My official apology to the Tea Party

After careful consideration, and too much time spent arguing with the dregs of the Drudge Report, I have decided I owe the Tea Party and its thousands of mouth-breathing members an apology after all. In fact, I owe them several apologies. But probably not the ones they're looking for. Here goes.

Dear Tea Party:

I'm sorry you seem to lack a sense of humor. Because you are a source of great amusement to the rest of us.

I'm sorry you feel the US Constitution is under attack, even though most of you have never read it, those of you who have read it don't seem to understand it, and the rest of you have trouble spelling the word "Constitution."

I'm sorry all you Real Americans have to put up with all us Fake Americans, even though our ancestors all came here from the same places at more or less the same times and we all do more or less the same things every day. That must be really irritating to you.

I'm sorry you may have to vote for a black guy after all. Lucky for you he's even a more of a reactionary bigot than many of you. Just pretend he's another white guy wearing blackface, it will go down easier.

I'm sorry Sarah's not running. That would be really fun to watch. And then just really sad.

I'm sorry the Mexicans want to flood our borders and steal all those high-paying jobs busing tables, picking lettuce, cleaning houses and mowing lawns. I'm sorry you don't get the chance to do all of those fun things.

I'm sorry you missed the parts in American History class about how the founding fathers did not actually end slavery or that Paul Revere warned the colonists, not the British. Also that bit in the Constitution about no state imposed religions. Facts just suck sometimes, don't they?

I'm sorry Wal-Mart is forced to pay minimum wage. People should be paying them just for the privilege of working there. I'm sure if your guy wins he'll find a way to kill the minimum wage. I understand slavery is making a big comeback.

I'm sorry there's no spellchecker for protest placards.

I'm sorry that 47% of Americans are too poor to pay Federal Income Tax. If they were really smart and ambitious they'd be too rich to pay Federal Income Tax.

I'm sorry the rich have to pay any taxes at all. I'm sure if your guy gets elected next time they'll take care of that.

I'm sorry for Welfare, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and every other government program that keeps the poor, the sick, and the elderly off the street. Because that's what America needs more than anything -- streets full of poor sick old people.

I'm sorry God loves only you. On the other hand, think how overcrowded Heaven would be if all of us got to go.

I'm sorry that if Jesus were on earth today He'd take one look at you and run screaming in the opposite direction. Hey, you did ask What would Jesus do?, didn't you? I can't lie about Jesus.

I'm sorry Obama's long-form birth certificate isn't long enough or formal

enough for you. Maybe they make an extra long extra formal one.

I'm really really sorry about Donald Trump's hair. It must be embarrassing for you to be on the same side with someone whose head looks like an orangutan's ass.

I'm sorry the streets are filled with angry protestors who hate America, employing the same tactics (and Constitutional rights) as angry protestors who love America, because aside from the lack of grammatical errors on their signs it's kind of hard to tell the difference.

I'm sorry we elected a Socialist Muslim Nigerian as president. I'm even sorrier some of you truly believe that.

I'm sorry Joe McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover aren't still around. They'd be proud of you. The rest of us? Not so much.

Dear Tea Party: Please die.

It appears I have angered and upset the Tea Party. Heaven forfend.

It turns out you don’t have to do very much to piss off the teabaggers. All you need to do is make a stupid joke at their expense to have your inbox, blog comments fields, and Tweetstream filled with mindless hate and misspelled vitriol.

A few days ago I posted a blog entry on ITworld (later picked up by PCworld) about Facebook and its phonebook. Here’s what I wrote:

You know how it goes on Facebook – somebody you don’t know asks to be your friend, you look over their friends list, decide they probably aren’t an axe murderer or a Tea Party member, and you say Yes, because Facebook is a fairly low risk, low maintenance connection. And if they prove to be truly annoying you can always block or defriend them later.

Not exactly Jon Stewart, I admit. But hey, if anybody deserves to be treated like buffoons …. And it’s my Facebook profile; I do reject people who look like crazy-ass conservatives, just as I am sure the crazies run screaming from me.

That apparently was enough to incite a very tsk-tsk story from Newsbusters’ Ken Shepherd, as well as a copycat piece from The Examiner’s Joe Newby (yes, seriously). And of course, the usual howling from the teabag chorus. It must have been a slow news day in Wingnutville.

So I apologized via Twitter thusly:

“ok, I apologize. to the axe murderers. you tea party guys need to develop a sense of humor. but I doubt it will happen."

