STEAMING MAD

An irritating recent example of your leftward bias was the article (“Mad as hell and coming to a street corner – or voting booth near you,” Aug. 12-18) which described the [Monterey County] Tea Party demonstrators in coded bias, that they are “mostly white and prosperous,” as if that made them somehow hypocritical and less worthy. (Any person who shares the values of the TP is welcome!)

As one who has stood at some Tea Parties, I can tell you that I have never heard a single individual complain about their own situation or demand a new program or benefit. To the extent that we are prosperous, we earned it through honest work, self-discipline and deferral of gratification.

There is a great deal more to be said about the direction we are being pushed, but this will have to suffice for the first round. We of the Tea Party are united in our love of country, freedom, and self-reliance. -Thomas McCord | Salinas

TOO SOFT ON TEA PARTY

Your recent piece on the Tea Party movement failed to give an accurate picture of the movement’s makeup or the extremist views held by many of its members. The consensus from national polls is that Tea Party supporters, in general, hold views that are far outside the mainstream on issues such as abortion, climate change, equal rights for gays and lesbians and health care reform. In addition, the polling data suggests that explicit racist sentiment is more common among Tea Party supporters than among other Americans. According to a recent Gallup poll, “Tea Party supporters are decidedly Republican and conservative in their leanings.” The CBS News/New York Times poll, the Pew Research poll and the Winston Group poll all reached similar conclusions. The Tea Party is simply the most extreme conservative wing of the Republican Party, a group which research has shown to be distinguished primarily by fear of change and tolerance for inequality.

You mention that only 18 percent of Americans support the Tea Party, making its ideology even less popular than socialism, an ideology which is viewed positively by 37 percent of Americans, according to Gallup. When can we expect your cover story on local socialists?-Phillip Crawford | Monterey