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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Why are the tea partiers so angry?
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Josephine
Orthodox Belle
# 3899
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Posted
The anger is so over-the-top that it would be funny if it weren't real.
And what do they want anyway?
This article argues that it is not really political anger at all, that the anger of the tea partiers is beyond politics.
A brief excerpt:
quote:
My hypothesis is that what all the events precipitating the Tea Party movement share is that they demonstrated, emphatically and unconditionally, the depths of the absolute dependence of us all on government action, and in so doing they undermined the deeply held fiction of individual autonomy and self-sufficiency that are intrinsic parts of Americans’ collective self-understanding.
The implicit bargain that many Americans struck with the state institutions supporting modern life is that they would be politically acceptable only to the degree to which they remained invisible, and that for all intents and purposes each citizen could continue to believe that she was sovereign over her life; she would, of course, pay taxes, use the roads and schools, receive Medicare and Social Security, but only so long as these could be perceived not as radical dependencies, but simply as the conditions for leading an autonomous and self-sufficient life. Recent events have left that bargain in tatters.
But even this way of expressing the issue of dependence is too weak, too merely political; after all, although recent events have revealed the breadth and depths of our dependencies on institutions and practices over which we have little or no control, not all of us have responded with such galvanizing anger and rage. Tea Party anger is, at bottom, metaphysical, not political: what has been undone by the economic crisis is the belief that each individual is metaphysically self-sufficient, that one’s very standing and being as a rational agent owes nothing to other individuals or institutions.
[Emphasis added]
If this author is right, if the anger is not political, but metaphysical, then it can't be accommodated, channeled, or organized in a political way. We can't work with the tea partiers to reach compromises and win-win situations, because it's the very idea that we need to work together that is the problem for them.
We saw that in the "debate" over health-care. The Democrats were trying to negotiate in good faith. Those with tea-party inclinations, not so much. They want to be the party of No, of Leave me alone, of Go away.
But that's not how the world works, nor how it has ever worked. And it is, it seems to me, a profoundly un-Christian way of seeing the world.
[code edit]
[ 05. November 2010, 00:09: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
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I've written a book! Catherine's Pascha: A celebration of Easter in the Orthodox Church. It's a lovely book for children. Take a look!
Posts: 10273 | From: Pacific Northwest, USA | Registered: Jan 2003
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Grammatica
Shipmate
# 13248
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Posted
The OP has an interesting analysis, but it leaves out what I believe is the most important factor in the rise of the Tea Party: the deterioration of the American middle class over the past 30-40 years. The destruction of the American industrial base, the loss of living wage jobs, the steady erosion of the job security, benefits, and pension plans the postwar middle class relied upon, the overstretched, harried families trying to make do, and the virtual certainty that the next generation will do worse than the present generation -- all this has accelerated, beginning in the 1990s.
For a time, the effects were masked by cheap credit, cheap imports, and the stock market and housing bubbles. Now the middle class can't sell their houses, can't find jobs, and have no money in their 401Ks on which to retire. Their jobless kids are moving back home, saddled with student loan debt. One automobile accident, one expensive illness, one run-of-the-mill catastrophe, and they are paupers.
There is nothing the middle class-by-the-skin-of-its-teeth fears more than a slide back into pauperism.
How did they get here? Well, they voted for it, at the ballot box and with their wallets. They were the Reagan Democrats; they owned SUVs; they supported the troops, fought culture wars, and voted with the Religious Right. To understand what went wrong, they'd have to recognize that everything they they thought was true, ever since the Carter Administration, was false. That's a hard trick to manage for anyone.
So of course they are angry! What distresses me more, though, is that the US governing elites have seemed so unconcerned. Perhaps they don't understand how badly the middle-class situation has deteriorated. (After all, the middle class, almost by definition, lives in fly-over territory.) So the middle class is left to be exploited by right-wing demagogues. This bodes ill for our nation.
Posts: 1058 | From: where the lemon trees blosson | Registered: Dec 2007
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Antisocial Alto
Shipmate
# 13810
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Posted
Well, except that according to the New York Times, the tea partiers are actually wealthier and better educated than the average American. (They also appear to all be white.) If they are white, wealthy(er) and well educated, then they are the people with the MOST autonomy here in America: wealthy enough to be fairly independent and, on account of looking "respectable", unlikely to be hassled by the authorities. They're also not as likely to have been affected by the real estate crisis, oil spill etc as minorities and poor people have been.
What are they angry about? Who knows?
One of the managers at the public library where I used to work is a tea partier. Damned if I know why. I mean, tax dollars literally pay his salary- why would he argue for cutting taxes, when libraries and schools are always the first thing on the chopping block? I kind of want to ask him about it, just to see what's going on in his mind and why he believes what he does. But I also want to get re-hired at the library someday, and I figure getting into a political controversy with a manager is not the way to do that!
Posts: 601 | From: United States | Registered: Jun 2008
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
But the economic situation of most Americans, middle class or otherwise, has improved over the last generation. Not proportionately by as much as that of most Chinese or even Greeks - but they are on the whole better off.
The rich have pulled even further ahead of the majority than they were before - but as you said the majority voted for that. And the poorest haven't been keeping up - but the majority voted for that as well.
