The Eagle has Landed!

Well, after having been bottled up for years working in the entertainment industry and realizing just how far left most of my former co-workers were and still are, I am vent—uring out and starting my own blog. The name of this blog "No Tread Threads" was originally going to be the name of a personalized blue jean line that I wanted to market to the tea party movement. I came up with this idea after feeling that many Americans, such as myself, felt muted and silenced for having conservative/traditional values.

Let me back up a bit. Last year, I was "just" a stay-at-home mom living in Austin, raising 4 boys. I will never forget the day I said to my oldest son, after it became painfully clear that our new government was rapidly putting us on a path counter to what the republic stood for, that we were going to need to throw a "tea party." I said we needed to have an "Austin Tea Party." I never imagined that a few days later, Glenn Beck would announce the founding of the 9/12 network and state that "We Surround Them." He asked Americans to send in their photos and answer the core values to see if we agreed. Those photos are in a mosaic behind his desk. When he said those words, I finally felt that I was not alone.

I sent my picture and answered the 9/12 values questions at the website—no small feat because I don't even know how to do that sort of thing. Somehow I was successful. I must have been one of the first members of this historic group. I am very proud to be a member. I am also delighted that because I jumped at the chance to get involved, I was able to secure the name "LibertyMom" for my screen name. It says exactly how I feel. A few weeks later, people all over the country began joining the 9/12 project and then it was announced that REAL tea parties were actually going to take place across America. I couldn't believe it. I had NEVER ever been politically involved, engaged or otherwise even interested. Up until the 9/12 project, it seemed that everyone was asleep at the wheel. Americans were too busy being fed their daily dose of un-reality television. I was not. I was engaged and flipping eagerly between FOX, CNN, and trying to even stomach MSNBC which I could not BELIEVE was even considered a legitimate news network. I could see this so clearly. I began reading Common Sense and The 5,000 Year Leap. I started 1984 but got so depressed at how closely it fit what was happening now that I put it down. I ordered 25 pocket constitutions from The Heritage Foundation and gave them to my 4 children. I offered the rest to my neighbors and left a basket on my doorstep for two days. Not many took them so I gave them to a group I knew would appreciate them—the Boy Scouts of America.

Shortly after joining this group, actual tea party events began cropping up in major cities in America. I did not consider going until Glenn Beck announced that he would be at the Alamo. My husband's great great uncles fought and died at the Alamo and I felt that this would be a significant historic event. So on April 15th, my husband, myself and our four boys went to the Alamo for the first Tea Party. I was so nervous. I did not know what to expect. We had a room at the historic Menger Hotel. We got there as Ted Nugent walked in. Glenn Beck was there too. I wrote him a personal note and gave it to reception. Our room had a balcony overlooking the plaza. We made t-shirts that were bright orange with an image of Alice's Tea Party." None of our neighbors came. We felt that we might be "crazy." That is until we got there. Everyone wanted that shirt. The restaurants on the river walk served free iced tea in honor of the day's event and everyone was SO nice. There was a palpable energy in the air that something was beginning. All kinds of people were there. Everyone we talked to had NEVER been to a political demonstration before. The streets were FULL of ALL kinds of people, young, old, an international crowd but MOST were middle class families like ourselves. Everyone wanted our t-shirt. To watch that event live and then watch part of it from our balcony and see that CNN and MSNBC were not even COVERING it live was such an eye opener for us. Later, when Jeanine Garafalo made her unbelievable remarks about "racist, ignorant tea baggers" along with Nancy Pelosi's "astroturf" and "well funded corporate" comments, I knew I would never be asleep again.

So back to the jeans—after the year we had, and watching the health "care" and I use that term loosely, debate and the cap and trade and the lobbyists and the speeches and the spin, I said to my husband that I feel so unable to be HEARD. I was in Los Angeles. My dad was fighting cancer and a white van drives by with these words in large letters across the back window. "Pelosi, you're going down in 2010. Can you hear me now?" I couldn't believe someone in California had that kind of courage. I decided that something that ALL Americans could wear would be a really nice way for people of EVERY type to VOICE their opinion.

Since most conservatives don't shop at Barney's or Neiman's, I wanted to create an affordable blue jean with beautiful embroidery or bejeweling that had sayings on them relating to what Americans were feeling. For example, if a customer bought a jean that said "Don't tread on CA," the funds would be channeled into a PAC that was designed to help Californians elect people who would replace Barbara Boxer, Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters and any other progressive radicals running the now bankrupt state. "Taxed Enough Already” would of course be a great jean to wear to a tea party. I wanted the proceeds to go to PACS across the country. My goal was going to be to market these jeans that were affordable to people who wanted to wear their feelings on their "sleeves" so to speak.

After several weeks of attempting to figure out the "how" of this great idea, I don't think I have the resources, and certainly not the funds to pull this off. The designs, I have. The sayings, oh, I have some GREAT ones. But, that little thing called distribution—that one eludes me. If anyone out there wants to help me make this happen, I could use a partner. Hmmm. I can bake! Maybe, I can make tea-cakes with sayings instead. Or maybe this little thing I call No Tread Threads will have to be my VOICE. Okay, for all of the experienced bloggers who are probably poised to slam me, yes, I am already aware that when you group the letters together for this blog, it spells Not Read Threads—yep, I get it. Hopefully, people will read. Even if they don't, if I don't begin putting my thoughts down somewhere to counter the vitriol espoused from the other side, I might really become the "nutjob" that I'm already apparently accused of being simply for having conservative, traditional values and views.