How NOT To Win Friends And Influence People

By Jesse Phillips

I love the tea party movement, but some people who call themselves tea partiers can be thoughtless.

Emailing a list of your congressional representatives personal cell phone numbers and email addresses, simply because they skipped out of a meeting you had planned to attend another with alleged lobbyists, is a fairly adolescent response that will do nothing to increase your influence in Congress.

Here’s a press release from the Central Florida Tea Party Council, which Citizen2Citizen is a proud member of, explaining what happened;

Florida Liberty Alliance

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: Tom Tillison

Grass Roots Florida Tea Party, 9/12 Project Members
Reject National “Tea Party Patriots” Methods

In an attempt to intimidate the Congressional Freshman Class, “leaders” of the national “Tea Party Patriots” group embarrass the grass roots Tea Party Movement by releasing the personal phone numbers of freshmen House Members with instructions to their email list to pressure Members into attending a private TPP Freshman Class Orientation.

ORLANDO, FLORIDA – November 12, 2010 – A statement issued to its email list yesterday by the national “Tea Party Patriots” group leadership demands: “Let’s show them that you won’t tolerate politics as usual and show them the power of the Tea Party” – and then breaks with the most basic protocol of respect and reveals the private cell numbers of the entire Congressional Freshman Class to their list to ensure delivery of this message.

Was this grand call to arms justified because of an important piece of legislation under consideration? Were these freshmen legislators engaged in some act of fiscal irresponsibility or constitutional malfeasance? Not exactly. This demand involved a Freshman Class Orientation scheduling conflict with the conservative organization Claremont Institute, unjustifiably attacked by TPP leaders in its statement as a group comprised of nothing but “Washington Insiders”.

“The grass roots Tea Party Movement, where the volunteers on the ground do the real heavy lifting in the Movement, find the message in the TPP statement and the release of private contact information of Congressional Members inexcusable and an embarrassment for all of us,” says Jason Hoyt, co-founder of the Central Florida Tea Party Council.

Many in the Congressional Freshman class are angry about how poorly they have been treated. There are those who are also puzzled by such egregious and meritless behavior imposed on them before they have even been sworn into office.

The Florida Liberty Alliance strongly requests that the leaders of the “Tea Party Patriots” immediately move do all that they can to repair the damage that these actions have caused to the Movement’s relationship with these Congressional Freshmen and the good name of the Tea Party Movement.

# # #

Billie Tucker                          Founder, First Coast Tea Party
Carole McManus                  Leader, First Coast Tea Party
Jason Hoyt                           Co-Founder, Central FL Tea Party Council
Tom Tillison                          Co-Founder, Central FL Tea Party Council
Clyde Fabretti                        Leader, West Orlando Tea Party
Tom Gaitens                         FL State Director, Freedomworks
Robin Stublen                      Punta Gorda Tea Party
Paula Helton                        Leader, Gainesville Tea Party
Alan BerkelHammer           Leader, Gainesville Tea Party
Don Hensarling                   FL State Director, 9/12 Project
Jesse Phillips                      Founder, Citizen2Citizen
Nancy Meinhardt                  Leader, Miami 9/12 Project
Karin Hoffman                      Founder, DC Works For Us
Pam Evans                           Leader, DC Works For Us
Sharon Taylor                       Leader, DC Works For Us
Sharon Calvert                     Leader, Tampa Tea Party
John Hendrix                        Leader, Tampa Tea Party
Tim Curtis                             Leader, Tampa 9/12 Project
Karen Jaroch                        Leader, Tampa 9/12 Project
Don Forward                        Leader, Titusville Patriots
Tina Woode                          Organizer, Lake Mary/Sanford 912 Project
Laurie Newsom                   Leader, Gainesville Tea Party
Rod Gonzolez                       Leader, Gainesville Tea Party
Pat Wayman                         Organizer, Venice area 912 Project
Bill Landes                            State Director, Florida Minuteman
Cindy Hofeditz                      Organizer, Polk City 912 Group

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