The Wing-Nut Code: What Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin Are Really Saying to Their Followers

Editor's note: As members of the Tea Party and patriot movements march and rally in Washington, D.C., on September 12, they will be out in full regalia, and you can expect the speeches to be loaded with code -- signals to various factions of their coalition, some of them armed, to mobilize politically on specific issues (health-care reform, energy reform, net neutrality) and against President Obama himself. Here's a glossary of the symbols and shorthand likely to be employed in this weekend's smoke-and-mirrors display of purported right-wing power.

When Glenn Beck offers an odd-looking icon for his 9-12 Project, or Sarah Palin says something about her native state that sounds a bit to off-kilter to the ears of those in the lower 48, it's tempting to think, well, they're just nuts.

Perhaps they are, but that's beside the point. The point is that when Beck throws up a graphic of a segmented snake as his project's mascot, or Palin speaks of her native land as the "sovereign" state of Alaska, they're blowing a kind of dog-whistle for the armed and paranoid who make up the right-wing, neo-militia "Patriot" movement and the broader "Tea Party" coalition.

The loose affiliation of right-wing groups under the Tea Party umbrella can make it difficult to discern who's truly dangerous, and who's just an angry blowhard.

For instance, in its report about the resurgence of the militia movement, the Southern Poverty Law Center notes that a Minuteman militia in Southern California uses the Tea Party anthem as its call to arms.

Scott Roeder, the militant anti-abortion activist who is charged with the killing of Dr. George Tiller, counts himself among the members of the patriot movement.

But in Pittsburgh earlier this month, I sat among a group of disgruntled senior citizens at a conference sponsored by the astroturf group, Americans for Prosperity, who probably don't spend their weekends training for a war with the government, but nonetheless consider themselves to be part of the Tea Party coalition -- and perhaps even the patriot movement. Nonetheless, when conference speakers made reference to gun rights, they received heartfelt applause.

The Tea Party coalition is mobilizing for what it promises will be a big march on Washington on Sept. 12. As the date approaches, expect to hear more disguised shout-outs to patriots and tea-partiers, as right-wing politicians seek to placate the hordes said to be on their way to the nation's capitol.

Members of the far-right Tea Party and patriot movements love the iconography of the American Revolution. They fancy themselves as "patriots" in the mold of Ethan Allen and Charles Gadsden -- men who led militias against the troops of England's despotic King George III.

Yet much of their ideology stems from the states' rights philosophy of the Confederacy in the Civil War, and sometimes the ideas and symbols of the two wars are drawn together in a tangle of rage.

Some self-described "patriots" take part in the resurgent militia movement, but many do not. However, gun enthusiasts are rife in their ranks, and many view their role as one of "resistance" to what they see as government encroachment in their lives.

They oppose virtually all forms of taxation and almost anything run by the government. (Hence, the title of the site run by Grassfire.org known as ResistNet.)

Here are some words and images used by right-wing political and media figures as signals to the patriot and Tea Party constituencies, signals used to organize the throngs against health care legislation, environmental reforms and all things identified with President Barack Obama.

1. Snakes! -- Even before the American Revolution, the rattlesnake -- native to North America -- was a potent symbol for the American colonies. The patriot movement has appropriated the use of a number of Revolutionary War militia flags that feature rattlesnakes, often accompanied by the words, "Don't Tread On Me."