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In an announcement fraught with irony, it seems that the TEA Party is having trouble raising money.

Some leading tea party activists are concerned that their efforts to reshape American politics, starting with the 2010 elections, are being undermined by a shortage of cash that’s partly the result of a deep ambivalence within the movement’s grass roots over the very idea of fundraising and partly attributable to an inability to win over the wealthy donors who fund the conservative establishment.

“Okay, so you base a political movement on being stingy and distrustful and then want to act amazed when they fail to raise money?” Juanita laughs.  “Sneeze, your brains are dusty.”

“It’s kinda like how the Libertarian Party can’t get organized enough to do any damage.  Darlin’, if they could organize, they wouldn’t be Libertarians.  Hell, if they could get along with other people, they wouldn’t be Libertarians.”

“So, in my mind, this is one of those moments that you wonder what they expected?  They expected greedy people to donate money to anything?  Hell, these people are so tight that when they smile, their toes curl.”

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Contrary to what you might suspect, Juanita loves Newt Gingrich.

“Any days that I have the slightest inkling of a doubt about my allegiance to the Democratic party, along comes Newt and whacks me upside the head.”

“Judge Walker’s ruling overturning Prop 8 is an outrageous disrespect for our Constitution and for the majority of people of the United States who believe marriage is the union of husband and wife.”

“Now, you know that sentence should end ‘between a husband and wife, and a wife, and a wife.’ Newt Gingrich is lecturing on the sanctity of marriage?  Oh dear, that’s so sweet to my ears.”

“According to recent studies, Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh have, between them, been married to every woman in America except Verdelia, me, and you.  We’re not so sure about Thelma.  Maybe she didn’t marry them but she, like the rest of us, got screwed by at least one of them at some time or another.”

“I suspect that counts.”

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“I know that I’m going to upset some of my Democratic friends by saying this, but I am tired, tired, sick and tired of the DNC using Texas for a bag drag,” Juanita said this morning.

For the past 22 years, some state Democrats complain, the national party has used Texas like an ATM. The national party’s constant suck of money out of the state without reinvesting in Texas has given Republicans an advantage in state elections, they say.

“If they’d invest this money in Texas, we’d be a blue (Democratic) state,” said long-time party consultant Glenn Smith. “They (national party leaders) come down here and drag the sack and spend the money on themselves.”

During the 2008 election cycle, the Democratic National Committee raised $6.5 million from Texas donors and left $204,000 behind with the state party, according to data kept by the Center for Responsive Politics.

“It is my humble belief that they ought to have to leave 25% of what they raise here.  If they had done that in the past, Texas would be a blue state,” Juanita say with certainty.

“Now, nobody is more excited than I am that President Obama is going to speak at UT.  But, $5,000 a person to attend the fundraiser that follows – well, that money scampers out of Texas for somewhere like Michigan.  Uh, the DNC boys need to buy a pocket calculator.  Texas has twice as many electoral votes as Michigan.”

“Let us have some table scraps, Boys.  If you elect local Democrats in Texas, we’ll teach the voters why everybody should vote Democratic!”

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Juanita is just a little bit glad that Tom DeLay hasn’t gone to jail yet.  If he had, she wouldn’t have seen him on Dancing with the Stars wearing Spankx, unsuccessfully trying to hustle a minor league baseball franchise in Sugar Land, or be the featured speaker at the Pearland Exchange Club.

Tom DeLay still trying to find a free lunch

“It’s a looong way down from big cigars at Jack Abramoff’s restaurant and being the federal government,” Juanita says.  “And I have to admit that I have enjoyed watching Tom take the ride.”

“I think he’s doing a supermarket opening next week and mooching a free 18 holes over at Happy Randy’s Miniature Golf Emporium and Taco on a Stick,” Thelma reports.

“Yeah, I heard that Randy offered Tom a job to stand at the windmill in a little Dutch Boy costume for kiddie birthday parties,” Verdelia said.

If ya heard it at Juanita’s, it’s gotta be true.

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George W. Bush has decided to postpone publishing his memoirs until after the 2010 mid term elections because he doesn’t want to hurt the Republican Party.

Georeg W. Bush has memories?

“Could have fooled me,” Juanita says.