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Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem.

Tea Party Archive

Saturday

26

May 2012

4

COMMENTS

Big Government Does Not Make America Great

Written by , Posted in Big Government, Culture & Society, Liberty & Limited Government

In yet another screed against the Tea Party, Van Jones offers a vehement defense of gigantic govenrment:

“At this point in this struggle, it’s the so-called patriots who are the ones who are smashing down every American institution,” Jones said last weekend in Milwaukee. “It’s the so-called patriots, the ones who come out here with their Tea Party and the flags and call themselves patriots — they’re the ones that are smashing down our unions, smashing down public education, smashing down every American institution that we built, and our parents built, and our grandparents built to make this country great.”

As is the wont of the statist, Van Jones confuses the country for its government, and America’s institutions for government bureaucracies. The institutions that truly make America great – the families, the churches, and the businesses – are not administered by appointed lackeys, nor found in federal budgets. They come from free peoples allowed to flourish relatively unencumbered by overbearing governments.

Wednesday

23

May 2012

0

COMMENTS

Joe Biden's Imagination

Written by , Posted in General/Misc.

Joe Biden says to “imagine where we’d be if the Tea Party hadn’t taken control of the House of Representatives.”

Thanks to new, cutting edge technology I have tapped into Joe’s brain and extracted just such imagination in lyrical form:

Imagine there’s no Tea Party,
It’s easy if you try.
No investigations for us,
Our only limits are the sky.
Imagine all the Keynesians
Spending for today.

Imagine there’s no elections,
It isn’t hard to do.
Nobody to elect or vote for,
And no Constitution too.
Imagine all the bureaucrats
Dictating life in peace.

You may say Old Joe’s a socialist,
But I’m not the only one.
Someday you’ll be forced to join us,
And the Party will be as one.

Imagine no free choices,
I wonder if you can.
No need for self-reliance,
Julia’s life is in our hands.
Imagine all the people,
Sharing Obama’s stash.

You may say I’m a schemer,
But I’m not the only one.
I know someday you’ll join us,
And we’ll all worship The One.

Sunday

16

October 2011

2

COMMENTS

Tea Party, OWS Congruence Greatly Overstated

Written by , Posted in Liberty & Limited Government

Some, particularly libertarians who can find at least some ideological agreement in either group, think there is hope for the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street (and its various offshoots) to work together somehow. They base this off an assessment of common ground expressed by this image:

Obviously it’s difficult generalizing movements that have significant diversity of views even within their membership, and the OWS crowd is particularly difficult to pin down. But insofar as their views can even be deciphered, the image seems a fairly accurate representation. But it’s also incredibly misleading.

Yes, there is overlap in what folks are upset about, but there is virtually none in the proposed solutions. Consider the same image with the logical solutions added. The Tea Party side would read, “The government has way too much power, so it should be reduced and the government should therefore be smaller.” And the Occupier side would read, “Large corporations have too much power, so it should be reduced through greater regulation, and thus a bigger government.” There is no common ground here, because the prescriptions are exactly the opposite of one another.

Occupy Wall Street is a big government movement at a time when big governments are imploding the world over. It is the last gasp of a dying ideology, lashing out in rage at its own impotence in the face of necessary cuts in government spending. They are the American equivalent of violent Greek protesters incapable of accepting the inherent internal contradictions of large welfare states that were behind the nation’s insolvency. Pretending that advocates for limited government can work with these people in any way, shape or form is an exercise in self-delusion.

Saturday

15

May 2010

0

COMMENTS

Elites Hate When The People Speak

Written by , Posted in Election Time

Much of the animosity we’ve witnessed directed at the Tea Party over the last year has come from political and cultural elites who find regular people disturbing, if not downright disgusting.  The peasants, according to elites, are prone to temper tantrums and just don’t get how things work in the sophisticated political world. That same attitude was on display this last weekend following the primary defeat of Sen. Bob Bennett.

On last Sunday’s Meet the Press, David Brooks described Bennett’s defeat as a “damn outrage.”  Liberal E.J. Dionne went a step further and called it “a nonviolent coup” because the Utah voters dared “deny the sitting Republican senator even a chance of getting on the primary ballot.”   Why, it’s almost like these voters think they’re allowed to choose their own representatives or something!

Brooks insists that Bennett is a “good senator” just “trying to get things done.” Unfortunately, what he was trying to get done was not what his electorate wanted him to get done.  While he was busy supporting TARP and advocating an individual mandate for health care, the people of Utah wanted spending restraint and less intrusive government.  On the most important votes regarding these issues, Bennett was too often on the wrong side for their taste.

It’s no damn outrage that voters would send a senator packing after serving three terms when he promised to serve only two. It’s no damn outrage that a Washington insider be sent on his way following the mess Washington has created.  The real damn outrage is the disdain with which elitists like David Brooks treat voters who don’t share their sophisticated policy preferences.

Cross-posted at Big Government and RightWingNews.

Sunday

18

April 2010

0

COMMENTS

New York Times Runs Racist Op-Ed Against Tea Party

Written by , Posted in General/Misc., Identity Politics, Media Bias

Charles M. Blow, a regular columnist for the New York Times, has taken the already despicable race narrative on the Tea Parties to another level.  He begins with a bit of “diversity” hunting:

I had specifically come to this rally because it was supposed to be especially diverse. And, on the stage at least, it was. The speakers included a black doctor who bashed Democrats for crying racism, a Hispanic immigrant who said that she had never received a single government entitlement and a Vietnamese immigrant who said that the Tea Party leader was God. It felt like a bizarre spoof of a 1980s Benetton ad.

The juxtaposition was striking: an abundance of diversity on the stage and a dearth of it in the crowd, with the exception of a few minorities like the young black man who carried a sign that read “Quit calling me a racist.”

…It was a farce. This Tea Party wanted to project a mainstream image of a group that is anything but. A New York Times/CBS News poll released on Wednesday found that only 1 percent of Tea Party supporters are black and only 1 percent are Hispanic. It’s almost all white.

The implication: a lack of the kind of diversity Mr. Blow deems important (because there are other kinds, which he apparently doesn’t care about) is somehow condemning.  Notice he never actually explains the logic for how this matters.  But don’t hold your breath waiting for Mr. Blow to similarly investigate an NAACP event, or the next Million Man March.

But that’s hardly the worst.  Things really get ugly when he begins using his own racist attacks:

And even when compared to other whites, their views are extreme and marginal. For instance, white Tea Party supporters are twice as likely as white independents and eight times as likely as white Democrats to believe that Barack Obama was born in another country.

Furthermore, they were more than eight times as likely as white independents and six times as likely as white Democrats to think that the Obama administration favors blacks over whites.

Thursday night I saw a political minstrel show devised for the entertainment of those on the rim of obliviousness and for those engaged in the subterfuge of intolerance. I was not amused.

Because, you know, white views are just naturally extreme and marginal, so even by that standard the tea parties are on the fringe!  What a racist.  Can you imagine the New York Times running an op-ed that says “even compared to other blacks, their views are [insert negative attribute]?” The author of such a statement would be crucified.

He then doubles down with a racist attack on the black speakers, who he dubs a “minstrel show.”  Apparently no black person is capable of the free thinking that might lead them to be there because they believe in the cause. Oh no.  They must be getting used or duped.  I wonder if Mr. Blow has ever applied the same logic to his employment at the upper-class, white New York Times.  Probably not, because if he did his head might just explode.