A Radio Tour of Tea Party Nation

A Radio Tour of Tea Party Nation

Gary Younge hits the road to understand how local opposition to President Obama explains a growing national movement.

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In his column for The Nation this week, Gary Younge hit the road to reveal what’s at the heart of Tea Party Nation. In this two-part, companion audio documentary from the BBC World Service, Younge tells the story of President Obama’s fiercest opponents. He spoke to tea-partiers, evangelicals and libertarians; local elected officials, country club members and small business owners to find out why they oppose the President, and what they think of his first year in office. He traveled to rural Arkansas and Kentucky, speaking with dozens of people who believe President Obama is taking the country in the wrong direction.

Listen to both parts below, or download the MP3. Special thanks to the BBC World Service for their production of this feature, and permission to run it at TheNation.com. You can listen to more audio documentaries from the BBC World Service here.

Part 1

Part 2

We cannot back down

We now confront a second Trump presidency.

There’s not a moment to lose. We must harness our fears, our grief, and yes, our anger, to resist the dangerous policies Donald Trump will unleash on our country. We rededicate ourselves to our role as journalists and writers of principle and conscience.

Today, we also steel ourselves for the fight ahead. It will demand a fearless spirit, an informed mind, wise analysis, and humane resistance. We face the enactment of Project 2025, a far-right supreme court, political authoritarianism, increasing inequality and record homelessness, a looming climate crisis, and conflicts abroad. The Nation will expose and propose, nurture investigative reporting, and stand together as a community to keep hope and possibility alive. The Nation’s work will continue—as it has in good and not-so-good times—to develop alternative ideas and visions, to deepen our mission of truth-telling and deep reporting, and to further solidarity in a nation divided.

Armed with a remarkable 160 years of bold, independent journalism, our mandate today remains the same as when abolitionists first founded The Nation—to uphold the principles of democracy and freedom, serve as a beacon through the darkest days of resistance, and to envision and struggle for a brighter future.

The day is dark, the forces arrayed are tenacious, but as the late Nation editorial board member Toni Morrison wrote “No! This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.”

I urge you to stand with The Nation and donate today.

Onwards,

Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editorial Director and Publisher, The Nation

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