The same is true of Britain of course. Most of us are better off than our parents were when they were our age. And we are nearly all better off than we were ourselves ten or fifteen years ago, or than people the age we are now were then.
Not as much as we'd like to be, and there is the specific problem of house prices (worse here than the USA) and things haven't been improving as fast as they did between the 1940s and the 1970s, but there is some genuine increase in prosperity in both countries. So it can't just be that.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Alfred E. Neuman
What? Me worry?
# 6855
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Posted
It boils down to a black guy with an Arab name in the White House. They "want their government back" for white people.
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RadicalWhig
Shipmate
# 13190
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Posted
Oh there's so much that one could say about this. I think it involves getting deep into the cultural psyche and ideological assumptions which have underpinned American civilisation since the Civil War.
America's obsession with freedom as an individualistic and market-orientated, as "non-interference", rather than as a communal attempt to achieve the common good, is largely to blame. It has created, for the vast majority, the conditions of economic dependency, social isolation, and political impotence.
The anger of the Tea Baggers is the anger of someone who has been the victim of a bait-n-switch game. They were promised economic and individual liberty, if only they would "roll back the frontiers of the State" and allow "rugged individualism" to flourish in the marketplace; they have discovered that this means they are working two jobs, are paying a fortune for health insurance, and can't afford to send their kids to college.
But, perversely, they cannot bring themselves to admit that they were cheated, so they lash out at those ("socialists") who would actually help them. It is hard to face the truth; much easier to lash out at those who tell it. "Obama-care" must be opposed, not because it is wrong, but because it brings home to them the very inconvenient and unpleasant truth that the America of their Grandpa's Quarter Section has gone - been destroyed by the very "free market" system they champion, and that "rugged individualism" is a more fragile foundation for a good society than "folkhemmet".
[There's more - so much more - but that will have to do for now.]
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Radical Whiggery for Beginners: "Trampling on the Common Prayer Book, talking against the Scriptures, commending Commonwealths, justifying the murder of King Charles I, railing against priests in general." (Sir Arthur Charlett on John Toland, 1695)
Posts: 3193 | From: Scotland | Registered: Nov 2007
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RadicalWhig
Shipmate
# 13190
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Posted
Grammatica is absolutely right on this one.
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Radical Whiggery for Beginners: "Trampling on the Common Prayer Book, talking against the Scriptures, commending Commonwealths, justifying the murder of King Charles I, railing against priests in general." (Sir Arthur Charlett on John Toland, 1695)
Posts: 3193 | From: Scotland | Registered: Nov 2007
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Imaginary Friend
Real to you
# 186
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
The OP has an interesting analysis, but it leaves out what I believe is the most important factor in the rise of the Tea Party: the deterioration of the American middle class over the past 30-40 years. The destruction of the American industrial base, the loss of living wage jobs, the steady erosion of the job security, benefits, and pension plans the postwar middle class relied upon, the overstretched, harried families trying to make do, and the virtual certainty that the next generation will do worse than the present generation -- all this has accelerated, beginning in the 1990s.
For a time, the effects were masked by cheap credit, cheap imports, and the stock market and housing bubbles. Now the middle class can't sell their houses, can't find jobs, and have no money in their 401Ks on which to retire. Their jobless kids are moving back home, saddled with student loan debt.
I think this is a really good point. Actually, George Monbiot (a fiercely leftist environmental campaigner) has written in the Guardian today praising the Tea Party for actually getting up and doing something about their discontent. But he also points out (as others have) that the Tea Party's plans for taxes and cuts will hurt the working classes most. I cannot understand why anyone with below average income, working a job which may disappear at any time and depending on employment benefits to get by would possibly be sucked in by the rhetoric. But people are.
And this makes me think that the author must be right. If the anger was political then surely it would be expressed in a way that makes sense for the situation that people are in. I think I would use the word 'existential' to describe the anger, rather than 'metaphysical', because it's an anger that seems to be about the foundational, concrete aspects of life rather than an abstract concept of life. But I guess that's semantics. Either way, it is not about the nuts-and-bolts of politics but about the very core of what society has become.
What the leaders of the Tea Party have done is to tap into that existential anger and found rhetoric which will funnel it towards their own political ends. I can think of another time when this happened in the twentieth century, but I'm not going to use that example for fear of becoming a parody of Godwin's law! Nevertheless, I can't think of any time when politicians have knowingly misdirected public anger and the end has been a good one. Surely an informed debate about the impact of globalization and the end of the carbon fuel economy would serve the United States much better than an ideologically driven countermovement characterized by conspiracy theories and revelling in their self-imposed underdog status?
quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
One automobile accident, one expensive illness, one run-of-the-mill catastrophe, and they are paupers.
And yet they fight against socialized healthcare as if their lives depended on it!
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"We had a good team on paper. Unfortunately, the game was played on grass."
Brian Clough
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Imaginary Friend
Real to you
# 186
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alfred E. Neuman:
It boils down to a black guy with an Arab name in the White House. They "want their government back" for white people.
Way to over-simplify. ![[Disappointed]](graemlins/disappointed.gif)
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"We had a good team on paper. Unfortunately, the game was played on grass."
