Government Workers Take Down the Tea Party

Tuesday, 09 February 2010 16:58 Last Updated on Tuesday, 09 February 2010 20:20 Written by Sheila Kihne

Astro Turf meets Government-Union Tough:

From Fox News:

"This movement is a fad," proclaims TheTeaPartyIsOver.org, which was established by the American Public Policy Center (APPC), a D.C.-based campaign shop that few people have ever heard of.

But a close look reveals the APPC's place in a complex network of money flowing from the mountainous coffers of the country's biggest labor unions into political slush funds for Democratic activists.

....The most recent backers of the Patriot Majority and Patriot Majority West, which helped fund the APPC and thus the Tea Party site, form a veritable Who's Who of the country's top labor unions: the Service Employees International Union, Change to Win, the Communications Workers of America, the National Education Association, the Teamsters Union, the United Food & Commercial Workers Union and others besides.

But by far the largest donations have come from a collection of unionized government workers, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) -- which in 2008 alone donated $5.8 million to Patriot Majority and another $4.1 million to Patriot Majority Midwest.

I blogged about Patriot Majority in 2008 when they were heavily involved in the failure that was the Aswin Madia for U.S. Congress campaign.

Who are they funded by? According to the non-partisan Campaign Legal Center:

Since July, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) has donated almost $5.5 million to three groups: Campaign Money Watch, Patriot Majority and Patriot Majority Midwest.

According to NPR reports that in addition to the $1.2 Million from AFSCME, Patriot Majority received:

$500,000 from the Change to Win labor federation (which is spearheaded by the Service Employees International Union); and $125,000 from the United Food and Commercial Workers union. In 2006, $400,000 from SEIU Local 1199; $250,000 from the Massachusetts Teachers Association; $200,000 from the Democratic Governors Association; $50,000 from Patricia Cornwell of CEI Enterprises.

How do you like that folks? The Union of GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES takes your tax dollars to lobby against a grassroots taxpayer movement. 

And the majority of dimwits in the mainstream media are still totally confused by the Tea Party movement and why people are mad?

I repeat:  Government Unions should be ILLEGAL.  When will brave GOP'ers propose this legislation?  The American taxpayers would be on their side.