AP: Politics, tea parties make strange brew

On The Table

Discussion

March 17, 2010

Anonymous The Joplin Globe Wed Mar 17, 2010, 10:34 AM CDT

The Associated Press

BERKELEY, Calif. — The tea party movement has riled plenty of people, but especially those who drink the stuff.

“It’s certainly an exciting time to see this kind of fervent activism, but for our industry, it has been very damaging in an overshadowing type of way,” said World Tea Expo president George Jage, who recently had to make a change in his Google alert settings.

Now he tracks industry news using the command “tea minus party.”

Strange things are happening as the refined world of tea parties — the kind where you mind your manners and consider proper brewing temperatures — collides with the rowdier milieu of the other kind of tea party, the kind where you brew political dissent.

Take Jack Cheng, co-founder of Steepster, a New York-based online tea-drinkers community.

“It’s becoming harder for people to find relevant information,” said Cheng, who was visiting San Francisco this week. “You always find some politically driven tea party as opposed to what you’re looking for.”

Political opinions within the trade vary; some are carefully neutral while others lean left or right. But all seem bemused by the idea of blending tea and tumult.

“I do everything in my power to promote the benefits and power of drinking specialty tea. With all the media attention that the tea party (movement) gets, it’s shifted that focus,” said Beth Johnston, owner of Teas Etc. in West Palm Beach, Fla. She’s staying neutral on the politics, but she has definite opinions about tea.

“Tea is soothing and it’s restorative and it’s healing and that’s really the polar opposite of the energy of the movement, regardless of whether you agree or disagree,” she said.

Activists, of course, are harkening back to 1773 and the Boston Tea Party, when colonists boarded British ships and threw tea into the harbor in a symbolic act of protest.

Even then, the juxtaposition of protest and propriety was jarring, said Robin Lakoff, professor of linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley.

“That was kind of an ironic play on what a tea party was supposed to be,” Lakoff said. Taking the name for modern-day protests was “what people like me refer to as intertextuality — which other narrative you hook into.”

Some tea partisans think tea partiers — who occasionally incorporate actual tea into their protests, for instance, flinging bags into a barrel or using them to decorate signs or clothing — are going about things the wrong way.

At least use specialty tea, says Bruce Richardson, owner of Elmwood Inn Fine Teas in Perryville, Ky. “If these people are really serious about it, they wouldn’t be using tea bags,” he said with a laugh.

Political tea partiers aren’t sitting around mulling linguistics, said Mark Meckler, a California attorney and co-founder of Tea Party Patriots, which has more than 1,200 chapters around the country.

“People simply associate it with the Boston Tea Party,” he said. “Today, there are a lot of people who feel that regardless who they voted for, they’re not actually represented by our government any longer.”

As for the plight of the tea merchants, he advises them to take advantage of the phenomenon.

“I hope they’re selling a lot more tea because people are so focused on the tea party these days,” he said.

While tea is a long way from knocking coffee off its perch in America, it has become more popular in recent years, especially specialty teas. Devotees include people like Kaya Mindlin, a yoga instructor who was sharing a pot of tea with friends at Far Leaves Tea in Berkeley this week.

“To me, the political tea party is divisionary,” she said. “Real tea parties are the opposite of that; it’s bringing people together.”

Jesse Jacobs, owner of Samovar, a San Francisco tea lounge and retailer, also is struck by the contrast. Still, he’s not entirely unhappy about tea’s celebrity.

“A lot of people, they hear ‘tea party’ and if you’re a tea fan, you say, ‘Hey, that’s great. Let’s go have one.’ If you’re on the forefront of political debate it may not sound good, but it still creates buzz,” said Jacobs. “At the end of the day, what’s important in life hasn’t changed. Having time for yourself. Being healthy and connecting with what you’re close to. Having tea allows you to do that.”