Brian Clough
Posts: 9455 | From: Left a bit... Right a bit... | Registered: May 2001
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
I've never noticed them as being all that angry, especially when compared to all the various political organizations and movements I've seen in my lifetime. The thread title is an unproven premise.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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Horseman Bree
Shipmate
# 5290
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Posted
May be a simplification, but there is an element of truth in it. Add "totaly idiotic foaming rage at the idea of a Democrat President" (as we had during the Clinton years, and the Carter years) and you'd be a lot closer.
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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Grammatica
Shipmate
# 13248
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Imaginary Friend:
If the anger was political then surely it would be expressed in a way that makes sense for the situation that people are in.
...
Surely an informed debate about the impact of globalization and the end of the carbon fuel economy would serve the United States much better than an ideologically driven countermovement characterized by conspiracy theories and revelling in their self-imposed underdog status?
If this were a political class feeling the pinch, you'd be hearing such a debate, but this is happening to the middle classes. That's perhaps the best point the OP made about Tea Party members. They aren't in the governing classes and don't make the decisions. (They don't make them at work, either. They carry out others' orders.) Their bargain was that they could leave governing alone, and the government would leave them alone.
They do not have the outlook of a governing class, nor the education of one, even if they have what are now called "college degrees." They are consumers; they are used to being catered to and emotionally manipulated. They've been watching "infotainment" TV channels, listening to talk radio, getting their views from people like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh who are responsible to no one but their advertisers.
I fear also that this is not going to end well at all, and will skirt Godwin's Law by mentioning only that I am a German-American.
Posts: 1058 | From: where the lemon trees blosson | Registered: Dec 2007
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Ender's Shadow
Shipmate
# 2272
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
But the economic situation of most Americans, middle class or otherwise, has improved over the last generation. Not proportionately by as much as that of most Chinese or even Greeks - but they are on the whole better off.
According to this apparently well referenced Wikipedia article, this isn't so, and its conclusions are the same as an Economist article that appeared recently. To me it's the same angst as expressed in Falling Down or indeed this scene from Network. They know there's something wrong. They believe that their existing political leadership has something to do with the problems they're experiencing. So they are lashing out and moving towards the only extreme that is acceptable in the USA...
Posts: 5018 | From: Manchester, England | Registered: Feb 2002
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Alogon
Cabin boy emeritus
# 5513
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
I've never noticed them as being all that angry, especially when compared to all the various political organizations and movements I've seen in my lifetime. The thread title is an unproven premise.
If you haven't noticed a lot of anger out there, you've been sleeping. Consider, for example, how some of the town hall meetings about health care degenerated into uncouth shouting matches and near riots. Let me guess: it was only some Republicans who were angry, and the other Republicans were so aghast at this anger that they stomped out and formed the tea party. Sure.
Alfred E. Neuman may be oversimplifying, but I think he has a point with a role of racism, sometimes subconscious.
I, too, will ![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif) Grammatica, except that the vanishing of the middle class is not entirely the fault of Republicans. It is also a result of globalization. If we need to compete with hundreds of millions of Asians who are willing to work for a tenth of what we've been earning, and probably longer hours as well, then our salaries and standards of living will go down. Can any politician do much about that? Sad to say, European social services are beleaguered and may soon need to be rolled back for the same reason. Any attempt at protectionism and isolationism would only make matters worse. If that were not so, doesn't Clinton share the blame for embracing free trade with the enthusiasm he did?
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Patriarchy (n.): A belief in original sin unaccompanied by a belief in God.
Posts: 7808 | From: West Chester PA | Registered: Feb 2004
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sabine
Shipmate
# 3861
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Posted
I think people approach politics from an emotional base as much as anything else.
And we live in emotional times. Times of insecurity and fear.
We also live in times when wind-up, fear-mongering radio & tv personalities (they are not analysts) and bloggers are easily accessible. They don't actually make people behave in certain ways but they are egging them on, honing in on the psychology of fear.
I know a household where FOX TV news on all the time, every time I happen to visit. Given that I don't visit on pre-arranged schedules and unless they turn it on especially for me (no please, I'm just fine, no need for that, thank you), I'm assuming they have it on most of the day.
If you listen to enough of the fear-mongering, all those little voices inside are going to pressurize themselves: "Everything I've worked for is going down the drain; our very liberty is at stake; we're doomed."
And--as with the case of many children who act out--when people feel they have no power over the bad things in life and they don't have an adequate vocabulary to express/discuss their pressurized feelings, they end up resorting to invective.
It's very hard to approach someone that angry and try to find out what one can do to help because there is a cultural norm not to reveal the depths of fear and emotion and to put the blame on something else--the government, the opposite party, people not like us, etc.
I find the trend toward anger disturbing in more ways than one, and wish that the shouting would die down long enough for people to figure out how to talk to one another again.
sabine
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"Hunger looks like the man that hunger is killing." Eduardo Galeano
Posts: 5887 | From: the US Heartland | Registered: Dec 2002
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sabine
Shipmate
# 3861
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Posted
I thought about this while I was doing another task and want to add to the post I made a while ago.
