Roland, none of those things bear on whether, as a matter of fact, some Tea Party groups in the U.S. are in contact with these radical U.K. groups. Townsend has evidence to support the link. I agree that some of his statements were overly general, but for the most part, he wasn’t writing about the Tea Party movement as a whole. He was writing about the connections between some politically active groups in the U.S. in communication with some radical nationalist groups in the U.K.

Jon, You may well be right; however, that does not make this good journalism. It is typical of efforts of the left wing media (in Europe as well as in the U.S.) to denigrate the tea parties through guilt by association. The real tea party priorities are never mentioned. As I noted the author is unaware of the emphasis on support for women; the same is true for minorities: the tea parties are supporting more black candidates in districts that are not majority black than is the entire Democratic Party.

Roland, sorry friend, but I feel Jon’s reply to your post are well founded.
The piece is about “connections” and supplies many names, organization names, wesites etc for a person to fact check. I see NO “un-named” sources. Also, as a reviewer, some of your own biases and prejudices are coming through. We all have them, but the review criteria are specific. All journalism should focus and not ramble into nether worlds. This one is about connections and movement links and is pretty focused on that process. Some premises regarding intents may be “assumptions”, but the communications flows are specified. Only fact checking will validate truth or not. Your statement “typical efforts by left wing media” (among others) somewhat belies your own objectivity.
Been there done that myself but I’m trying harder.