“The Tea Party is better understood as a reactionary conservative force.”

“The Tea Party is better understood as a reactionary conservative force.”

University of Washington political scientist Christopher Parker, a co-author of Change They Can’t Believe In: The Tea Party and Reactionary Politics in America:

"In our survey research, a list experiment also revealed how Tea Party conservatives think differently than other conservatives.  We randomly divided survey respondents into two groups and asked them how many of a list of statements — but not which statements — they agreed with.  The only thing that differed across the two groups was whether the list of statements included the proposition that “Obama is destroying the country.” The results showed a striking divergence: 71 percent of Tea-Party conservatives agreed with this statement but six percent of non-Tea Party conservatives did."  (Emphasis mine)

"We also explored the roots of identification with the Tea Party.  We found that, even after controlling a host of factors — including ideology and attitudes toward African-Americans — Tea Party identifiers were more common among those believing that Obama actively promotes socialism.  This again suggests motives more akin to reactionary conservatism."

Once again, we see the identification against a devil (Obama) as the primary basis of Tea Party membership and movement.  Parker calls them "reactionary".  We call them fanatical.  I'm going to tentatively suggest that being fanatical and being reactionary are not exactly the same.  In a fanactical group there is a specific rhetorical devil.  This is not necessarily the case in a reactionary movement.  Fanatical movements are motivated by fear - not necessarily so a reactionary m0vement.  This is a tentative conclusion - I'm still thinking about it...