Welcome To Fruita

Has Mike the Headless Chicken gone grassroots?  “We need to stop electing politicians who keep getting egg on their face”.  “We’re not as well funded as the big boys and could get our heads handed to us”.  A grassroots, TEA Party platform and predicament if we’ve ever heard one.  But what are the chances for Fruita, Colorado’s mindless mascot fowl write in candidate for President on the national scene?  Probably somewhere between slim and none, what with slim just catching the last train for the coast.

But in Mesa County, well that’s a whole different barn yard, where grassroots are not made of plastic Astroturf material.  On the forgotten side of the mountain not even the cows, let alone the voters are swallowing that stuff as evidenced by the cry of outrage by local grassroots TEA Parties in response to last Friday’s all red, American’s for Prosperity/WSCA sponsored, transparent attempt by the Republican hierarchy to cash in politically on the credibility established by Grassroots TEA Parties.  

The lavishly funded faux Tea Party whose sponsors were publicly predicting the draw of at least a thousand attendees ended up claiming five hundred which was over twice the number estimated by Parks and Rec.  By actual headcount at the event, (minus the disappointed vendors), under 160 showed up with only one token Gadsden Flag to be seen. Yellow Tea Party hats and T-shirts were conspicuous by their absence.  The event received no coverage in the local newspaper in what promises to be a PR nightmare for the Republican establishment and a developing rift (read split) in the Conservative vote.

“The only thing that was wrong, was they held this event under the guise of being a Tea Party..” said Tim Fenwick, founder of “A Tea Party of One and Mad as Hell” which is an outgrowth group that sprang from Grand Junction’s GJResult/Tea Party, the organizer and sponsor of the western slope’s first, largest, Grassroots Tea Party event which drew over 3,000, in contrast to Friday’s attempted identity theft exhibition.  

While it is doubtful that Mike the Headless Chicken’s write in campaign will gain the momentum necessary to overcome the “lesser of two evils” choice for Conservatives and Grassroots Tea Party people in the coming Presidential campaign, ominous storm clouds are gathering that predict a developing “knife fight in a phone booth” de ja vue, all over again in Colorado’s CD3 race reminiscent of the last CO gubernatorial race in which the old guard threw their primary winner Dan Maes under the bus and supported the third party candidate Tom Tancredo, while the local grassroots Tea Parties respected the vote of the people and held to their support of the Republican nominee.  

With the grassroots Tea Parties supporting Independent candidate Tisha Casida as their conservative pick of the litter over the old guard’s ethically challenged incumbent Scott Tipton and the Dem’s Sal Pace by about the same ratio as voters who didn’t show up at the faux Tea Party event, the only discernible message now coming from the Mesa County GOP and their surrogates is one of desperation accompanied by a warning to the grassroots Tea Parties; don’t do as we do, do as we say do.  It is a no-brainer how that message will be received under the “Don’t Tread On Me” banner with the smart money down on Mike the headless chicken as the odds on favorite in Mesa County.