At the World Tea Expo, Jage can understand the discontent that led to tea party protesting. He’s thinking about borrowing from the activist playbook and adding a town hall-style session — this one focused on the mission of selling specialty tea — when the Expo holds its annual meeting this June in Las Vegas.

Like a true tea drinker, he takes a philosophical view.

“Tea has been around for 5,000 years,” he said. “I am more than confident that we will survive.”

Text Only

On The Table

Restaurant owners introduce customers to cuisine of Thailand
Aithit Worrathong says the great thing about Thai food is the cuisine offers a little something for everyone.

February 8, 2012 1 Photo
Cheryle Finley: Love slow cooker for Valentine’s dinner
Where is this year going? In less than a week, it’s already Valentine’s Day. My husband, Chris, and I will be at Granny Shafer’s enjoying the food and the Duke Mason Band.

February 8, 2012 1 Photo
Wine producers campaign for truth in labeling
Napa Valley wine producers will go a long way to protect their good name, all the way to Thailand if necessary.

February 8, 2012
Cheryle Finley: Super party calls for super plan
It’s just a few days until the Super Bowl, which means football and, most importantly to me, lots of grazing at the food tables. I would be hard pressed to tell you which teams are playing for the Super Bowl title, but it’s easy to tell you some great cooking and eating ideas for game day or any day when you are entertaining a group of family and friends.

February 1, 2012 1 Photo
Dave Woods: Sam Adams founder talks passion, pride and football
Jim, founder of the Boston Beer Company, is the brewer behind Sam Adams stable of craft ales and lagers. I hooked up with Jim by phone recently after touring his Jamaica Plain, Mass., brewery. The crew at the brewery was super friendly and offered great insight into Sam Adams beers. All of Sam’s beer recipes are developed inside the small brewery in JP.
I had plenty of questions for the beer magnate, but one burned: Who was his money on — metaphorically speaking, of course — in the Super Bowl match up between the New England Patriots and New York Giants.

January 31, 2012 2 Stories
Top football cities and the beers their fans love
Many of America’s great football cities are great beer cities, too. Even if your team didn’t make the final game this season, you can enjoy a taste of your favorite home team with these locally available brews.

January 31, 2012 2 Stories
Head to head: Football, beer aficionados offer best bets for Super Bowl, super party
On Sunday, millions of football fanatics across the country will huddle together around big screen TVs, pass the chips and dips and kick up their heels as the New England Patriots and New York Giants face off in Super Bowl XLVI.
“It’s a natural relationship,” Walkenhorst said. “Beer is the ultimate social beverage. The Super Bowl is the ultimate social event, so they just go hand in hand.”

January 31, 2012 10 Photos 2 Stories
Jam, chicken mesh in delicious Super Bowl dish
When it comes to making pulled chicken, it’s hard to beat the two-ingredient simplicity of simmering chicken breasts in a bottle of barbecue sauce.

January 25, 2012
Cheryle Finley: End results vary depending on cook
When we were novice cooks, how many of us wondered if we could get away with substituting baking soda for baking powder? Probably most of us. So what happens when we don’t follow the recipe, especially the first time we are trying a new dish?

January 25, 2012 1 Photo
Chinese secret: Broth is key to hot and sour soup
To see what Kham Luong says is the essence of traditional Chinese hot and sour soup, all you have to do is dip your spoon into a bowl of the soup served at the Lotus Garden Restaurant, 1818 W. Seventh St., and look at the broth.

January 25, 2012 1 Photo
More On The Table Headlines

Water company cites reconnections

On The Table

Search Results

Discussion

AP: Politics, tea parties make strange brew

Joplin City Manager Mark Rohr wants the city to distribute weather radios to all Joplin homes that don’t have one. That’s 11,000 radios. Do you think that’s a good use of $300,440?

Joplin City Manager Mark Rohr wants the city to distribute weather radios to all Joplin homes that don’t have one. That’s 11,000 radios. Do you think that’s a good use of $300,440?

Site Map

Contact Us