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Why The Tea Party Freaks Out The Left

by on Oct. 19, 2010, under Uncategorized

Commentary magazine is one of the finest publications you’ll find online; Jennifer Rubin is one of its finest writers. In her recent article, “The Tea Party Rocks The Right And The Left, Rubin points out how the Tea Party movement is forcing both Republicans and Democrats to take note of, and adapt to, it.

It’s pushing Republicans back to the Founders’ original ideals of limited national government.

It’s pushing Democrats and liberals over the edge.

Born in response to President Obama’s self-declared desire to fundamentally change America, the tea party movement has made its central goals abundantly clear. Activists and the sizeable swath of voters who sympathize with them want to reduce the massively ballooning national debt, cut runaway federal spending, keep taxes in check, reinvigorate the economy, and block the expansion of the state into citizens’ lives.

Peter Berkowitz’s Wall Street Journal opinion on the Tea Party does acknowledge that “the tea party sports its share of clowns, kooks and creeps.” (The vast majority of whom, the Tea Parties have repudiated). He also shows how leading liberal media voices—Paul Krugman, E.J. Dionne—are utterly befuddled by the whole tea party movement. They simply can’t figure it out. So, they insult it and try to dismiss it.

Dismissing it hasn’t worked too well, has it?

the left did not merely misunderstand the Tea Party movement but actively distorted and vilified it. When unsubstantiated claims of “racism” start flying, you know the left is running scared. Certainly the Tea Party was the repudiation of the notion that the recession and the election of Obama had moved the country to the left. It simply couldn’t be that there was a broad and principled objection to this hypothesis. And when the rabble — that would be fellow citizens — showed again and again that the movement was genuine, determined, and deeply principled, the left had a collective meltdown, railing at the supposedly crazy citizenry.

See? THAT’s why I read Jennifer Rubin.

For those who think (or claim) that the Tea Party is a tool of the Republican elite, the results of Republican primaries disprove that. Quite a few members of the Republican elite—Bob Bennett in Utah, Lisa Murkowski in Alaska, Charlie Crist in Florida, Mike Castle in Delaware—were turned out of office by, in large part, the efforts of Tea Partiers participating in the party primary process.

Wonder why Tea Partiers didn’t gravitate to the Democratic Party? Perhaps they realized today’s Democratic Party isn’t really interested in doing any of these things: reduce the massively ballooning national debt, cut runaway federal spending, keep taxes in check, reinvigorate the economy, and block the expansion of the state into citizens’ lives.

The left understood all too well what the Tea Party was about, tried its best to strangle it in its political crib, and now has seen its worst fears come true.

THAT’s why the Left is freaking out.

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  • ari

    The Tea Party is today’s iteration of the same right-wing state’s rights conservatives that have been around since the south lost the war. If the Tea Party was really only interested in those issues it wouldn’t freak the vast majority of America out…but it’s not. They also hold extreme views about abortion, social security, medicare, public education, and civil rights. The Tea Party is totally out of the main stream and that it exactly what you are going to see on November 2nd when they all go down in flames.

  • Chris

    The reason the Tea Party scares the crap out of the Left is that for the first time in many years their ideas have some mainstream populist support. I’m 46 and I’ve seen the Tea Party ideas many time in the past but they were mainly from the far right-wing of the Republican Party. I can remember back in 1983 when I attended a young Republicans’ meeting people passing out the anti-Federal Reserve, DOE, DOC, and so forth stuff. The only difference this time is that this time the terrible economy and large Federal debt has given this fringe of the party a larger voice than they deserve. I will not vote for any Tea Party candidates because I feel once the economy turns around the voters will turn on the Republican party fast (I will not sacrifice short term gains for long term damage to the Republican Party).

  • anonymous_coward

    “They also hold extreme views about abortion, social security, medicare, public education, and civil rights. ”

    Perhaps you are out of the mainstream and need to read the US Consitution.

  • notagain

    The Tea Party stands for freedom for the American people.  The Left stands for the enslavement of the American People.  Globalism, Socialism and welfare are forms of slavery.  Can a man own a farm and not have the government involved?  If not, the government is wrong and needs to be changed. 

    • The Lou Show

      Allow me to correct your virtual ignorance about the “Tea Party”:
      Those sucked up by the Tea Party think they are a grass roots organization.  They are not.  The Tea Party is a fabrication from wealthy political action committees.  From near-top to bottom, they are woefully uninformed on matters of the law and in matters of history, despite being the so-called party of the US Constitution.
      Government programs like Social Security, while being demonized as “Socialism”, actually helped give rise to America’s Middle Class; the modern move towards “Globalism” can be traced back to the end of WWII (and before) and cannot be stopped given today’s virtual world, and; welfare accounts for a mere fraction of what’s spent on so-called Defense.
      While the idea of “balancing the budget” or “reducing the deficit” is logical and appealing, the Tea Party, the Republicans, will accomplish nothing without The People.  And the People are moreso and mostly composed of those people the Tea Party and Republicans blame for our ills (immigrants, people of color, gays, women, various religions).  But the Teapublican continues to protect and do the bidding of moneyed interests.  They are eluded into thinking they are an autonomous bunch but they are mere puppets.
      They are puppets who do not even know how to spell . . . because Fox News canceled “Spelling with Fox & Friends”. but I digress.
      However, returning to the economics of the thing, Fiscal Health can be quickly achieved by greatly reducing Defense spending and spending back at home.  Clinton left a surplus, and it was a Bush that squandered the money and put us in deficit.
      But, of course, no Teabagger, no so-called “Patriot”, would ever agree to scale back military spending, arguing that it would make America look “weak”.
      Oh, the Tea Party will certainly win over hearts and minds (wink, wink) going after entitlements and cutting anything else they can think of to cut in order to save money; their positions are inherently unpopular to the masses.  (I especially laugh with glee whenever I hear one of them say “Keep your stinkin’ hands off my Medicare!”)  Despite being ignorant sods, all of them, they offer comic relief.
      Whenever munitions go off, wealth is destroyed.  A dollar given in exchange for oil helps enable the religious extremist and, again, becomes devalued.  Solution?  End war, invest here, end outsourcing, invest in green technology, legalize the cash crop Hemp, allow more people into the country to create demand for goods, establish a maximum wage, and . . . put a premium on Social Justice by changing to accept the needs of the melting pot.
      The government is not so wrong compared to whose behind the government: the moneyed interests.  But there seems to be a relatively new gang on the block running interference for them, the Corporations.  And that new gang is . . . The Tea Party.
       
