Tea Party Nation canceled their “unity” convention, scheduled for this coming weekend in Las Vegas, claiming it was just too damned hot.
“The heat in Las Vegas in July is keeping many who would like to participate from attending,” organizers wrote last month, earning them mockery far and wide. Organizers said Friday in their weekly newsletter, obtained by TPM, that the rescheduling is “being worked on” so people can plan to attend.
Uh-huh.
No doubt it’s scorching in Las Vegas this time of year, but that won’t stop me and a couple thousand other progressive bloggers and political activists from heading to Sin City the following weekend for Netroots Nation, our annual blogger confab.
I’m not particularly looking forward to a few days of 105+ degree heat… though I’m assured it’s a dry heat, and that they have this newfangled thing called “air conditioning.”
Vegas was a bad pick. Many of those religious fruit cakes won’t go near the place. They probably only had about 6 people commit.
Since the Tea Party prefers to stand outdoors, wave misspelled signs, and shout incoherently — instead of developing policies and debating solutions to the problems of governance — it’s no wonder they cancelled their Las Vegas trip.
OTOH, what better way to foster incoherent ranting and errors in spelling than sunburn, heatstroke, and dehydration?
Who goes outdoors in Vegas this time of year? Everything’s air conditioned, there’s not much need to go outside during the daytime except for the short dash from an air-conditioned car to an air-conditioned hotel room. Besides, it was hot everywhere last week. It’s not like it was going to be that much worse than wherever the tea party people were coming from.
That story just doesn’t hold water.
I’ve been involved in arranging a few such gatherings, albeit on a much smaller scale. Most hotels large enough to hold more than a handful of people require reservations months in advance, and the contracts require a large advance deposit, and typically include a minumum number of guaranteed reservations for hotel rooms.
Maybe the tea partiers didn’t want to stay in the hotel rooms at full rate, and instead were taking advantage of the really cheap bargain rates they could get from some other casinos? Last year I had to attend a business convention in L.A., and now I get an e-mail alert every week from the Luxor, last week they were advertising $19 a night M-Th.
Or maybe the organizers were getting requests for info on campgrounds with RV hookups instead, and they realized they were not going to make the minimum room rentals required? Having to pay for a couple hundred empty rooms for several days at full rates could wreck their budget.
Maybe they were required to make advance payment of the full bill the week before the convention, (less incidental charges), and they didn’t have the money? That means they would lose a rather large initial deposit, unless they could work it out as a “re-scheduling” if the host facility was feeling generous.
And I also agree that Vegas wasn’t the best choice. Too many bible-Belt wives would be too worried that their husbands would be out carousing in “sin city” – no way would they agree to that trip.
Branson, MO would have been a better bet. Closer to the home of the tea party folks, they could have turned it into a mini-vacation, lots of hotel rooms, and generally a family-friendly environment.
rhp6033 @3:
Excellent suggestion! In addition, they could freely exercise their Trigger-happiness in Branson.
Places whose economies rely all or in part on tourism offer sensationally priced deals to organizers of trade shows and conventions to keep things going during the off season. There’s one large purveyor of “enterprise management software” that holds its big users’ group meeting every year in New Orleans around the first of August, because it’s hella cheap.
Since the teabaggers, by all appearances, and their protestations to the contrary, are hard-core conservatives, holding a big event in Vegas would appear to clash with the whole “family values” thing. Maybe they discovered that the next big hotel down the strip was holding a burlesque revival. More likely, someone had the notion to put on a big show of force to try and scare Harry Reid into retiring, and pulled the plug when they realized they didn’t have the numbers.
Hmm, reading back on the TPM back-threads.
They really did try to book this at the Pallazo hotel/casino. For a while I thought maybe they were using a public convention center or something, which would have avoided the minimum room guarantee problem and the casino PR problem, as well.
The Tea Party Nation e-mail listed, in addition to the heat, that “We have also received numerous emails from people who were forced to decide between family vacations and attending the convention.” Well, duh. That’s been a problem for party activists for the past several generations. But more importantly, note that cancelling the convention barely a week before it is to occur doesn’t solve the problem for the people who USED THEIR VACATION TIME FOR THIS CONVENTION. In most companies, scheduling vacation time is something you have to do months in advance, and re-scheduling on a whim isn’t possible. Likewise, these people are already out the $399 attendence fee PLUS the room rate – I doubt the hotel’s going to give them refunds. Oh, and let’s not forget the non-refundable airfare tickets to vegas! It seems that for those who did register, they are going to have to go to Vegas on vacation this week or skip vacation entirely this year.
Some interesting thoughts from the TPM comment boards:
And after reading the e-mail statement from the Tea-Party Nation, which expressed reluctance at canceling the convention but hoping everyone would still dig deep into their pocketbooks to keep the movement going, I couldn’t help but chuckle at this one:
Oops, forgot to post the link for # 7, above:
Tea Party Convention Postponed — Vegas In July Is Too Hot!
Among their many deficits, it’s clear that Teabaggers have no planning or organizational skills. Such a surprise. I hope Cynny paid to go.
Hence their desire to govern cities, states, and nation. Truly Grover Norquist’s wet-dream.
There’s also an implication here that Scaifes, Perrys et al who’ve bankrolled a lot of the “astroturfing” in recent years, including the Swift Boat Bullshitters and the charter-bus loudmouths from whom the “tea-party” movment presumably evolved, have, for whatever reason, started to pull the plug.
Well, if Vegas is too hot, they could always try for Buffalo in January.
# 11: I think you are on the right track. It’s a lot of fun ridiculing their excuses, but the short story here is that they couldn’t get enough people signed up to justify proceeding, on a financial and/or P.R. basis.
The reasons quoted – that it was too hot in Las Vegas in July, or that it conflicted with people’s vaction plans, are just excuses. There will always be people who wish it were somewhere else, or on a different schedule, or who can only take so much time out of their work schedules.
The real source of their problems are known only to them. Was Las Vegas too much of “sin city” for the Evangelical’s taste? Did too many people want to camp or stay in cheaper lodgings to satisfy the hotel’s minimum room booking requirements? Did the Tea Party folks use up all their available funds and vacation time over the past year for other events/campaigns, and simply are tapped out in terms of both time and money? Are there too many divergent interests involved to keep the movement together (state’s rights seperationists, libertarians, family values evangelicals, gun right’s advocates, fiscal conservatives, etc.)? Is there too much in-fighting within the seperate entities which have organized under the banner, each seeking to be the “national leader” for their own ambition?
Goldy,
You are having trouble paying your bills and your mortgage(and thus repeatedly begging for money), yet you somehow have the cash for a boondoggle to Vegas?
does anyone else find this a bit odd?
smells like…a scam to me..
# 14: Attending conventions is something people have to do in professional life sometimes. It’s one of the things you have to do to take a struggling business to a higher level.
Besides, it appears that Netroots Nation had enough sense to book the convention in a property off the main drag (east of the freeway from the main casinos). They are probably saving a lot of money, as well as keeping room rates low in the process.
So if some bloggers who barely support their own blogging efforts can make their convention work, then how come some patriotic Tea Party folks can’t do the same in the same town?
Is it because the weather in Vegas is SO MUCH COOLER in a week later in July?
@15
LMFAO….maybe you can pick up the air fare.
sucker.
Maxie,
Do you honestly believe that being a sorry-assed sonofabitch will get you to heaven?
Is goldy paying B&O taxes on the money he makes from HA?
discuss.
Is Max sane? Or does he wear a dress just because?
discuss.
Capital Hill Joe is picking up the goldy’s drink tab in Vegas.
Sucker.
so is that a no on the B&O taxes?
hmm….