I've spent a fair amount of time with people who live under a low-grade and constant anxiety until one day something triggers them and....bam! they are having a full blown anxiety attack, complete with vigilence and fixation on finding and rooting out the cause, tunnel vision and inability to imagine alternative strategies, hyperventilation, inability to describe feelings, etc. etc.
I think we are witnessing a sort of group anxiety attack, and a group hug is going to do very little to help.
That the teabaggers have been able to give themselves a name doesn't mean that they are able to keep themselves from spinning their wheels.
Unfortunately, yelling, name calling, the backed-into-a-corner-you-can't-make-me-change-my mind feeling that we're on the road to hell is a conversation stopper. It's also a lens through which it's very hard to see how many people care about the same issues and are working on dealing with them in various ways.
I feel a bit sad about it, really. Idealism Alert!! Everyone in the world has something to lose in life. Everyone suffers in some way. It's so much easier when we can at least talk to one another.
sabine
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"Hunger looks like the man that hunger is killing." Eduardo Galeano
Posts: 5887 | From: the US Heartland | Registered: Dec 2002
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RadicalWhig
Shipmate
# 13190
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alogon:
I, too, will Grammatica, except that the vanishing of the middle class is not entirely the fault of Republicans. It is also a result of globalization.
Agreed, but whose fault is globalisation? It didn't just "happen" - it was deliberately brought about by free-market, free-trade ideologues, who had sucked-up a bit too much David Ricardo.
quote:
If we need to compete with hundreds of millions of Asians who are willing to work for a tenth of what we've been earning, and probably longer hours as well, then our salaries and standards of living will go down. Can any politician do much about that?
Quite a lot they can do about it. It's called tariffs.
quote:
Sad to say, European social services are beleaguered and may soon need to be rolled back for the same reason.
Yes, that is sad to say. The EU has bought into this free-trade nonsense, and abandoned the idea of "community preference" (which was deliberately designed to make the EU into a self-sufficient economically autarkic bloc, thus preserving the "social-market" model and preventing a "race to the bottom"). That needs to change before we end up going the same way as America.
quote:
Any attempt at protectionism and isolationism would only make matters worse.
I'm not so sure. That's the nineteenth century economic theory; I'm really not convinced that it's the twenty-first century economic reality.
quote:
If that were not so, doesn't Clinton share the blame for embracing free trade with the enthusiasm he did?
Yep, he deserves the blame too - just as Blair deserves as much blame as Thatcher.
I'm not advocating communism, I'm not advocating a command economy (one of the tricks of the American Right is to reduce socio-economic choices to a false dichotomy of free-market wild-west economics or Soviet communism, the reality is so much more nuanced and multi-dimensional). But if we really want to solve this, and maintain or even improve standards of living, we need to recognise that the free-market, free-trade model has reached its natural end, and that a new economic model is required, one which focuses on the building up of the local economy and gives the public sector an instrumental role in managing trade and employment for the common good.
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Radical Whiggery for Beginners: "Trampling on the Common Prayer Book, talking against the Scriptures, commending Commonwealths, justifying the murder of King Charles I, railing against priests in general." (Sir Arthur Charlett on John Toland, 1695)
Posts: 3193 | From: Scotland | Registered: Nov 2007
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Grammatica
Shipmate
# 13248
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alogon:
The vanishing of the middle class is not entirely the fault of Republicans. ... Doesn't Clinton share the blame for embracing free trade with the enthusiasm he did?
Absolutely. I am no fan of Bill Clinton's.
Radical Whig on tariffs.
Sabine on anxiety attacks.
Posts: 1058 | From: where the lemon trees blosson | Registered: Dec 2007
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
Clinton wasn't a Republican? Oh right, he was a Democrat by party affiliation. But he was to the right of Nixon, at least, in action. Except that, unlike any Republican in living memory, he left office with a balanced budget.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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MerlintheMad
Shipmate
# 12279
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Posted
"It would be comforting if a clear political diagnosis of the Tea Party movement were available — if we knew precisely what political events had inspired the fierce anger that pervades its meetings and rallies, what policy proposals its backers advocate, and, most obviously, what political ideals and values are orienting its members."
This paragraph illustrates the disingenuous character of this piece. Even I, the political bunny, can tell you what causes the anger.
Years of Gov't mismanagement: ever increasing size of Gov't; encroachment into our private lives; entitlements promised and delivered to the least deserving; the increasing burden of taxation to pay for said-entitlements and other bureaucratic crap; and all of this and more caused by BOTH parties. Above all, the belief that none of them can be trusted; that we continue to be lied to.
Is that enough reason to be angry?
Now, how to fix it, that is another issue altogether. If wiser heads prevail and a reformed "American" party arises from this angry mess, it will resemble something that has an agenda like this: lower taxes; cut entitlements to the bone; advocate for jobs to replace entitlements; and all of this results in a balanced budget, and a beginning of paying off our national debts. In future, Gov't will operate on a balanced budget and continue to cut taxes where possible; entitlements are right out, with includes Social Security and national (gov't supplied) health care. A healthy economy makes individual saving for retirement not only possible but practical and necessary if you are planning to retire at all. A healthy economy allows businesses to contribute to said-retirement plans with matched contributions: instead of the trend we've seen for many years of companies cutting retirement plans and reducing matched savings, etc., as cost-cutting measures (which is what happens in a worsening economy like this one).
