NPR and the Tea Party

I was listening to NPR this morning on the way to the dentist (aargh! Needed distraction--I feel like I've been living in that office lately). Two members of the Tea Party were debating. I didn't hear where the gentleman was from, but he said the Tea Party is based on the values of our forefathers--right to life, freedom of religion, marriage between a man and a woman, all the Christian far right values. The woman, who is from Waco, Texas, and I think the founder of the Tea Party movement there, made much more sense: she said they don't concern themselves with social issues, because the Tea Party is about economics. We wouldn't, she said, expect the NRA to take up the anti-abortion cause, and her Tea Party doesn't take it up either. The other day I heard commentators discussing the movement, also on NPR, and one wondered why they didn't just form a separate political party. The answer was that they feel they already have a party: the GOP. While some one pointed out that it's time for change in Washington--the same people keep getting elected and get set in their ways and their opinions (to my mind a valid point)--another suggested that it's not the established politicians who are liable to be defeated this fall--it's those who have only been in Congress for one or two terms. And then someone commented that if a number of Tea Party candidates are elected, as seems likely from the primaries the other night, Congress will find itself with a whole lot of newcomers who don't kow how things work, don't even know where the restrooms are in the capitol. If that happens, he predicted, it will be hard for Mitch McConnell to control and manage his caucus. All of this makes me think it should be interesting times ahead in our national government. Meantime, I'm worrying about state and local government and grateful that the city balanced the budget without closing three threatened libraries in "poverty areas." Since my mentor and good friend Fred lives near one of those libraries and uses it frequently, I asked if he wanted to consider moving, and he assured me not.
I think I inherited this interest in politics from my dad, who always voted for the best man, but the best man, as far as I know, always turned out to be a Democrat, and I was raised with real reverence for FDR. I remember when I was quite young playing outside the house and seeing a woman jump out of a car and yell, "Hooray! Roosevelt is dead." I rushed in the house to tell my mother, and she said something like, "Hush! Don't you talk that way!"
From the serious to the mundane: my brother and his wife called tonight. Cindy said she was on her third attempt to make mayonnaise and had I ever done it. I said I tried and failed, and my advice was that Hellman's low-fat with olive oil is really good and she should buy some. John got on the phone, thanked me for my non-help, and as we chatted he said Cindy reported that the mayo was thickening up but didn't have much flavor. I suggested lemon, and John said he'd add white pepper. I'm all for from-scratch cooking, but there are times when it's easier to buy it.
"Scuse me, I have to go bone a chicken now.