Time marches so quickly that it is unsettling to recall that barely two years ago, there was no Tea Party. Then on February 19, 2009 in a rant heard round the nation, CNBC business news editor Rick Santelli from the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange called for a popular rebellion against what he considered an out-of-control government that was then refinancing mortgages (see below). He asked traders to hold a tea party, dumping derivatives into the Chicago River. Soon there was a Tea Party, or many Tea Parties, or no Tea Party. But what IS the Tea Party?

Today there is much debate as to whether the Tea Party is growing in popularity or shrinking in consequence. Freudians once plaintively asked, “What do women want?” Today pundits echo Sigmund’s question, “What does the Tea Party want?” And in a year in which the politics of budgets will dominate domestic debate, our imaginaries of the Tea Party matter.

Space opened for a small government movement as many middle-class Americans felt that government spending, controlled by liberals, was spiraling out of control. Money was being spent too fast. There was the bank bailout, the automotive bailout, refinancing mortgages, and, most dramatically, the stimulus bill, cleverly renamed by some conservative commentators as the “Porkulus” bill. Rather than targeting government spending on easily justified projects, such as infrastructure, repairing aging bridges and highways, the government spent money without a plan. Republicans and independents argued that the Democrats dusted off their personal wish lists, lying in the bottom of their file cabinets, and proclaimed that those projects would save the republic. Any spending seemed to suffice to rescue the economy. Academics know fortunate colleagues who received stimulus spending to support their graduate students. Fairs and festivals were awarded tax dollars. Such a wild increase of the deficit was all-too-easy to mock. But beyond mocking, opponents made the argument, a serious one that even the President now embraces, that such spending poses existential dangers for the national welfare. When the unemployment rate sped (and remains) above the 8% level that President Obama promised would not be reached, something appeared to have gone terribly wrong. We were using our “seed corn” and jobs were not sprouting.

This spending spree, while perhaps avoiding a Depression, led to the belief that the Democratic majorities in Congress were King Georges to the red state Paul Reveres. Holding a tea party to remind the rulers of the fears of the governed had immediate appeal. Groups under the banner of the Tea Party organized rallies “for the rest of us.” The April 15^th rallies were Ferris Bueller’s Dad’s Day Off.

These political hijinks are well and good, but, after all, what is this Tea Party? The rallies were spirited, but they lacked a permanent infrastructure. There was no there, there. The Tea Party is a critter lacking head or spine. Can a movement survive on heart alone?

The powerful appeal of the Tea Party, a mass without leaders, provides opportunities to control it for personal ends. Some were undoubtedly sincere, and others were grifters. Some are serious about controlling government spending; others focus on curios and clutter. The ambitious searched for followers to justify their desire for attention and fame. And like mushrooms, new groups appeared each dewy morning. We find the Tea Party Nation, the Tea Party Express, the Tea Party Patriots, the Tea Party Coalition, the Tea Party Federation, and on and on. Anyone with a microphone and a coterie can lead a Tea Party. While figures such as Seattle blogger Keli Carender have more street cred than others, many claim the mantel.

In such a world, what is the media to do? Reporters demand a steady font of information to organize their work life. A leaderless movement is an affront to professional journalism. To whom does one turn? While some colorful individuals are anointed as “Tea Party favorites,” assigned the leadership of a leaderless movement, often pundits turn to their typewriters. Without leaders who will object if a writer claims that the Tea Party is happy, engaged, angry, disappointed, or melting away? This week journalists ask whether John Boehner passed the Tea Party test, whomever the grader might be. Is it Rush Limbaugh? Dick Armey? Sarah Palin? Jim Demint? Or some unnamed Joe the Plumber in a red state suburb? The imagined Tea Party may be serious about the debt, fundamentally racist, supportive of small business, conservative, libertarian, or simply confused. Take your choice.

While what we casually label as the Tea Party is located in one sector of our political space, in truth the movement is amorphous. The Tea Party is whatever a writer wishes for it to be. The larger issue – an issue that transcends this movement – is that as a matter of course we refer to imagined groups to which we assign firm and sticky meaning. The voters want this. The public is demanding that, women desire this, blacks insist on that. We take diverse and divided non-groups and erase their differences. We create one from many. In so doing, we mislead. While social categories have central tendencies, they also have variance. We deceive ourselves if we assert that any unorganized public has a narrowly tailored creed. And in this sense, despite our claims, the Tea Party is truly no thing.