Tea party caucus by region: 63%, South; 19% Midwest; 16% West; 2% Northeast

This is not to say that all Southerners are conservatives, or that Dems are to be blamed for what Rethugs do. But the writers ARE saying that Southern conservatives are a different breed of conservatives, and that the tea party movement has its roots in the "radical Southern right."


http://www.salon.com/2011/08/02/lind_tea_party/


Contradicting the mainstream media narrative that the Tea Party is a new populist movement that formed spontaneously in reaction to government bailouts or the Obama administration, the facts show that the Tea Party in Congress is merely the familiar old neo-Confederate Southern right under a new label. The threat of Southern Tea Party representatives and their sidekicks from the Midwest and elsewhere to destroy America’s credit rating unless the federal government agrees to enact Dixie’s economic agenda of preserving defense spending while slashing entitlements is simply the latest act of aggression by the Solid South.

SNIP

In light of this recent history, it is clear that the origins of the debt ceiling crisis are to be sought, not in generic American conservatism, but in idiosyncratic Southern conservatism. The goal, the methods and the passion of the Tea Party in the House are all characteristic of the radical Southern right.

From the earliest years of the American republic, white Southern conservatives when they have lost elections and found themselves in the political minority have sought to extort concession from national majorities by paralyzing or threatening to destroy the United States.

SNIP