Tea Parties Are a Bad Idea

I want to take a minute to give my 2 cents on the tea parties going on around America right now. This is a really, really BAD idea. Sending tea bags or any other questionable substance into the IRS or any other government work place will only waste people's time, and YOUR tax payer dollars.

I used to work in the mail room for the IRS back around the time of the whole Anthrax scare. Anytime something comes into the mailroom that is questionable in any form, it HAS to be treated as Hazardous Material.

When that happens, all of the work has to stop. The employees have to be either quarantined or evacuated to a safe place. The hazmat team has to be called in to deal with the substance. And because of the Anthrax scare, they cannot assume that it's tea because of the news stories or whatever and just ignore it. Because as we found out during the anthrax scare, some people are just sick, and they could even get some great inspirations from these Teabaggers.

I had to be quarantined or evacuated a number of times during the three years I had worked there. The times I was quarantined, there were at least two occasions when I had to be kept past my work hours (and I worked swings the first year so by the time I got out of work it was 10pm) before they evacuated us. Both times I was told to go home immediately, not to come in contact with anyone, shower well, and wash all clothing immediately and anything else I had come in contact with before coming in contact with other people. One of those times I had a little 3 year old and a small infant who I could not pick up from the sitters until I did all this in order to protect their safety, even if the substance really was nothing.

And you know what is used to pay the hazmat team, the police that have to get involved, the overtime that is needed in order to now get these tax forms through on time because of the amount of time that the employees are not allowed to work during the quarantine/evacuation, etc, etc? Tax payer dollars. So, if you are looking for a way to protest your tax payer dollars not being used efficiently, this is not the way to do it.

Please, if you are thinking about attending one of these Tea Parties or being involved in anyway, I ask you to please think of this and ask yourself if this is tax money and time well spent.