea party.. Im joining the pizza party anyone want to join??
#1 - You are a cool aid drinking democrat. I am a doctor-and since that bill has passed there has been unimaginable changes to how we have to treat patients and it is not because the bill is fully in swing yet-rather the insurance companies are already changing their tune to reflect the entire bill. Otherwise known as expect Great Britain healthcare eventually-which means you go home to die if you are over 75 and have even a mild pre existing condition. So, for all you democrat lovers; better make some money to pay me, becasue I ain’t working for free (doing that already for many of you with insurance!!).
Tea Party or not; this bill stinks.
#1 : Look up the meaning of “Fascist” before you spew. It’s the democrats that want the government to control all industry (healthcare, cars, oil, banks, etc.).
#4: There are plenty of racists and antisemites of all colors in both parties. What’s important is that he wants to limit government interference in our lives and get rid of the corrupt left-wingers who are running things right now.
#5: Although he was educated at Solomon Schechter, he davens at an Orthodox shul and can be clearly seen wearing a yarmulka in many of the pictures on his website.
The left wing liberal nuts refer to Republicans as “fascists”, “KKK” “hate mongers”, etc. Now that many formerly non political Americans got together to “save America” from itself the liberals are panicking because the Tea Party is a threat to them. It is also a threat to some Republicans too. The Tea Party is a threat to any politician who lies, a Republican who votes like a liberal Demorat or a Demorat who votes like a Socialist. Most Tea Party activists just want America to be the way it was before Obama tore up the Constitution. G-d Bless America.
Post #1 and Post #4 are one and the same person(s).
Personally, I believe that all blogs with a certain amount of traffic are monitored by the Democratic machine or by the White House itself.
It’s all about propaganda and counter-propaganda. The moment any right wing or conservative leaning story is posted you will find within the first 3 or 4 posts clearly left-wing comments which seek to influence the minds of the uniformed and the lazy.
It sad because it is effective.
It slimy because it’s an opinion presented as facts.
Palosi and The president and wright, these are all good people?!?!?! I invite the Tea Party! Stupid liberals are worse hiding behind a facade of human Rights!
Not that it makes a difference, but to answer some previous posters, I am from Chicago and I can tell you that Joel Pollack is frum.
Join the Jewish Tea Party
Go, Yoel, GO!
Let’s repeal the bill before it’s too late.
While I applaud his ambition in jumping into the race, and I certainly hope he is as conservative as he seems to be, he needs to run away from these tea partiers.
The tea party certainly entertains its share of racists and antisemites, although no more than the extreme left does.
The problem is the idiocy and ignorance of most of the tea partiers who know NOTHING about government, believe everything that Alaskan bimbo tells them (no matter how much of it is PROVEN to be lies), and get all their information from ENTERTAINERS who LIE and LIE OFTEN, instead of actually compiling FACTS. Don’t get me wrong, the hard left is just as bad, if not worse.
I once saw a poster that read “none of us is as dumb as all of us”. It certainly holds true with most of the tea partiers I know. They know nothing about government (as proven by demands that Obama FIRE Helen Thomas), they know very little about the law, and know nothing of our history as a nation other than what Glen Beck tells them in order to make silly comparisons to Hitler.
I hope he truly believes what he says he believes. I also hope he finds his way to TRUE Conservatism, the way William F. Buckley laid it out for us.
The most blatant Anti-Semitism comes these days from Leftists, Liberals. Orthodox Jews are very matching to belong with the Conservative Party, we believe in G-D, Family Values, Small Government, Lower Taxes, Strong Military, Stand with Israel etc.
I’m not sure what you mean that “nobody is denying…” There are several posters above that think that if the dry cleaning clerk dosent have insurance, well thats just too bad. She should get educated and get a real job! Or maybe her spending priorities arent right! Or.. its not the goverments responsibility to do the safety net thing anyway, so tough! None of these, dare I call them viewpoints, show, IMHO, the kind of maturity it takes to fix, or at least improve, real social problems for millions and millions of real people. So, while you and I might debatethe most effective methods (leave it up to the states? that would change what exactly?) , there really *are* many who poo-poo the whole issue. Many of them, nebich, belong to the Tea Party.
I live in Mr. Pollak’s district. There is absolutely no way I would vote for someone who wants to roll back the progress thats been made. I dont care how frum he is or where he davens.