Thursday evening on MSNBC comedian, actress and political activist Janeane Garofalo said the people who attended the tea parties are racists with dysfunctional brains.
"Let's be very honest about what this is about. This is not about bashing Democrats. It's not about taxes. They have no idea what the Boston Tea party was about. They don't know their history at all. It's about hating a black man in the White House," said Garofalo. "This is racism straight up and is nothing but a bunch of teabagging rednecks. There is no way around that."
"Their synapses are misfiring. ... It is a neurological problem we are dealing with," she said.
Click here to watch the segment…
Wednesday's “Tea Party” protests used the dreaded April 15 -- the U.S. deadline to file income taxes -- as a hook to vent about government spending and corporate bailouts in an homage to the Boston Tea Party. Organizers said the movement developed organically through online social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter and through promotion from conservative pundits and bloggers.
While the political implications of the rallies remain to be seen as President Obama's administration pursues its economic recovery plan, thousands of protesters turned out in loud and colorful ways to express their frustration with Obama and Washington in general.
Indianapolis small business owners Ben and Bree Finegan brought their two children to a local rally. Two-year-old Kate held a sign from her stroller reading, "In diapers & in debt."
The crowd in Carson City, Nev., included a 5-year-old boy holding a sign that read, "My share of the national debt is $36,500." Some wore cowboy hats with tea bags dangling from them.
In Boston, a few hundred protesters gathered on the Boston Common, a short distance from the original Tea Party in 1773. Some dressed in Revolutionary garb and carried signs that said "Barney Frank, Bernie Madoff: And the Difference Is?" and "D.C.: District of Communism."
In Atlanta, thousands of people gathered outside the Capitol, where Fox News Channel conservative pundit Sean Hannity broadcast his show Wednesday night. One protester's sign read: "Hey Obama you can keep the change."
Julie Reeves, of Covington, Ga., brought her Chihuahua, Arnie, who wore a tiny anti-IRS T-shirt. "I want the government to get its hand the hell out of my wallet," Reeves said.
Duncan Philp, of Carpenter, Wyo., carried a flag in Cheyenne reading "Don't Tread on Me" and dragged a United Nations flag on the ground. Philp said he's a member of the Wyoming Tyranny Response Team, a group dedicated to the Bill of Rights.
He said Congress ignored Americans' request not to bail out financially troubled banks.
"Bush and Obama have done the same thing," Philp said. "They've given out loans for money they don't have."
In Helena, Mont., protesters stomped on boxes labeled to represent various taxes, such as income and a proposal to tax carbon dioxide output.
"It's a stepping stone to one day being able to tax you for the very air that you breathe," said event organizer Jim Walker.
There were several small counter-protests, including one that drew about a dozen people at Fountain Square in Cincinnati. A counter-protester held a sign that read, "Where were you when Bush was spending billions a month 'liberating' Iraq?" The anti-tax demonstration there, meanwhile, drew about 4,000 people.
