People and organizations with a lick of common sense (and in the case of the State of Idaho, organizations that are constrained by the State Constitution) live within their means, and tighten their belt when the going gets tough. By stark contrast, the Fed spends money like never before, in some ill-conceived scheme of "spending our way to prosperity." It's never worked in the past... but by golly, let's try again! And our kids and grandkids can pay all that money back, anyway. No worry!
I was delighted that a grassroots "Tea Party" materialized in Boise (along with hundreds of other places across the Fruited Plain). I was there. I met the marchers enroute and joined in, marching down Capitol Boulevard to the State House.
Are these fringe radicals? Are they anti-government? Maybe a few are. I believe the vast majority are patriotic American citizens who are deeply concerned about the direction we're headed. (And I don't mean the direction starting last January... we've been headed in a bad direction for quite some time. Unfortunately, some people have come to expect that the government should take care of every citizen's every need. And unfortunately, it's not sustainable.)
Is anybody paying attention?
(One comment/criticism... this should have been strictly about deficit spending and fiscal matters. But inevitably there were fringe issues that attached themselves. There was the "Bibles in school" crowd. And the "Pro Life" crowd. And the "Get us out of the U.N." crowd. And I saw one lady with a sign that said, "Show us your birth certificate, Obama." I suppose one view is that the issue we have in common today is government spending. But I can't help but feel that they were a distraction on Tea Party Day.)
2 comments:
Where were these teabaggers during the Bush administration? These are the same people who put him into office. Bush spent more on wars than Obama has on any sort of bailout (which I am not a fan of either). These teabaggers have no credibilty simply because of their discrimination. Had they protested Bush's spending tactics as well, I would listen to them.
Hi, thegoodword. Sorry for the delay; you may have posted your comment MONTHS ago! (I don't tend this blog as much as I should.)
I don't care for the term "teabaggers," because of its multiple connotations.
If these protesters were totally silent during the Bush years, I'm with you! But there are a couple points to consider:
1) You are right - Bush was NO fiscal conservative! I was very unhappy about and critical of his spending policies. If somebody had organized a parade, I would've tried to participate!
2) BUT... spending by the Obama administration makes Bush look like a tightwad amateur! (I s'pose it started with the $700+ billion "bailout" at the end of Bush... or even his "stimulus refund." But now it makes your head spin!) Dave Barry accurately describes it in his 2009 Year in Review: "It was also a year of Change ... Washington, rejecting "business as usual," finally stopped trying to solve every problem by throwing billions of taxpayer dollars at it and instead started trying to solve every problem by throwing trillions of taxpayer dollars at it."
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