Half Sigma uses a class analysis on the tea party. He argues that it is indeed a Marxist movement responding to the proletariat or workers. I have quoted almost the entire post, but it is good. go read it.

The Tea Party movement is accused of being right-wing, and people are accustomed to associating Marxism with the left, so some will be surprised, even shocked, that the Tea Party is a Marxist movement.

We should be clear that the Tea Party is not promoting Communism (an idea which turned out to be really bad), but rather that the Tea Party movement represents the rising class consciousness of the Proletariat, as predicted by Marx.

The modern left doesn’t promote the interests of the Proletariat; it’s the Lumpenproletariat that the left is most concerned about. The Democratic Party relies upon the Lumpenproletariat to win elections, and once elected uses the power of government to advance its own moral agenda which is adverse to the interests of the Proletariat.

The people who write columns in newspapers opining how much they hate the Tea Party movement come from the class most closely analogous to what Marx called the Petit-Bourgeoisie

via Half Sigma: The Tea Party is a Marxist movement.

What half Sigma does not say is that an alliance of the underclasses with the elite and intellectual class will not be able to sustain a revolt by the workers and peasants. The workers and peasants are normally quite conservative on social issues. They do not like interference in their work and traditions. But… they won the US revolution, the French revolution (and then supported Napoleon to end it) the Soviet revolution (because they thought they would get the land) and both the Chinese revolutions (because they thought they would get their land).

Beck and Palin speak to these people in the US: Paul Henry speaks for them in NZ. Chris Trotter describes them — and states that the current progressive parties are seen by them as the enemy.  And I think Chris Trotter is correct in this assessment.