I just ran across this peculiar tale of IRS-love in the New Mexico Independent. It seems that a group of Albuquerque seniors decided to wage a rally in support of the IRS after learning it was targetted for a Tax Day tea-party protest.
Tea partiers are saying they actually like the IRS and were holding an unrelated rally in a different spot. I guess the school-loving, sidewalk-hugging grannies and gramps must be suffering from Alzheimers...
According to the Independent, members of The New Mexico Alliance for Retired Americans began noticing flyers on bold yellow paper posted throughout Albuquerque's posh Anglo Northeast Heights neighborhood in the days immediately following the kamikaze strike on the Austin IRS building.
The fliers announcing the tea party protest at IRS headquarters are yellow, bold, and have "been up all over the Northeast Heights for over a month," Terry Schleder, spokesperson for the seniors group, told The Independent.
"Our seniors will be there because they have historical perspective, on the importance of strong government," Schleder said.
"Real Patriots Pay Their Fair Share of Taxes... Save our Social Security, Medicare, public schools, jobs, parks, libraries, firefighters, workers, streets, sidewalks," the group said in a statement announcing the counter rally.
Tea Party leaders claim the mysterious flyers were actually posted by an enemy of the Tea Party in the wake of the Austin terrorist suicide bombing (my description, not theirs) to make Tea Partiers look bad. The seniors called their claim "horse hockey" and vowed they would show up in front of the IRS to support strong government anyway before moving along to counter protest at the new Tea Party Tax protest location.
"The Albuquerque tea party is trying to distance themselves from the people who called this IRS rally, but I think that’s complete horse hockey," he said. "The tea partiers speak for people who’d rather not have government sidewalks, public libraries, or public schools. So I think its pretty farcical that they’re distancing themselves."
The Independent then quotes the Albuquerque Journal which you actually have to pay to read:
The signs started appearing a few days after a man crashed his plane into the IRS building in Austin, Texas, said Tina Carson, one of the organizers of the Albuquerque Tea Party.
"We don’t know who they are, but we know they are anti-tea party," Carson said Tuesday. "We have nothing against the IRS, and we won’t be at the IRS building."
For those of you who caught my last post to Morning Feature, entitled Memoirs of a Rogue Organizer, I swear to heaven, I did not post a single one of those flyers!!!!!
However, I wish I had.
I won't be at either protest. I won't be anywhere near Albuquerque. I will be at my local post office patriotically mailing my tax returns to the IRS.