This is the America the Tea Party folks want. Whether they can cobble together enough cooperation and support to even make a beginning remains to be seen…
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MerlintheMad
Shipmate
# 12279
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Imaginary Friend:
quote:
Originally posted by Alfred E. Neuman:
It boils down to a black guy with an Arab name in the White House. They "want their government back" for white people.
Way to over-simplify.
Ditto that! What utter horseshit. You probably believe that the Tea Party would cease to exist if all the racists left it. That's exactly what the guy who wrote this piece believes, and every one of those who also believe that the objection to His Oness is because he's a Black Man. The POTUS is a fascist and he's bent on remaking American in his own image. That's what has so many people both alarmed and pissed off. Our lifestyle and our very liberty is at stake. We don't want America following some European model of socialism or worse!...
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Grammatica:
The OP has an interesting analysis, but it leaves out what I believe is the most important factor in the rise of the Tea Party: the deterioration of the American middle class over the past 30-40 years. The destruction of the American industrial base, the loss of living wage jobs, the steady erosion of the job security, benefits, and pension plans the postwar middle class relied upon, the overstretched, harried families trying to make do, and the virtual certainty that the next generation will do worse than the present generation -- all this has accelerated, beginning in the 1990s.
For a time, the effects were masked by cheap credit, cheap imports, and the stock market and housing bubbles. Now the middle class can't sell their houses, can't find jobs, and have no money in their 401Ks on which to retire. Their jobless kids are moving back home, saddled with student loan debt. One automobile accident, one expensive illness, one run-of-the-mill catastrophe, and they are paupers.
There is nothing the middle class-by-the-skin-of-its-teeth fears more than a slide back into pauperism.
How did they get here? Well, they voted for it, at the ballot box and with their wallets. They were the Reagan Democrats; they owned SUVs; they supported the troops, fought culture wars, and voted with the Religious Right. To understand what went wrong, they'd have to recognize that everything they they thought was true, ever since the Carter Administration, was false. That's a hard trick to manage for anyone.
So of course they are angry! What distresses me more, though, is that the US governing elites have seemed so unconcerned. Perhaps they don't understand how badly the middle-class situation has deteriorated. (After all, the middle class, almost by definition, lives in fly-over territory.) So the middle class is left to be exploited by right-wing demagogues. This bodes ill for our nation.
I think all of the above is spot-on, with the exception of the last paragraph. If you think it is only the fly-over states who have been impacted by the decline of the industrial base, the erosion of the middle class, then you need to visit inner-city and rural California.
I'm also not as cynical as you re: the concern of the lefties. I think there is genuine awareness there, and genuine concern (tempered of course by the usual power issues). But they (we) definitely seem tone-deaf in how to communicate with this group in any meaningful/ understandable way w/o sounding like pedantic, patronizing snobs.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alogon:
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
[qb] I've never noticed them as being all that angry, especially when compared to all the various political organizations and movements I've seen in my lifetime. The thread title is an unproven premise.
If you haven't noticed a lot of anger out there, you've been sleeping. Consider, for example, how some of the town hall meetings about health care degenerated into uncouth shouting matches and near riots.
Did you peel off your "Question Authority" bumpersticker on 11/05/08, or something?
I've noticed anger as I plainly said. It just isn't an unusual amount and from what I've seen of the town hall meetings they still appear a bit more civil than what often happens when certain folks are invited to speak at a university.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
Years of Gov't mismanagement: ever increasing size of Gov't; encroachment into our private lives; entitlements promised and delivered to the least deserving; the increasing burden of taxation to pay for said-entitlements and other bureaucratic crap
The problem with this analysis, at least from outside the Republican Party, is that it's just those entitlements that the Tea Partiers are screaming for the government not to take away. They want the government to stay out of healthcare, but leave their Medicare alone. Huh? The apparent irrationality of that statement flummoxes the left (well, center -- there is no effective left in this country anymore).
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
You probably believe that the Tea Party would cease to exist if all the racists left it.
Yes, but not because I think their anger is chiefly about racism. But just because that's the slice of society that make up the Tea Party. I note that the Tea Party has not distanced itself at all from the birthers. Probably because they make up a sizeable enough portion of the Tea Party that the non-birthers don't feel they can afford to alienate them. Although one might think that has to do with their intelligence -- but then we are told the rank-and-file Tea Partier is well-educated. Maybe that shows that "education" in this country isn't all it's cracked up to be.
quote:
That's exactly what the guy who wrote this piece believes
I'm not sure I see evidence of that. He "leaves aside" consideration of the racism question, and focuses on other things.
quote:
The POTUS is a fascist
Here's another thing that flummoxes the center -- the seemingly willing misuse of labels like "fascist", "communist", "socialist", "Nazi" and the like. They're emotionally loaded, and none of them apply to Obama or today's Democratic Party, except a very watered-down socialism that I think is better described as communitarianism. But the use of that word by the TP is red-baiting, not honest analysis. It's a deliberate attempt to arouse fear and hatred.
