Are these polls accurate about the Tea Party? Do you have better polls?

I don't know enough about the Tea Party to say. However, the New York TImes poll that somebody cited above reported additional facts about the Tea Party types -- that they identify themselves as "very conservative" or "conservative," and that they're richer on the average than most other Americans. The findings that you cite suggest that about half of these people are somewhat racist, and I think that's probably true.

However, I suspect that a big fraction of the TP people are greedy and/or economically insecure, regardless of how they feel about race. They know they're doing somewhat better than their neighbors economically. They mostly feel that they're richer than their neighbors because they're smarter and harder - working (meaning they feel "entitled" to greater wealth than those rotten liberal ghetto dwellers enjoy).

And they're terrified that "Big Government" and "tax and spend liberals" are going to take their extra income away and give it to welfare chislers who don't deserve it. The Tea Party people who've responded to my questions on YA also usually have expressed a generally Libertarian suspicion of government that I think has deep roots in American history. When I was in elementary school in Iowa in the 1950s and my father was involved in liberal Republican politics, I thought the main theme of the American revolution was that "freedom" and especially "freedom from government" are the highest values, if not the ONLY values, that any American patriot should pursue.

That single-minded focus on "freedom" at all costs also inspired me when I turned to Libertarianism as a teenager. I now believe that freedom is only one of several important values that the US government should be protecting, and I've come to believe that my teenaged libertarian beliefs -- on economic matters -- were mistaken. However, I suspect that many Americans never get to the stage of questioning what they learned about the Boston Tea Party in elementary school.

I think out of loyalty to bedrock truths they learned in 5th grade, they're still obsessed with "freedom" to the exclusion of all other values - e.g. social justice, compassion towards the poor, basic fairness in the execution of the laws, environmental protection -- etc. etc. So long as these people think of Americanism as consisting of "economic freedom," and nothing else, I think they'll be likely recruits to RW movements like the Tea Party.

The only other thing I could find from Gallup was this. http://www.gallup.com/poll/127181/Tea-Pa... A New York Times poll differs slightly, claiming they are wealthier and more educated: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/15/us/pol... I found this kind of interesting: Nearly half of the voters have no opinion on the Tea Party http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/... It really seems like tea partiers like themselves, and liberals don't like them, but nobody else really gives a hoot!

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.