Rare.us | This is exactly what we elected the Tea Party to do | Rare Rare.us What's all this empty nonsense about the Tea Party being dead? Actually, I've weighed calling in the mortician several times myself, given how indifferent ... |
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This is exactly what we elected the Tea Party to do | Rare - Rare.us
MANKATO The leader of the tea party movement in south-central Minnesotawould like to see a little tolerance and patience from the political left toward their still-new president.
"We're in a divided country, but I'm hopeful," said Mankato attorney Andrew Johnson. "And I hope people give Trump a chance to demonstrate what he's capable of."
Johnson, who was heavily involved in the formation of the tea party movement locally and statewide, sees Donald Trump's victory as a culmination of that movement. While the organization hasn't been as active in recent years, the tea party's philosophy was still alive in the minds of supporters.
"The tea party mentality helped elect Trump as president," said Johnson, adding that the New York real estate developer deserves high marks for his efforts since Nov. 8. "I am impressed with his diligence prior to being sworn in and up to now. ... I suspect with his energy level, he's going to do a lot of things."
The rise of grass-roots organizing in opposition to Trump has been compared to the emergence of the tea party in the weeks after the federal government takeover by the Democrats in the 2008 election. Johnson, though, thinks opposition to Trump has been more radical and less tolerant than the tea party movement.
"The reactionary attitude, to me, is beyond the constitutional parameters of free speech," he said. "... I don't recall seeing any tea party mentality or reaction as offensive as I've seen reported now where they don't tolerate opposing viewpoints."
Attempting to maintain a focus on core principles is a challenge for any grass-roots movement, and it was sometimes difficult for the tea party. For Johnson, those principles could be boiled down to limited government, fiscal responsibility and support of free enterprise, but the movement also attracted social conservatives focused on opposition to abortion or gay marriage.
"I would listen to them and acknowledge them no matter what the viewpoint," he said. But then the former Blue Earth County commissioner would attempt to steer the message back to the group's basic beliefs.
Maintaining enthusiasm also was a challenge, something he blames partly on the tea party's portrayal by the media. After an energetic first couple of years, the local tea party's public activities were mainly centered around meetings featuring conservative speakers.
Johnson doesn't appear worried that the Indivisible movement or other left-leaning groups will grow to the size and strength of the tea party during its zenith in 2009 and 2010. Average Americans were attracted to the tea party, and Johnson thinks most will be repelled by the Trump opposition groups.
"I don't think the left is making a decent impression on the American public," he said.
These days Johnson's duties as a tea party leader are minimal. He participates in occasional webinars and periodically passes along an item of interest through the group's local email list.
"So we're still sort of active, but on a more subtle basis," he said. "But I don't think the tea party is gone. As demonstrated by our last election, a tea party mentality is still around."
And if the progressive version of the tea party becomes more publicly energetic in opposing Trump's agenda, Johnson said he might be inclined to try to call the former troops back to duty.
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Tea party leader hopes Trump opponents will give president a chance - Mankato Free Press
Senior Citizens' News: Pittston Adult Center tea party is March 27 The Sunday Dispatch An afternoon tea party will be held at 1 p.m. Monday, April 24. There will be a Volunteer Special Dinner and Program Thursday, April 27. Volunteers who assist with at least 12 hours per month this past year will be honored. There will be no bowling ... |
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Senior Citizens' News: Pittston Adult Center tea party is March 27 - The Sunday Dispatch
Denis Voronenkov, who'd been a Communist member of Russia's lower legislative house before he left, was fatally shot outside a hotel in broad daylight, officials said.
Voronenkov becomes the latest in a string of Russian critics of President Vladimir Putin and the Russian government who were killed or injured in mysterious circumstances.
The suspect in his death died in the hospital after a shootout with Voronenkov's bodyguard.
Poroshenko's accusation drew a sharp rebuke from Moscow. Any claims that Russia is connected to the killing are "absurd," Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, according to Russian state-run TASS news agency.
Details about the shooting weren't immediately released. CNN video shows investigators standing over the bloodied body of Voronenkov, lying face-up on a Kiev sidewalk near the Premier Palace hotel.
The suspect was wounded and taken to a hospital where he later died, Kiev police Chief Andriy Krischenko said.
Details about the suspect's identity and who injured him weren't available. No motive for the attack was immediately known.
Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuri Lutsenko said Voronenkov had given "extremely important testimony" to Ukraine's military prosecutors.
Voronenkov's killing was "a demonstrative execution of a witness," Lutsenko said.
