What's coming up for future 'tea party' protests?
Last month's "tea party" protests have come and gone but are not forgotten. New protests are already brewing, some maybe this holiday weekend, others probably for July 4, with txt msgs and tweets flying back and forth.
The phenomenon in many ways is familiar in American political history -- a kind of eruption, an incoherent lashing out by people angry over taxes and spending and big government and bigger spending. And the uncertainty of their current lives.
Contrary to some cable news channels, we found "tea party" protesters often to be just as angry at Republicans in general and George W. Bush in particular as at the awe-inspiring size of the Obama Democratic administration's spending plans.
Historically, these protests have fizzled without some political personality to coalesce around -- a Gene McCarthy, a John Anderson, a George Wallace. A Ron Paul even.
Our Times colleague Richard Fausset spent a good deal of time recently with "tea party" participants. And we asked him to go through his notes and thoughts and share the experiences with us. Here's what he told us:
The people I talked with had a variety of targets. This doesn’t mean they went easy on Obama, however. One fake campaign sign showed a picture of the president and...
... a certain hirsute German philosopher: It said: “Obama Marx ’08 – BFF.”
Another sign featured a picture of Obama in a Soviet officers’ uniform and the words: “JUST SAY NYET.”
“Hey, is that available as a T-shirt?” a guy asked the sign holder. “It will be soon,” came the reply.
It was somewhat surprising to hear from numerous folks that their beef wasn’t just with Obama’s economic policies. Time and again, people said they'd been just as upset with what they saw as profligate spending under Bush.
Tim Lee was typical. A councilman from suburban Atlanta's Cobb County. “The Republicans,” he said, “were doing just as bad for eight years.”
Lee’s home county, like many municipalities around the country, has been facing its own economic crisis, forced to cut millions from budgets to match anemic tax revenue. As for the national economy, he said the federal government should have “let it crash” instead of offering bailouts to troubled industries and a big stimulus package.
“We would have picked ourselves up and moved on,” Lee added. “The pain would have been short-term. Now we’re taking the long- term pain of having to pay all that money back.”
John Pettit, a 48-year-old contractor, hoisted a sign that read “Chains – we can count on.” Pettit said the nation was “headed for bondage” with its reliance on government borrowing. Pettit’s concerns about government policy didn’t start with Obama or the current Congress, he said.
It went all the way back to the New Deal. Although he said the new guys were part of that long, sorry history by spending money that they simply didn’t have. “Hey," Pettit said, "good habits are learned in bad times. And bad habits are learned in good times. Right now, Congress isn’t learning.”
The rallies typically have a temporary stage, a parade of local officials speaking, radio DJs and minor celebrities rallying the crowd.
What emerges in thought later is the lack of a unifying figure around whom the "tea party" folks can rally.
It will be interesting to see if someone emerges as organizers roll out plans for the next round of protests. If it is to be effective in the long term, it seems the movement will need a decider: not just a public figurehead, but someone who can focus and modulate the multifarious blob of themes and emotions that seem to drive this fascinating middle-class revolt.
Someone, in short, who can tap both the thoughtfulness and anger behind the movement, the patriotism and Americans’ natural skepticism of government power … plus the anti-Obamaism, the call for a fair tax, the fear of new controls on carbon emissions. All that and more.
-- Richard Fausset
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Photos: Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times; Scott Olson / Getty Images
Bravo Richard Fausset. I think your notes are the most accurate description of tea party movement participants I've seen in mainstream media.
Posted by: Mike W | May 22, 2009 at 04:01 PM
The Tea Party Protests should not be either pro republican or pro democratic rallies. We should be looking at the Credit Card Companies and how they have suffocated local economies with their recent actions.
The punitive actions by the credit card companies against most americans who are conscientious customers has caused government taxing revenues to decline.
The credit card companies are a big component of why taxes and stimulus packages are the order of the day.
http://www.Daily-Protest.com
Posted by: Alessandro Machi | May 22, 2009 at 08:15 PM
We Need A Federalism Amendment
We the people are asking our State Legislators to resist the growth of federal power. We ask thath they petition Congress for a convention to propose amendments to the Constitution.
We need the federal government to halt its practice of imposing mandates upon the states for purposes not enumerated by the Constitution of the United States.
We want a restoration of a healthy balance between federal and state power while protecting the liberties of the people. We propose a new "Federalism Amendment" , proposed recently in the Wall Street Journal, with wording similar to this:
Section 1: Congress shall have power to regulate or prohibit any activity between one state and another, or with foreign nations, provided that no regulation or prohibition shall infringe any enumerated or unenumerated right, privilege or immunity recognized by this Constitution.
Section 2: Nothing in this article, or the eighth section of article I, shall be construed to authorize Congress to regulate or prohibit any activity that takes place wholly within a single state, regardless of its effects outside the state or whether it employs instrumentalities therefrom; but Congress may define and punish offenses constituting acts of war or violent insurrection against the United States.
Section 3: The power of Congress to appropriate any funds shall be limited to carrying into execution the powers enumerated by this Constitution and vested in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof; or to satisfy any current obligation of the United States to any person living at the time of the ratification of this article.
Section 4: The 16th article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed, effective five years from the date of the ratification of this article.
Section 5: The judicial power of the United States to enforce this article includes but is not limited to the power to nullify any prohibition or unreasonable regulation of a rightful exercise of liberty. The words of this article, and any other provision of this Constitution, shall be interpreted according to their public meaning at the time of their enactment.
Except for its expansion of Congressional power in Section 1, this proposed amendment is consistent with the original meaning of our Constitution. It merely clarifies the boundary between federal and state powers, and reaffirms the power of courts to police this boundary and protect individual liberty.
Posted by: Pom Pom Girl | May 22, 2009 at 09:27 PM
Tea parties do NOT need a "leader" thank you very much. This is a grass roots movement. Those opposed to the rallies will do their best to decapitate "the leadership" to discredit the groundswell. By not providing an easy target, we are more difficult to combat by conventional means. We have to leverage our assets if we want a fulcrum to change the system. Professional politicians should only participate in the demonstrations as private citizens.
Posted by: Vejadu | May 24, 2009 at 07:13 AM
President Eisenhower warned of the dangers of a military/industrial complex but he was wrong. The real danger to our Republic is the media/government complex. The media used to be the watch dog to warn a protect us of the excesses and corruption of government. Now however, the media is in bed with and in the tank for big, bloated corrupt government. Media and government employees - and their "managers" - share the same ideology i.e. far left and the glue that binds these kindred spirits together are unions. Most government and media employees belong to unions and unions, of course, support Democrats. Simply put, the media can no longer be trusted to defend our Constitutional rights. If you doubt that, tell me the last time you heard Olbermman, Matthews, Couric or Scheiffer defend the 2nd Amendment. And tell me the last time you saw a story about corruption in government OR media unions. The brothers and sisters in media and government simply will not rat on each other. How many investigations of the media has the EEOC launched for violation of the sexual harassment laws, which include creating a sexually hostile work environment? When Anderson Cooper exposed his CNN stage and crew to the gross verbal picture of "teabagging," was he even chastised by management - say nothing about the EEOC. Why? Cooper and his cres are a members of AFTRA and the EEOC employees are members of the federal employee's union. Again, beware the media/government complex - they are not looking out for you, they are looking to enslave you.
Posted by: Don DeVan | May 24, 2009 at 08:59 AM