Palin addresses Tea Party Convention

February 7, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

McClatchy Newspapers

NASHVILLE — The burgeoning “tea party” movement should remain leaderless and decentralized, former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin said Saturday, calling the effort “bigger than any king or queen of the ‘tea party.’”

“Put your faith in ideas. I caution against allowing this movement to be defined by one leader or operation,” she told the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville. The small government movement is “a ground-up call to action that’s forcing both parties to change the way they’re doing business. This is about the people.”

In her keynote address, Palin offered her analysis of President Obama’s foreign policy record and delivered a critique of his stimulus package — decrying the federal deficit as “generational theft.” The list of Obama’s broken promises is long, Palin said in her signature folksy delivery.

“How’s that hopey, changing stuff workin’ out for ya?” she asked 1,000 or so supporters who paid $300 apiece to attend her speech.

Palin applauded the president’s decision to increase forces in Afghanistan while deriding his efforts at diplomacy, singling out North Korea.

“We must spend less time courting our adversaries and more time working with our allies,” the former Alaska governor said. “The lesson of that last year is this: Foreign policy cannot be managed through the politics of personality.”

In recent months, Palin has positioned herself outside the Republican Party establishment. She passed on an invitation to attend the annual Conservative Political Action Conference and agreed to speak at the Nashville event.

Palin also has said she would attend two upcoming “tea party” events: a rally next month in Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s hometown of Searchlight, Nev., and an April get-together in Boston. Both gatherings are being organized by the Sacramento-based Tea Party Express.

Palin remained committed to the Nashville conference even after some “tea party” groups questioned its financing and accused the Tea Party Nation, which organized the event, of profiteering. A handful of sponsors pulled out of the event citing the hefty price tag of $560 for a ticket to the full convention.

Reps. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., backed out over concerns they might later run into trouble with the House Ethics Committee.

And the price kept some devoted fans from seeing Palin — but it did not keep them from trying.

Merle Firestone got up at 4 a.m., left a note on the coffee pot for his wife and drove from Rainbow, Miss., to try to see the former governor, even though he could not afford the ticket. The 72-year-old retired small business owner and bow-hunter said he particularly liked Palin’s support for his sport. He said he had been following the “tea party” movement as he watched his friends and children struggle with the recession.

“I don’t have any answers, I just want people to get back to work,” he said, standing by as conventioneers went in and out of the hall in the Gaylord Opryland Hotel. When Firestone tried to get in without a pass, he was turned away. But, he said, there were plenty of like-minded people to chat with in the hallways.

The roughly 600 people who attended the full convention were overwhelmingly white, older and disproportionately from neighboring states. They seemed united in their opposition to the growth of government and their belief Obama’s policies represent a dangerous creep of socialism into American life. They also were united in plans to turn what began as a protest movement into a political force for conservative candidates in the midterm elections.

Still, many resisted the suggestion they would unite under leadership from Palin or any other figure.

“I don’t think the ‘tea party’ movement has a leader,” said Charlene Miller of Cincinnati. “That’s not what this is about. She embodies the spirit of the ‘tea party’ movement.”

That model — a series of local groups linked online — has led to some disagreements over direction.

“Tea party” leaders in Washington have sought to downplay some of the controversial messages that popped up at early rallies. But some of those were spotlighted again in Nashville.

On Friday, Joseph Farah of WorldNetDaily.com spent much of his address questioning whether the president was born in the United States. On Thursday, former Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., told the audience Obama was elected by people “who could not spell the word ’vote’ or say it in English.”

But there was criticism from within the movement Saturday, focused on convention organizer Judson Phillips of the Tea Party Nation.

Members of a group feuding with Phillips held a news conference outside the convention hall, at which they dismissed the event as lacking true local support.

“There’s top-down leadership and there’s grass-roots organization,” said Anthony Shreeve of the Tennessee Tea Party Coalition, holding a copy of his group’s charter — printed on yellowed paper with an ornate font reminiscent of the U.S. Constitution.

Phillips, a Nashville attorney who has been active in local Republican politics, said he did not expect to make much money off the convention and that any profit “would probably go back into future events to further the cause.” Another convention is planned for July, he said.

Palin has suggested the same. In an opinion piece published recently in USA Today, she said she would put her speaker’s fee — which sources put at more than $100,000 — back to “the cause.”