      The Lou Show

      • fraser007

        Wow, now I understand. You made it so clear.

      • Don

        Thank you, Lou, for being you.  The Tea Party is SO in your head! 

        And…of course, Google never forgets.

  • Jim’s Shipmate

    “reduce the massively ballooning national debt, cut runaway federal spending, keep taxes in check, reinvigorate the economy, and block the expansion of the state into citizens’ lives”

    Racist!

    • Don

      I’m reminded of that board game “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.”  I’ve never played it, but from what I hear, you relate everything in life to the actor Kevin Bacon.

      Apparently, many progressives are busily playing “One Degree Of Everyone-Who-Disagrees-With-Me-Is-A-Racist.”

      • The Lou Show

        The counter claim of the racist, that the accuser is using the race card unnecessarily, or “There you go again . . . “, is mute and should NOT reduce or devalue the charge or observation.  If Progressives have been claiming racism sometimes (many times in recent history) maybe the claim could be true, and we all owe it to our sense of fairness to investigate.
        Don, I suppose if you had a vote in the Hate Crime Law, you would vote “No”.
        (Or would you rather I speak as collective as you and write “All Republicans would rather there not be a Hate Crime Law.”)
        Don, why do you think there is such a thing as a Hate Crime Law?  Are you under the delusion that there is no such thing as hate?
        How did George Tiller die, Don?
        The Lou Show

        • Don

          This is what I mean—the Tea Party is freaking out the left.

          Don, I suppose if you had a vote in the Hate Crime Law, you would vote “No”.
          Don, why do you think there is such a thing as a Hate Crime Law?  Are you under the delusion that there is no such thing as hate          ?

          It is, however, easy to freak out the feeble-minded.

  • Ernie McCray

    “Born in response to President Obama’s self-declared desire to fundamentally change America, the tea party movement has made its central goals abundantly clear. Activists and the sizeable swath of voters who sympathize with them want to reduce the massively ballooning national debt, cut runaway federal spending, keep taxes in check, reinvigorate the economy, and block the expansion of the state into citizens’ lives.”
    How is the tea party going to do all this or try to do all this? Could they share just one plan?
    As to the “race card,” is it not a viable card in the deck ever? Every time it’s raised it’s in error? What are the tea party people going to do to make all races feel comfortable in our society and if it does do something will that be “playing the race card.” Are our inner cities and barrios going to feel this notion of “We’re for all people” in their hearts and souls. Is there a “Yes we Can” vibe in it at all? Or will we have to wait until the corporations and the very rich let something trickle down to the majority of us from their vast coffers?
    What’s it really all about? What will future generations, our children, gain from it? I ask this in that my desires never seem to be mentioned when I listen to Fox or some Tea Party spokesperson?

    • Don

      What are the tea party people going to do to make all races feel comfortable in our society

      Why is that the Tea Party’s responsibility?  Why is that ANYONE’s responsibility?

  • RH

    Tea Partier’s are nothing but angry former Bush Jr fans, and historically one can see their origins in anarchist’s, who also hated government, advocated chaos instead, we have had them all down through history when they called themselves by variety of names ideological theories on what is wrong with America, but reality is they wax and wane, will fizzle of their own self destruction we see them now in Nevada eating their own with the tea party candidate denigrating the wanna-be tea party candidate who is a long time state GOP politician trying to use their anger, hatreds, prejudices to unseat Reid! They cannot perform in the long run, since fact is to get anything done in our system one has to have a majority of minimum 2/3rds votes in senate, majority in congress and have a compliant president who will not veto your agenda, but politicians are like lawyers will promise you the sun and stars as long as you pay their fee’s or do as they wish to enrich themselves!:-) This tea party will fizzle, make a lot of noise, run a lot of elderly folks blood pressure up to premature cardiac arrest levels, some will not even see 2012 elections!

    • Don

      The Tea Party has rendered RH incapable of punctuation.

      When the Left degenerates into incoherent run-on sentences, you KNOW they’re freaking out. 

  • JC

    Sometimes you just can’t make this stuff up.  The Tea Party has the left so scared that the current administration tasked Bill Clinton to ask a black democrat candidate for Governor of Florida to drop out of the race and endorse a white male former republican, because he was a better choice than the Tea Party candidate.
    Let me say that again, sometimes the truth is so strange that there’s no chance you could have made it up.

    • JC

      Ok,  my reading comprehension is low. That’s the Senate race in Florida, not the Governor’s race.
      But correcting this mistake gives me a chance to make my other point more clearly, they call the Tea Party racist, but ask a black candidate to step down in favor of a white candidate from outside the party?  That seems pretty racist to me, and when you put it together with Juan Williams firing you can start to make a pretty good case that it’s the liberals that are the racists in this country.

  • Ace Ragsdale
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