Actually, I'm married to a Libertarian who supports the Free State movement. For what it's worth, she's very supportive of Ron Paul.

Richie, I didn't have time to check all of your links - I was referring to Figmo's post.

You wonder why I seem so passionate about this? Well, there are two reasons.

1) It's a hot topic - so the coversation is going to be there. It's not like we're talking about older topics like Welfare Reform.

2) It's the double standard. I think I can easily say that's my biggest red-hot button as far as my personality goes in the debating arena.

A few a-holes crash the Tea Party rallies and everyone implores them not to be judged by them. Fair enough. There are plenty of Tea Party supporters around here (NH) that don't fit that mold so I have positive reinforcement of my perception that the Tea Party is NOT a haven of racist dorks - no matter what certain news organizations might want you to perceive.

A few incidents happen at Occupy sites. The more I dig into them, the more it appears that the problems come from, among other thing, homeless crashing the party - much like the LaRouchies crashing the Tea Party rallies.

A few of these get violent. Consider the numbers though. The THOUSANDS of worldwide protests and the WEEKS that they went on. I'm not disparaging the Tea Party rallies when I say that they were there and gone the same day. I'm just stating a fact to highlight a difference. Let me reiterate, I find nothing wrong with a one-day Tea Party rally. It's the message that's important, after all.

So now the news media is starting to demonize the Occupy movement. (Does that sound familiar to any Tea Party supporters?) People call them unemployed, even though they're not. They call them Communists, even though they're not (ok, 2 in Boston and, I would imagine, a similar insignificant percentage nationwide looking to piggyback on the anti-corrupt-covernment, anti-bank, anti-lobbyist sentiment)

I see this kind of demonization over and over again. I saw it when the liberals tried to dehumanize President Bush. "Trained Monkey" was a common insult that I took offense to. But, again, it was to dehumanize someone. To make them seem less than human so that it was ok to disparage them.

It happens today in the media. It's a time-honored tradition that goes back to the beginning of history. Convince people that their 'enemy' isn't "really human" - or in this case "A real American" and you justify all kinds of crap-flinging at your target.

Richie, I promise you that I'll get to YOUR links - it just might not be until tomorrow.