• I’m busy today so notify me asap when NAACP renders verdict: are liberty-loving, equality-respecting patriots racist? Bated breath, waiting …
• Sarah Palin • Tweeting about the anticipated move by the NAACP to denounce the Modern Tea Party Movement* for “explicitly racist behavior.” Not often we say this, but … Palin’s right. Yo, NAACP, what happened to setting the example instead of playing angry reactionary? You guys are a pretty effective weapon in the war on racism, but if you’re using it to play politics, it will not work out for you. It seems as pathetic as boycotting a greeting card that sounds like something it obviously isn’t. source

* – After a little soul-searching and some feedback from fellow readers, we’ve chosen to revert back to referring to the Tea Party Movement as such, leaving “bizarro hippies” as a part of our past and adding the word “Modern” in front of “Tea Party,” which should get around the problem that the name creates – that it disregards and usurps the memory of the original Boston Tea Party. Let’s admit it. It was intended as a lighthearted joke but some readers didn’t take it that way.

• Transcript of this clip: I’m Rick Barber and I’m trying to get on MSNBC so Rachel Maddow will make fun of me. Then, people will vote for me in this runoff election, despite the fact that three other Alabama candidates tried similar tactics and lost. See the founding fathers? See me ripping out their souls with my stare? Vote for me! source

• Lots of potential, but many Americans aren’t convinced. The new ABC News/Washington Post poll on bizarro hippies (not to be confused with the similar New York Times/CBS News poll a few weeks ago) suggests that the party has a lot of opportunity to grow their base, but could find themselves ticking off moderates in the process.

• 2% of Americans are directly a part of the bizarro hippie movement

Would you vote for these guys?

• 15% of registered voters are more apt to
  support a bizarro hippie candidate
  running for Congress (9 percent
  “much more likely”)
• 24% are more apt to oppose
  that candidate because they’re
  a bizarro hippie (17 percent “much more likely”)

Do you like what you hear?

• 34% like bizarro hippies the more
  they hear about them
• 43% hate bizarro hippies the more
  they hear about them

• » The neutral problem: There’s a large sub-section of the population that’s fairly neutral to the bizarro hippies – around 44 percent – and 45 percent of them really REALLY grow to dislike them the more they hear about them.

Understanding their constituients

• Bizarro hippies may be a movement built out of republican weakness. While progressives largely stand behind the Democratic party, Republicans on the other hand have trouble getting their political equals under the same tent, according to the study:

• 86% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning indie kids say the party represents their values
• 56% of Republicans and Republican-leaning indie kids say the same thing about their party
• 29% of Republicans would much rather wear a funny hat and tape tea bags to the rim of it

Who doesn’t like Obama? Bizarro hippies

• 84% of bizarro hippies think Obama is lamesauce

• 87% of bizarro hippies say race is not a reason that the support the movement
• 57% of evil socialists think race is a huge reason why bizarro hippies hang out and party together

• » Other notes: Bizarro hippies think that race is less of a problem in this country than the country at large, but they also tend to be more likely to be white. 81 percent of bizarro hippies are white, versus 74 percent of all adults and 65 percent of people who think bizarro hippies are lamesauce. Just as many bizarro hippies think Obama is doing too much for black people as he is not doing quite enough, which matches the population at large. source

• Back in 1997, when Montana was letting after-school program kids drink alcohol and Syrus was hitting on their parents, The Real World (Season 6, Boston) featured a champion lumberjack amongst its cast members. Now, Sean Duffy‘s long been married to fellow conservative Rachel (Season 3, San Francisco), he’s a longstanding district attorney in his home state of Wisconsin, and he’s giving longstanding Democratic Congressman David Obey fits. Plus, he has bizarro hippie support. A Real World congressman? Hey, at least it wasn’t Puck (Season 3, San Francisco). source

• Geraldo nearly killed Bizarro Hippie Express chairman Mark Williams was on Fox News’ “Geraldo at Large” talking about extremism in the movement, except in reality, he was on the air to rail on Geraldo Rivera (he even calls him out for his yellow journalism!). Mike Huckabee looks like an unfortunate bystander to this trainwreck.
• 
  Clinton on extremism Earlier this weekend, Bill Clinton said some stuff about extremism that suggested another Timothy McVeigh could come out of the bizarro hippie movement. It drew a lot of scorn from the right. This clarification during ABC’s “This Week” makes his position sound entirely reasonable.
• colbert on fact-checking We love this clip for three reasons: First, it name-checks journalism smart guy Jay Rosen (one of our smart people we love reading on our iPad); second, it makes a reasonable suggestion for fact-checking Sunday shows; and third, it holds David Gregory’s feet to the fire for not doing so.

• My feeling was, heck, if staging public gripe fests gives these people something to do, then great. It’s outside. It involves handicrafts, the making of signs and costumes. It’s like Scouting for irked middle-aged white people.
• Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg • In an often-hilarious takedown of the bizarro hippies. The article, written after he went to the Chicago Tax Day Bizarro Hippie Fest, notes that he attempted to talk to multiple people at the event only to see the protesters run away from him. He started conversations with phrases such as, “I’ve used tinfoil hats as metaphor, but I’ve never seen anyone actually wearing one …”, and later compared the bizarro hippie movement to the anti-interventionist America First movement around the time of World War II. As you might guess, the comment thread on this article is best to be avoided. source

• The people spoke, and they spoke loudly, and boy, did I hear from them this week.
• Florida Gov. Charlie Crist • On his move to veto a Republican-backed education bill which would tie teachers’ pay to their performance. The move was controversial on all sides of the aisle – the GOP strongly stood behind the bill, while teachers werelargely against it. Even some bizarro hippies didn’t like it. The decision is raising speculation that our boy Charlie will run as an independent in the gubernatorial election, where he has a genuine shot of winning against bizarro hippie-endorsed Marco Rubio (who’s leading Crist handily in the Republican primary) and Democrat Kendrick Meek. source

• We’d love to beat Nancy Pelosi in San Francisco but she’s too strong. We try to keep our focus on the doable.
• Bizarro Hippie Express strategist Sal Russo • Regarding their plans to attempt to knock Democrats out of office this year. They have claimed some victories (sorta) in the form of the retirements of Chris Dodd and Bart Stupak (claims which are kinda questionable) and the party switch of Arlen Specter. The grassroots political movement is in D.C. today because it’s Tax Day and they want to make a big deal out of that day. Their best reason why should be this, but isn’t. source

• Who are the real bizarro hippies, anyway? In December, just after the election that will prove whether or not the movement actually has steam, different strains of Florida hippies will find themselves in a courtroom debating if anyone has ownership of the the name. After lawyer Fred O’Neal registered the name for a political party, it became a big issue, especially after he and his partner Doug Guetzloe started strong-arming fellow groups not to use the name. Those fighting against O’Neal and Guetzloe claim they aren’t “real” bizarro hippies. Do they have tests for this? source

• 18% of Americans support
  the bizarro hippies source

• one Bizarro hippies are largely older, white, male and wealthier than your average Americans.
• two They largely describe themselves as “very conservative” and think Obama is “very liberal.”
• three They by and large feel that Obama’s policies favor the poor more than anyone else. source