"It's not what we oppose," explained Rockland County Tea Party organizer Anthony Mele. "It's what we are for."
Despite the Palisades Center not allowing the Rally for America to gather at the Nanuet mall, Rockland County was host to a well received "Blueprint for Change" on President's Day.
A few hundred well-intetended citizens held what organizers call a civic conference at the Comfort Inn in Nanuet.
Mele and others, including former Congressman Joe DioGuardi, explained that people are worried about over-taxing, over-spending and government over-reaching into their lives.
Moderated by a group called Conserveality, the day included panel discussions on grass-roots planning, galvanizing the voters, how to become more politically active in the coming elections with campaigns -- and joining political parties as committee members/district leaders.
Above is the welcome video that started the conference and below are some clips from the entire conference.
The conference had only one flashpoint. Some discussion of social conservative issues in a news story one week prior to the conference prompted this letter to the editor by Joseph DiToma of Pearl River in the local Gannett newspaper disagreeing with a Rockland lawmaker.
The comments of Rockland County Legislator Frank Sparaco that "many are concerned about gay marriage and abortion" is precisely the kind of comment that is meant to cause division in an otherwise noble cause ...
... Gay marriage, abortion, etc., these are not our concern. Our concern is to take back our government, abolish the 16th and 17th amendments and reinstate the Constitution as our basis of law. We cannot allow ourselves to be distracted from our quest ...
Tea party groups appear divided on more than just the social issues, including territorial fights and resistance to endorsing any candidate (or getting involved in any political party). However, today's conference in Rockland had no revealed controversies or disagreements. Much like the Founding Fathers they tend to emulate, this is not a one size fits all movement -- nor are these true patriots afraid of dissent.
We (Tea Partiers) don't need to explain it to those who cannot or will not get "it". It doesn't matter if you understand "it" or not. We do.
It is a movement of thought and there isn't a way to "divide" us. We all can agree on three "over" issues and we all agree that that is enough.
Over taxing, over spending and over reaching.
The rest we will work out after we re-take our government back. And I promise you we will.
Don't believe me? You don't get "it" then. Sorry.
Posted by: Rob Griffith | Tuesday, February 16, 2010 at 12:12 PM
Great event, check out the news release feature: http://www.officialwire.com/main.php?action=posted_news&rid=99436
Posted by: Jeremy Sellis | Friday, February 19, 2010 at 11:08 AM