The article referenced in the OP, if accurate, does make something understandable that I before had not been able to wrap my head around: the irrational anger and hatred of the right against Hillary Clinton. But it's easily explained now: she wrote a book called "It Takes a Village" -- and if you're a rugged inividualist, that's a heresy. But a frightening one because you fear it's true. Hence the accelerated rush to remove kids from public schooling.
Personally I think only strong government can protect us from big business. And the TPers are playing right into the hands of big business by blindly supporting the anti-regulationism of the GOP, which of course is fueled not by consideration of what's best for the middle American, but what's best for the campaign coffer.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
I've noticed anger as I plainly said. It just isn't an unusual amount and from what I've seen of the town hall meetings they still appear a bit more civil than what often happens when certain folks are invited to speak at a university.
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif) Two wrongs make a far right?
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
[QB] Clinton wasn't a Republican? Oh right, he was a Democrat by party affiliation. But he was to the right of Nixon, . . .
and probably Bush.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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RadicalWhig
Shipmate
# 13190
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Posted
MerlintheMad,
I hear what you are saying. I feel the anger. But you anger is woefully misdirected. The problem facing America isn't "too much European-style socialism" - that's not what's threatening your liberty or your way of life. Quite the opposite, in fact.
You are being played by the rich and powerful, and into made a willing forger of your own chains.
For your sake, for America's sake, wake up.
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Radical Whiggery for Beginners: "Trampling on the Common Prayer Book, talking against the Scriptures, commending Commonwealths, justifying the murder of King Charles I, railing against priests in general." (Sir Arthur Charlett on John Toland, 1695)
Posts: 3193 | From: Scotland | Registered: Nov 2007
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by RadicalWhig:
You are being played by the rich and powerful, and into made a willing forger of your own chains.
Are you a Tea Party recruiter? When I think of the rich and powerful, I think of DC where they spend whatever they feel like spending and take pretty much whatever power they feel like taking.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
quote:
Originally posted by RadicalWhig:
You are being played by the rich and powerful, and into made a willing forger of your own chains.
Are you a Tea Party recruiter? When I think of the rich and powerful, I think of DC where they spend whatever they feel like spending and take pretty much whatever power they feel like taking.
Pwned. That's exactly what they want you to think. Keeps your mind off the way Megacorp Inc. is fucking you dry.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
quote:
Originally posted by RadicalWhig:
You are being played by the rich and powerful, and into made a willing forger of your own chains.
Are you a Tea Party recruiter? When I think of the rich and powerful, I think of DC where they spend whatever they feel like spending and take pretty much whatever power they feel like taking.
Pwned. That's exactly what they want you to think. Keeps your mind off the way Megacorp Inc. is fucking you dry.
Megacorp? Is that a new name for the federal government? In the movie Deliverance, Ned Beatty was raped by a Democrat politician.
[ 15. June 2010, 17:34: Message edited by: Mere Nick ]
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by RadicalWhig:
Quite a lot they can do about it. It's called tariffs.
Historically tariffs have been the usual precursor to a sudden lurch into tyranny.
It was Chamberlain and his tariffs that killed the old Liberal party in Britain. Took decades to die, and now some right-wing centralist authoritarian renegades from the Labour Party are walking around in its clothes that they nicked off the corpse.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Leaf
Shipmate
# 14169
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Posted
I thought the anger stemmed from a sense of betrayal. This was supported by Merlin the Mad's theory: quote:
Years of Gov't mismanagement: ever increasing size of Gov't; encroachment into our private lives; entitlements promised and delivered to the least deserving; the increasing burden of taxation to pay for said-entitlements and other bureaucratic crap; and all of this and more caused by BOTH parties. Above all, the belief that none of them can be trusted; that we continue to be lied to.
I don't know whether any of those allegations are true, but to Tea Partiers, they seem true. It's as if there was some other America promised to them, which has been taken away by some or all of the following: Democrats, visible minorities, left-wing special interest groups, unions, feminists, liberals, gun control advocates, environmentalists, bureaucrats, and anyone who believes in international co-operation. In short, 90 per cent of their neighbours.
Add to that a sense of impotence that businesses, which are Teh Good, are packing up and moving elsewhere, and that the Republican party has not improved things much for them.
Hell hath no fury like one of these voters scorned.
Posts: 2786 | From: the electrical field | Registered: Oct 2008
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
[QUOTE]
I've noticed anger as I plainly said. It just isn't an unusual amount and from what I've seen of the town hall meetings they still appear a bit more civil than what often happens when certain folks are invited to speak at a university.
Then I would agree with Alogon that you don't seem to be paying attention. Or you the universities where you hang around cater to a lot more angry student body than the ones at the university where I teach.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Alogon
Cabin boy emeritus
# 5513
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
A healthy economy makes individual saving for retirement not only possible but practical and necessary if you are planning to retire at all.
I never doubted that. But since September 2008, a lot of people have been glad that Social Security exists since their retirement nest eggs went bust. Suddenly the outgoing administration and its ideological think tanks stopped talking about "privatizing Social Security". And the bust occurred because the same outgoing administration didn't believe in keeping any leash whatsoever on the Wall Street Luftmenschen.
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Patriarchy (n.): A belief in original sin unaccompanied by a belief in God.