Some of the Tea Party faithful were inspired enough to try and leave a comment on my business blog and contacted me via my Twitter page. Here’s a representative sampling:

First up: John S. Murphy:

Nice, insulting those of us that read your publications but don't agree with your politics. There are other options so I guess I won't have to read your screed in the future.

By the way, aren't you just a bit old to have an avatar?

A fairly typical response: I don’t agree with your politics, so now I will never read you again. Nice open mind you got there, Johnny. Also: If you’re looking at my avatar, how the frak do you know how old I am?

It gets uglier. Now we have one Jeffrey D. Davis. He writes:

Go fuck yourself you buttfucked faggot. A useful idiot who infests the democRAT trailer park such as yourself wouldn't make a wart on a Tea Partier's ass.

Dear Jeff: Given your raging homophobia, I’ll bet you’ve seen way more warty Tea Party ass than I have. Just a guess.

Now Philip James:

Hey, I feel the same way about people like you.... you are slightly obnoxious and self-important... which is apparently what you think about Tea Party people... amazes me how narcissistic liberals like you can be, to the point of appearing really stupid and ignorant.

So, just to be clear: You feel the same way I do about people like me, which means you must also be really obnoxious, self-important, narcissistic, stupid and ignorant. Did I miss anything?

One brave Teabagger used no name and a fake gmail address to offer this:

Wonder if Tynan the Obamabot would have lumped Obama in with the axe murderers? Your hypocrisy reeks, just like your articles...

Yes, but my breath is still minty fresh, thanks to these ObamaMints I’ve planted under my ObamaTongue.

Jerry Goodwin had this to say

For years,k I received emails from PC World, daily and weekly. As a member of the TEA PARTY I hereby unsubscribe from these articles.
You have no respect for the TEA PARTY members, I have no respect for you nor PC World. GOODBYE!

We’ll miss you Jerry. Don’t forget to take your teeth with you when you go.

On Twitter, JerseyRight tweets:

@tynan_on_tech excellent on tech privacy, idiotic on politics bad choice of forum. Not renewing 2 gift renewals now as a result.

So I guess I shouldn’t be expecting anything from you at Christmas, eh? I was kinda hoping for an autographed picture of Snooki.

SaucyChica, who quite accurately describes herself as a “foul-mouthed conservative bitch,” tweets:

Stick to writing about gadgets you leftist limp dick. Why are all you homosexuals so catty?

Because all people who hate the Tea Party must be gay (us and that Jeffrey D. Davis guy). Damn, you discovered our secret. So much for those plans of world domination, followed by world redecorating.

Some creature calling itself BarneyFrankenbama (Twitter description: “America, F#@K Yeah!”) had this lovely contribution:

Dan Tynan loves watching k***** p*** on his computer. See how this works? Not fun anymore is it? #developasenseofhumor 

Here’s a FAQ on US libel statutes. See how these work?

RevDrEBuzz (whose Twitter page exclaims: “I wear great slacks and dacron shirts, chicks are always interested in me, and what I have to offer them, even beyond conversation”) required three separate tweets to fully vent his spleen …

"you tea partiers" You liberals need to learn that it's not nice to be such a whiny douchebag, of Olbermannian proportions.

sense of humor...yes, like liberals such as yourself have about Obama...RACIST! you scream...spare me, douche.

it is putzes like you, effete douches, who have demolished California. Hows it feel to be such a braindead liberal?

Yes, it’s true, I single handedly demolished California (not the recently retired Republican governator), even though I live and work 3000 miles away. I am that powerful. But thanks for the tip about those Dacron shirts – I bet they really drive the chicks wild.

What are all these people so pissed off about, exactly? Oh right – losing in 2008. And maybe, just maybe, having a black/liberal* man as president.

Small government, fiscal responsibility, and respect for the Constitution? I have no problem with any of that. And if these folks were out there four, six, eight years ago howling about the growth of government, massive deficits, and the complete subversion of the Constitution in favor of the executive branch, I might have some respect for them.

But they weren’t. Because that’s not what this is about. This is about using irrationality and rage as a political weapon. Because I had the temerity to make a small joke, they directed the firehose at me. That’s ok, I can take it.

And please, TPers, don’t read anything I write ever again. That’ll show me.

* Liberalness not guaranteed.

PS: To the anonymous Teabaggers who've been contacting my editors and trying to get me fired, stop acting like cowards and address me directly.