Hijacking of US government by the Republicans' Tea Party

Karen Hatter

The United States of America was created with three check and balance components which are meant to allow governing of the country through the representative process.

The country is governed by its citizens voting for representatives that in turn vote in favour of their constituents' interests within the US Congress, which is comprised of two branches, the House of Representatives and the Senate. The third component is the office of the President of the United States.

In July 2010, a House committee approved Minnesota Republican Party Representative Michele Bachmann's request to form the Tea Party Caucus. She is currently seeking her party's nomination for the office of President of the United States in 2012.

The US nation and the world were first introduced to the Tea Party, the right-wing of the Republican Party in the spring 2009 during the faux outrage over attempts to reform health care and the insurance industry - the faux outrage having been orchestrated by conservatives and the Republican Party, at town hall meetings across the country.

Since then, those calling themselves the Tea Party have been cultivated and organised by conservative money from those like the billionaire Koch brothers, Dick Armey, the creator of FreedomWorks, the insurance industry and other conservative corporate interests.

The Tea Party freshmen, elected into Congress in the House of Representatives in the fall of November 2010, taking office in January 2011, and those TEA Party leaning freshmen, are said to be less than 90 in number. They have held the US hostage and caused great concern in the world's financial markets, as they pushed their Right Wing minority view of how and what should be done by the US government.

The House of Representatives, one third of the United States' governing process, currently has 435 members with two vacancies, 193 Democrats and 240 Republicans. The Tea Party Caucus and Tea Party leaning freshmen, all Republican Party members, are about 20 per cent of the entire House of Representatives and less than 50 per cent of the Republican Party, actually 33 per cent of the Republican Party in the House.

Yet, the Republican Party has allowed the Tea Party to dictate how and what the Republican Party would negotiate during the Republican Party generated crisis involving raising the debt ceiling.

As long as the Tea Party has assumed control of the Republican Party, the American people will continue to be held hostage.

The Republican Party allows the Tea Party to control their party, as the Republican Tea Party uses tyranny to force the US government to give in to their demands while proclaiming loudly how much the Tea Party despises tyranny.

Well, it seems the Tea Party only hates tyranny if it isn't wielded by the Tea Party.

*Karen Hatter is the producer, host and social commentator of Inside the Eye of the Storm, aired daily on Internet radio AKERU! Global Network, formerly AKERU! NU Afrakan Network,www.akeruradio.com. Karen is also guest editor at NowPublic.com.