Posts: 7808 | From: West Chester PA | Registered: Feb 2004
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
[QUOTE]
I've noticed anger as I plainly said. It just isn't an unusual amount and from what I've seen of the town hall meetings they still appear a bit more civil than what often happens when certain folks are invited to speak at a university.
Then I would agree with Alogon that you don't seem to be paying attention. Or you the universities where you hang around cater to a lot more angry student body than the ones at the university where I teach.
Of course I'm paying attention. I just don't agree with the selective indignation.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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MerlintheMad
Shipmate
# 12279
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by RadicalWhig:
MerlintheMad,
I hear what you are saying. I feel the anger. But you anger is woefully misdirected. The problem facing America isn't "too much European-style socialism" - that's not what's threatening your liberty or your way of life. Quite the opposite, in fact.
You are being played by the rich and powerful, and into made a willing forger of your own chains.
For your sake, for America's sake, wake up.
I am awake, believe that. There is this little but oh-so-significant-difference in the way the Founders viewed inalienable rights and the way the rest of the Western world tends to: and that is that in this country the Individual trumps the body or corporate "good". For many years this has been eroded. Until now we have so many clamoring for more entitlements at the expense of individual (private sector) freedoms. The right way is not to view this balance of powers as "big business versus strong government". When you have an over-strong (intrusive) gov't, it fosters big business: it IS the big business! And the bigger gov't business is the fewer rivals it brooks. If His Oness has his way America will become a nation of big, gov't-owned/regulated business. That my friends is fascism. And that is why I call him a fascist. I am no Tea Party "member" either. I've never attended a meeting or a rally. But I keep my ear to the ground and my eyes wide open....
Posts: 3499 | Registered: Jan 2007
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
The POTUS is a fascist and he's bent on remaking American in his own image. That's what has so many people both alarmed and pissed off. Our lifestyle and our very liberty is at stake. We don't want America following some European model of socialism or worse!...
Help here can you please? How can one be a fascist and a socialist?
ISTM the single biggest threat to American Civil liberty in recent years was the Patriot act. Yet, no tea party formed then.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
The POTUS is a fascist and he's bent on remaking American in his own image. That's what has so many people both alarmed and pissed off. Our lifestyle and our very liberty is at stake. We don't want America following some European model of socialism or worse!...
Help here can you please? How can one be a fascist and a socialist?
ISTM the single biggest threat to American Civil liberty in recent years was the Patriot act. Yet, no tea party formed then.
Locally, the folks who are talking up the tea party now were complaining about the Patriot act, then.
Can't a fascist be a member of the National Socialist German Worker's Party?
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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MerlintheMad
Shipmate
# 12279
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alogon:
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
A healthy economy makes individual saving for retirement not only possible but practical and necessary if you are planning to retire at all.
I never doubted that. But since September 2008, a lot of people have been glad that Social Security exists since their retirement nest eggs went bust. Suddenly the outgoing administration and its ideological think tanks stopped talking about "privatizing Social Security". And the bust occurred because the same outgoing administration didn't believe in keeping any leash whatsoever on the Wall Street Luftmenschen.
Over-simplification. ALL retirement nest eggs have not gone "bust". Mine hasn't and it isn't even a big one. I lost a lot of value, but it is on the way back up. Historically it is like riding an escalator with a yoyo: the economic dips are the yoyo doing up and down; but the escalator tends upward nevertheless. Those whose yoyo strings busted were high-risk, get-rich-quick mentality investments. Anyone in the know will tell you to invest diversely and in the middle; steady gains over-all to buffer the hits, the pits and valleys in the investment market.
The economy went down because of a lot of stupid people acting stupidly at all levels. The Gov't isn't required to fix any of that; the Market fixes itself through natural consequences, thank you....
Posts: 3499 | Registered: Jan 2007
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Alfred E. Neuman
What? Me worry?
# 6855
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
...The right way is not to view this balance of powers as "big business versus strong government". When you have an over-strong (intrusive) gov't, it fosters big business: it IS the big business!
That's the ticket! Less government interference in its own big business! We can start with less regulation of big government's banking and oil industries! Then we can dump the EPA, FDA, IRS, FBI, NSA... all those useless departments that infringe upon the individual's right to be, well... individual!
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--Formerly: Gort--
Posts: 12954 | Registered: May 2004
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New Yorker
Shipmate
# 9898
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Posted
I have not been to a Tea Party nor do I call myself a Tea Partier. However, I am, in general, in agreement with what I hear them saying.
The tea partiers are angry, very simply, because they feel that we are "Taxed Enough Already." The first letters of that three word phrase spell "TEA." Get it?
It's really as simple as that.
They're saying no to more taxes and no to the debt we're piling up.
Are they angry? Yes. Are they racist? No.
[ 15. June 2010, 19:20: Message edited by: New Yorker ]
Posts: 3193 | From: New York City | Registered: Jul 2005
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
Locally, the folks who are talking up the tea party now were complaining about the Patriot act, then.
Hmmmm, yet no protests. Interesting.
quote:
Originally posted by Mere Nick:
Can't a fascist be a member of the National Socialist German Worker's Party?
