Via Althouse, here’s a snippet from a letter by Jim Messina, Campaign Manager for Obama for America re Iowa:
The extremist Tea Party agenda won a clear victory. No matter who the Republicans nominate, we’ll be running against someone who has embraced that agenda in order to win — vowing to let Wall Street write its own rules, end Medicare as we know it, roll back gay rights, leave the troops in Iraq indefinitely, restrict a woman’s right to choose, and gut Social Security to pay for more tax cuts for millionaires and corporations.
I’ve been paying attention to the Tea Party since it first emerged from the astroturf laboratory of Dick Armey. Even before it turned into a grassroots coalition and ran amok, it has never been about abortion, gay rights or Iraq.
I got this from the Tea Party Express website:
The Tea Party Express is proud to stand for six simple principles
No more bailouts
Reduce the size and intrusiveness of government
Stop raising our taxes
Repeal Obamacare
Cease out-of-control spending
Bring back American prosperity
Tea Party Patriots:
Tea Party Patriots does not have a foreign policy. We have three core principles: fiscal responsibility, constitutionally limited government, and free market solutions.
That’s two of the largest Tea Party organizations. There are several major groups and lots more little ones. Nobody speaks for all of them, but the common thread among them all is the idea of smaller government and lower taxes.
The Tea Partiers don’t like Wall Street, and they want government to keep its hands off of Social Security and Medicare. The Tea Party members are mostly conservative Republicans and independents, which means they tend to support conservative positions on issues like abortion and gay rights. But those are not Tea Party issues.
I’m not a Tea Partier. I’ve never had any interest in joining up or participating with any or the TP groups. That’s because I disagree with them on almost every issue.
On the other hand, I respect their right to assemble and petition for redress of grievances, and I admire their effectiveness. I don’t think Tea Partiers are evil, bad, stupid, ignorant or racist. They are generally good people who have DIFFERENT beliefs, and they have just as much right to them as we do to ours.
Here’s what so many people fail to grasp:
In a democratic system, when bad laws are passed (or good laws repealed) IT IS NOT THE END OF THE WORLD!
Let’s say the Republicans managed to end Social Security. What would happen?
Within a very short time they would either reinstate it or replace it with something similar. If they didn’t they would be replaced in the next election by people who would.
Our history shows that sooner or later the party in power will be out of power and vice versa. In my lifetime there have been eleven different presidents and control of the White House has changed hands between the parties six times. In 1992 the Democrats had the White House and both houses of Congress. In 2002 the Republicans held full control. In 2008 the Democrats were in charge again. For most of my life the parties have shared power with one holding the White House and the other holding Congress.
Somehow we’ve managed to survive.
Filed under: Disingenuous Democrats, Tea Party | Tagged: Tea Party | 13 Comments »
