White House Cheat Sheet: Of Tax Day and Tea Parties

Chris Cillizza
WashPost

Conservatives across the country are hoping to grab the national spotlight away from President Obama for at least a day by holding tea parties across the country today to signal their displeasure with the government spending put in place in the early days of the Obama administration.

The tea parties, which grew from an on-air tirade from CNBC's Rick Santelli earlier this year, are being cast by national Republicans as the first signs of a rebirth of a conservative movement that has been sorely lacking in recent elections.

"This outpouring of citizen energy is like Perot activists in 1992," said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich who will speak at a tea party in New York City today. "It is not automatically pro-Republican but it is intensely anti leftwing Democrat."

National Republican Congressional Committee executive director Guy Harrison sent a message to the organization's email list on Tuesday urging attendance at a tea party: "Thousands of Americans will gather to protest oppressive government taxation, and stand as one for fiscal sanity at tea parties across the nation," stated the missive.

(More here.)