A Washington Post analysis found that some of the top national tea party groups engaged in this year’s midterm elections have put just a tiny fraction of their money directly into boosting the candidates they’ve endorsed. [snip]
Out of the $37.5 million spent so far by the PACs of six major tea party organizations, less than $7 million has been devoted to directly helping candidates, according to the analysis, which was based on campaign finance data provided by the Sunlight Foundation. (our emphasis)Among the biggest grifters is Jenny Beth Martin, preznit of the Tea Party
Her twin salaries put her on track to make more than $450,000 this year, a dramatic change in lifestyle for the tea party activist, who had filed for bankruptcy in 2008 and then cleaned homes for a period of time to bring in extra money. (our emphasis)While one never likes to see peoples' pockets vacuumed clean by con artists, our sympathy is tempered by the knowledge that the donors would be just as likely to be taken in by your Elmer Gantry du jour, or by investing in Glenn Beck's gold bug schemes. There's always a sucker for every bet.
Also, we would take some comfort in the fact that these tea bagger monies are not going into corrosive campaign ads or capacity-building, as there's already too much of that Koch brothers lucre sloshing around ("free speech!") corrupting politics and bamboozling low-information voters.
Speaking of low-information voters, we would leave you with the thoughts of one tea party contributor, 85-year-old Arlin Ashmead from Idaho, which pretty well sums up the level of sophistication of the sheeple being fleeced:
“Oh, I don’t know,” he said. “Living back here in Idaho, I don’t know too much about what is going on. I hope they’re helping the candidates, too.” (our emphasis)Hope springs eternal, Arlin.
(Photo: Grifter-in-Chief Jenny Beth Martin - T.J. Kirkpatrick/Getty Images)
