Here are a couple of additional articles I located. Who Says the Tea Party is Not a Religious Movement? Who Says the Tea Party isn’t a Religious Movement?, Part II
I know evnow disagrees with me on this, but here's how I recall the history. During the 2008 RNC convention, Ron Paul and the Republican Libertarians held their own convention next door called Rally for the Republic. This, I believe, was the genesis for the Tea Party Movement. After the Rally for the Republic, they developed the Contract From America. The start of the document reads... We, the citizens of the United States of America, call upon those seeking to represent us in public office to sign the Contract from America and by doing so commit to support each of its agenda items on behalf of individual liberty, limited government, and economic freedom.
As you would expect, that has Libertarian all over it. Dick Armey's FreedomWorks (with Koch Bros financing) then promoted this and it became the Tea Party Movement. So my point is that somewhere along the way, the religious right co-oped the movement and the speculation is that it was the Mormons and a lot of Mormon financing. The individual liberty pillar is now gone from the movement. They now advocate, for example, zero tolerance on abortion.
I know evnow disagrees with me on this, but here's how I recall the history. During the 2008 RNC convention, Ron Paul and the Republican Libertarians held their own convention next door called Rally for the Republic. This, I believe, was the genesis for the Tea Party Movement. After the Rally for the Republic, they developed the Contract From America. The start of the document reads... We, the citizens of the United States of America, call upon those seeking to represent us in public office to sign the Contract from America and by doing so commit to support each of its agenda items on behalf of individual liberty, limited government, and economic freedom.
As you would expect, that has Libertarian all over it. Dick Armey's FreedomWorks (with Koch Bros financing) then promoted this and it became the Tea Party Movement. So my point is that somewhere along the way, the religious right co-oped the movement and the speculation is that it was the Mormons and a lot of Mormon financing. The individual liberty pillar is now gone from the movement. They now advocate, for example, zero tolerance on abortion.