Voronenkov and his wife, former Russian lawmaker Maria Maksakova, sharply criticized Putin after they left Russia for Ukraine in October.
Voronenkov also alleged that although he was recorded as having voted for the annexation in Russia's Duma, the vote was cast against his will. He was not at parliament that day, and another legislator used Voronenkov's card to vote for him, he told Radio Free Europe.
The day after that interview, Peskov, Putin's spokesman, denied Voronenkov's claim.
Voronenkov said he thought his criticisms led Russian authorities to charge him in absentia with fraud in February, Radio Free Europe reported. He called the charges "fake" and "political," the report said.
Voronenkov said he'd become a Ukrainian citizen. While he was a Communist Party member, his wife had belonged to the ruling United Russia party.
Yanukovych was Ukraine's President when, in 2013, he suspended talks on what was to be a landmark political and trade deal with the European Union. Russia had opposed Ukraine forming closer ties with the European Union.
Tens of thousands of pro-Western protesters rallied in Kiev against Yanukovych's decision, and in February 2014, a gunfight between protesters and police left dozens dead. Yanukovych soon fled, eventually for Russia, as his guards abandoned the presidential compound.
Russia's parliament signed off on Putin's request to send military forces into Crimea the next month. An uprising by pro-Russian rebels in the eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk ensued, a conflict that has left thousands of people dead and injured.
"I told (prosecutors) some details of what was going on. And I will give testimony in open court in the course of judicial inquiry held in Ukraine," Voronenkov told Radio Free Europe.
Voronenkov is one of several Kremlin critics to die or be injured in mysterious circumstances.
Five suspects have been on trial in Moscow since October, with one accused of accepting cash to kill him. All have pleaded not guilty.
Putin blamed extremists and protesters who he said were trying to stir internal strife in Russia. But people close to Nemtsov have expressed concern that he was killed because of his opposition to the government.
It was the second time in two years Kara-Murza fell into a coma after a suspected poisoning.
In 2013, Russian businessman Boris Berezovsky was found dead inside his house in Britain with a noose around his neck. His falling-out with the Russian government had left him self-exiled in the United Kingdom.
A coroner's officer said it couldn't say whether Berezovsky killed himself. That year, Putin said he could not rule out that foreign secret services had a role in Berezovsky's death, but he added that there was no evidence of this.
In July 2009, human rights activist Natalya Estemirova was kidnapped outside her home in the Russian republic of Chechnya and found shot to death in a neighboring republic the same day. She had spent years investigating human rights abuses in Chechnya.
The head of the group Estemirova worked for, Memorial, accused the Kremlin-backed Chechen leadership of ordering her killing. Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov denied involvement in her death, calling it a "monstrous crime" that was carried out to discredit his government.
In 2006, Anna Politkovskaya, a journalist critical of Russia's war in Chechnya, was gunned down at the entrance to her Moscow apartment.
The Kremlin has staunchly denied accusations that it or its agents are targeting political opponents or had anything to do with the deaths.
Journalist Victoria Butenko reported from Ukraine, and CNN's Jason Hanna wrote in Atlanta. CNN's Antonia Mortensen, Nick Thompson, Alanne Orjoux, Holly Yan and Catherine E. Shoichet contributed to this report.
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Putin critic Denis Voronenkov dead: Ukraine's leader calls ...
By Staff The Associated Press
Ukrainian officials say one person is dead and around 20,000 people have been evacuated in the Kharkiv region near the border with Russia after a massive fire at a military ammunition depot.
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Ukraines chief military prosecutor, Anatolii Matios, said on Facebook that the blaze, which erupted early Thursday at the depot in Balaklia, was sparked by an act of sabotage.
The body of the 66-year old woman was found in a house that had been hit by a shell in a town near the depot in Balaklia, Ukraines State Emergency Service minister Mykola Chechetkin told lawmakers Friday.
Local reports also said a 54-year-old woman was injured after being struck in the head with shrapnel
Ukraines Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman has flown to the area to monitor the blaze, which is still continuing, but its intensity had lessened.
Ukrainian officials have accused Russian or separatist saboteurs of causing the fire with the aid of a drone. Separatists deny the claim and say it likely was caused by what they call Ukrainian military incompetence.
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The arsenal holds large-calibre artillery rounds and is one of Ukraines largest.
Kharkiv lies just north of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, where Ukrainian troops have been fighting Russia-backed separatists. The conflict has killed more than 9,800 since April 2014.
-With files from Global News.
2017The Associated Press
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One dead after explosion at Ukraine ammunition depot forces evacuation of 20000 people - Globalnews.ca