Low taxes and small government may be the Tea Party's defining issues, says Hanna Rosin in Slate, but the movement has developed a fierce "feminist streak." With a growing number of female Tea Party candidates and inflating resentment against the male-dominated Republican and Democratic parties, the mostly-female movement has arguably become a bastion of women's empowerment. An excerpt:
"Is the Tea Party a women's movement? More women than men belong—55 percent, according to the latest Quinnipiac poll. And while no movement that uses Michelle Malkin as a poster girl could fairly be described as feminist, the party has become an insta-network for ambitious women.... Some are aspiring candidates who could never get traction within the tight, local Republican Party networks. Some are angry-mom-activist types who, like their heroine Sarah Palin, outgrew the PTA. But some would surprise you with their straightforward feminist rage.
"For the last few years Anna Barone, a Tea Party leader from Mount Vernon, N.Y., has used the e-mail handle annaforhillary.com: 'The way they treated Hillary is unforgiveable, and then they did it to Sarah Palin,' she said. 'I've been to 15 Tea Party meetings and never heard a woman called a name just because she's powerful. I guess you could say the Tea Party is where I truly became a feminist.'
