The TEA Party is a loose affiliation of people who are fed up with the current direction of government on all levels and want to see a return to the limited scope under it was originally created.

There is no real organizational structure in how it is set up, nor are those who attend TEA Party rallies or meetings in any way obligated to directly follow the issues promoted by any one particular TEA Party group.

I can tell you that the TEA Party meetings that I have attended, those attending were not very appreciative of the fact that republicans voted for tax hikes (case in point: just ask Rep. Knollenberg about the reaction he received when he got called out on his vote in favor of that first round of tax hikes on Seniors).

I would chalk up the lack of more protests so far on to two main factors:

One, I doubt that anyone believed that the legislature would work even half as fast as they did when they rammed through this year's budget (albeit not very well after you read everything above).

Two, by the time things filtered down the the "rank and file" members, those bills had already been approved.

If you go through the journals of the bills being submitted, there is an awful lot of information to absorb. I haven't even gotten through any amendments that have been made that take even more time to filter down, to say nothing about any backroom deals that are made for votes (sometimes on the same day).

Most of us have real jobs, so out time spent on the above is very limited. But from my observations, my opinion here is that the TEA Party groups aren't going to be so forgiving with elected officials in the near future, especially during election time, after they have had a more time to do a thorough review of their voting records.