While Americans prepared for Thanksgiving feasts and hit the malls on Black Friday, the Tea Party movement lived on in the streets of St. Louis and in the small towns of Arkansas to protest Obamacare, rampant government spending, and the massive expansion of the federal government.
According to the St. Louis Conservative Examiner, 4,000 “Tea Partiers” gathered on Saturday in downtown St. Louis’ Kiener plaza.
From St. Louis’ Fox2now.com:
The protesters were quickly energized with waving flags and signs adorning issues most important to them. Rationed health care, czars, corruption, and increased taxes were many of the protests discussed and displayed.
Fox2now.com also found that the protests weren’t just about health care:
Protester Jane Petry says,” Losing the values of our country, not following our constitution anymore, and health care, the government thinking they can take that over.”
Protester Joe Wilson says, “I don’t think the government should be spending more money than it brings in. That’s not the way I live and I don’t think that’s how the government should operate.”
St. Louis is the latest in a series of Tea Party rallies that have been sweeping the country. Three hundred miles away in Harrison, Ark., 200 protesters gathered at the Boone County Courthouse on November 20 as part of the Americans for Prosperity bus tour against federally-run health care.
From HarrisonDaily.com’s report:
“No one here is against health care reform,” Teresa Oelke, the state director for the Arkansas chapter of Americans for Prosperity, told the crowd of about 200. “We just believe there is different way to get there.”
The “Hands off my health care” bus has made about 60 stops around the state, and, according to Oelke, more than 25,000 people have signed petitions against a federally-run health care system.
It seems that even through the holiday season, the Tea Party movement is going strong.
