East Mountain Tea Party Connections
Editor’s Note: We regret that we do not have time to do an April Fool’s article, as many other publications do on this particular date. Time does not permit at present.
by John Weckerle
Some time back, we came across some interesting information on the East Mountain Tea Party, set it aside for future use, and – embarrassingly – forgot about it. A recent statement on the EMTP web site – that there is no affiliation between the East Mountain Tea Party and the First Baptist Church in Moriarty, at which their recent event was held – jogged our memory, and we decided to take a look. We found no evidence of a direct link between the Church and the EMTP; however, our previous research (including some reported in earlier articles [click on the Tea Party-gate category for a list]) does provide some insight into the East Mountain Tea Party’s relationships, both sectarian and commercial.
In our earlier articles, we demonstrated a certain “commonality of leadership” between the East Mountain Tea Party and a group called The Table of The Remnant, now Operation Jesus Pictures. We located a web page bearing the EMTP logo, references to the web site, and a list of business supporters. Listed are the following:
- Enchanted Floral Design (Tina Gleason, Owner)
- Chili Hills Restaurant
- Prestige Carpet Care (owned by Table of the Remnant official Doug Cooper)
- Eagle Buildings of New Mexico
- Edgewood News Plus (this is actually a link to Edgewood Town Councilor Chuck Ring’s blog. Mr. Ring makes no bones about being a Tea Party supporter)
- Hook ~ Fast Specialties
- Shorty’s BBQ
- Jim Valentine Floor Covering
- James Valentine Jr., Independent Contractor (this may be the same as the floor covering enterprise, but it is listed separately)
- Mountain View Properties – This is a real estate firm operated by Diane Stearley, wife of Edgewood mayor Bob Stearley. We can imagine that at least a few of our readers might be curious as to what this might mean regarding Mayor Stearley’s support, if any exists, for the East Mountain Tea Party. We will leave it to Mr. Stearley to decide whether he wishes to provide any clarification, and invite him to comment here if he does.
- Rock Solid Investments LLC – Jim Gillespie, President.
We leave it to our readers to decide whether they think a business’s involvement with the EMTP is a good thing, a neutral thing, or a bad thing – and whether it makes any difference one way or the other with respect to their buying habits.
Beyond the list of businesses, one of the things that we found interesting was the location of this page; it is not on the EMTP web site, but is contained within a fully functional, separate (and apparently former) EMTP sub-web on the Table of the Remnant/Operation Jesus Pictures web site. The sub-web provides a place to send donations, which is the same P.O. Box as that given for Operation Jesus Pictures and on the EMTP web site. As we noted in our previous articles, this group appears to have a substantial degree of potential control over EMTP’s activities and is demonstrably biased against Muslims, as is the EMTP – and the relationship between the two organizations seems, at least to us, both closer and blurrier than it did before. Some may see this as a good thing, others as bad, and others as irrelevant. Given the discriminatory opinions voiced by both, we tend to fall into the “thinking it’s not good” category. To some this may represent a tempest in a teapot, and others may see it as a different type of storm entirely – one way or another, we think knowledge is a good thing and, at least for some people, may provide a basis for well-considered decision making.