A German Tea Party?

The success of the Tea Party movement in the US has caught the attention of right-wing pundits and politicians in Europe.  In addition, the success of Geert Wilders and the Freedom Party in the Netherlands has breathed life into populist movements across the continent.  Will the Tea Party carry its momentum across the Atlantic? Daniel Hannen, UK journalist and politician, writes in the Telegraph that "All the elements are in place for a European tea party".  Dieter Stein, managing editor of the neo-fascist weekly Junge Freiheit pleads on the front page of this week's issue "Für eine deutsche Tea Party" that would be to the right of the CDU.  The same issue contains an interview with Friedrich-Wilhelm Siebeke who believes that the conditions are ripe in Germany for a right-wing populist movement, or even a new party on the right.  All that's missing is a charismatic leader:

Und der Zünder kann nur ein charismatischer Politiker sein, ein Populist wie Jean-Marie Le Pen in Frankreich oder einst Jörg Haider in Österreich und bald vielleicht Geert Wilders in den Niederlanden. Es gibt einige Beispiele dafür, daß Parteien durch charismatische Persönlichkeiten ganz entscheidend bewegt wurden. (We need a charismatic politician to light the fuse, a populist like Jean-Marie Le Pen in France or like the late Joerg Haider in Austria, and soon perhaps Geert Wilders in the Netherlands. There are several examples of how parties were decisively invigorated by charismatic personalities.)

The magazine Jungle World believes that the German Tea Party already has its charismatic politician: Guido Westerwelle. 

Wie kommt Guido Westerwelle auf all diese glänzenden Ideen? Ich vermute, er hat sie den US-Republikanern geklaut. Sarah Palin scheint sein großes Vorbild zu sein, nicht nur im Hinblick auf außenpolitische Inkompetenz. Die Strategie ist simpel. Obwohl man selbst zum Establishment gehört, tut man so, als kämpfe man gegen das Establishment, gegen eine Übermacht von „Sozialisten“, die der „schweigenden Mehrheit“ alles wegnehmen wollen. Die rechten Republikaner schwatzen derzeit gar nicht so viel über Gott, sie reden lieber über Geld. Westerwelle würde sicher gerne so etwas wie die Tea Party Patriots  organisieren...

(How does Guido Westerwelle come up with all of these brilliant ideas?  My guess is that he stole them from the Republicans in the US. Sarah Palin seems to be his great model, and not just in terms of her incompetence in foreign policy.  The strategy is simple.  Even though you yourself belong to the establishment, act like you're fighting against the establishment, against the arrogance of the "socialists" who want to take everything away from "the silent majority."  The right-wing Republicans no longer talk so much about God, now they talk about money.  Westerwelle would very much like to organize something like the Tea Party Patriots. ) 

Westerwelle and his right-wing friends had better hurry to get a German Tea Party off the ground or else they might face opposition from a new grass-root movement - The Coffee Party.  See Amerikas Capuccino-Linke macht mobil. 

Comments

[hattie]

LOL! Coffee Party! I'm going to open a branch! I have an espresso machine. Why not?

[Dan]

HI,

The early years of the Cold War saw the United States facing a hostile Soviet Union, the "loss" of China to communism, and war in Korea. In this politically charged atmosphere, fears of Communist influence over American institutions spread easily.

On February 9, 1950, Joseph McCarthy, a Republican senator from Wisconsin, claimed that he had a list of 205 State Department employees who were Communists.

I wonder if Joe was about 60 years to early? How many "Socialist Commie" Czars are in the WH in 2010? Go Figure....

Peace!
Dan
http://josephmccarthy.org