Right. They were as socialist as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea are democratic.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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MerlintheMad
Shipmate
# 12279
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
The POTUS is a fascist and he's bent on remaking American in his own image. That's what has so many people both alarmed and pissed off. Our lifestyle and our very liberty is at stake. We don't want America following some European model of socialism or worse!...
Help here can you please? How can one be a fascist and a socialist?
ISTM the single biggest threat to American Civil liberty in recent years was the Patriot act. Yet, no tea party formed then.
Fascism doesn't have to create a socialist environment, but it usually does or pays lip service to socialism. Warm fuzzies are created when the gov't speaks often of its duty to protect and provide the necessaries of life for the disadvantaged: cradle to grave care is the ultimate entitlement. And fascism is just the most gov't-owned way to pull that off, if it chooses to. The way His Oness is going (and he's not alone in this by any stretch), all of the remaining business concerns in the USA will be effectively Gov't-owned. Private enterprise will be a foreign phrase. It's going that way and has been for a long time. If McCain had been elected we would probably not be as upset or doing any screaming about it: but His Oness has shocked us into mobility. I only hope it is effective for needed change.
The Patriot Act was directly aimed at enemies of the USA, both foreign and domestic. I know of not a single instance where a citizen's rights have been violated (i.e. without due cause and process)....
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RadicalWhig
Shipmate
# 13190
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
...the Market fixes itself through natural consequences, thank you....
Yep. And one of those "natural consequences" of the market "fixing itself" is starving in the street. What a beautiful system! It works only if you forget that "the market" includes human beings - not just numbers on a board.
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Radical Whiggery for Beginners: "Trampling on the Common Prayer Book, talking against the Scriptures, commending Commonwealths, justifying the murder of King Charles I, railing against priests in general." (Sir Arthur Charlett on John Toland, 1695)
Posts: 3193 | From: Scotland | Registered: Nov 2007
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alogon:
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
A healthy economy makes individual saving for retirement not only possible but practical and necessary if you are planning to retire at all.
I never doubted that. But since September 2008, a lot of people have been glad that Social Security exists since their retirement nest eggs went bust. Suddenly the outgoing administration and its ideological think tanks stopped talking about "privatizing Social Security". And the bust occurred because the same outgoing administration didn't believe in keeping any leash whatsoever on the Wall Street Luftmenschen.
When one looks at the historical returns of various asset classes, it seems obvious that loaning money to the government via Social Security has not been a good investment. However, the demographic problem that is screwing up Social Security and Medicare may just screw up everything else if eligibility ages are not increased to reflect the increase in attained age life expectancies and decreased birth rates. Bush had a good point, but he still seems to have danced around the real problem.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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Mere Nick
Shipmate
# 11827
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
They were as socialist as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea are democratic.
The North Korean's aren't democratic but Hitler and the Nazis were socialists.
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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell
Posts: 2797 | From: West Carolina | Registered: Sep 2006
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Alogon
Cabin boy emeritus
# 5513
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
Over-simplification. ALL retirement nest eggs have not gone "bust". Mine hasn't and it isn't even a big one. I lost a lot of value, but it is on the way back up.
Same with me. Our portfolios, unlike some, are apparently diversified and not leveraged. And of course, we can wait awhile for the market to go back up because we didn't happen to retire in August 2008. How smart of us.
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Patriarchy (n.): A belief in original sin unaccompanied by a belief in God.
Posts: 7808 | From: West Chester PA | Registered: Feb 2004
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by RadicalWhig:
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
...the Market fixes itself through natural consequences, thank you....
Yep. And one of those "natural consequences" of the market "fixing itself" is starving in the street. What a beautiful system! It works only if you forget that "the market" includes human beings - not just numbers on a board.
I agree RW - there are two 'market forces' - fear and greed.
They need tempering imo.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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sabine
Shipmate
# 3861
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Posted
I was waiting to see how long it would take before someone used the word fascist -- about 16 posts. And then the arguing started, making it hard for a real discussion to continue.
This supports the idea that when faced with an anxiety-producing set of circumstances or with a weak argument, some people will simply resort to name calling.
I respect those who might have a willingness to discuss things from a perspective that is not popular, but as soon as name-calling comes into play or using terms outside of their meaning, then it's not a discussion--just a squaring off to trade verbal punches....
...which, of course, never solves anything. It doesn't convert anyone to a POV, it doesn't solve an issue. It really only works to raise the anger level.
I thought we were already at flood stage, but perhaps not.
[tangent] I was driving in a university town when I saw a man on a street corner with a sign that read: "Obama is a Nazi, fascist, socialist, communist, anarchist."
It was cold, the windows of the car were up. I wanted to say:
Those are different philosophies, dude. You're in a college town. Read a book! ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
sabine
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"Hunger looks like the man that hunger is killing." Eduardo Galeano
Posts: 5887 | From: the US Heartland | Registered: Dec 2002
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MerlintheMad
Shipmate
# 12279
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by RadicalWhig:
quote:
Originally posted by MerlintheMad:
...the Market fixes itself through natural consequences, thank you....
Yep. And one of those "natural consequences" of the market "fixing itself" is starving in the street. What a beautiful system! It works only if you forget that "the market" includes human beings - not just numbers on a board.
"Starving in the street". Manure. Because in the USA people don't starve in the streets unless they are homeless; and people are homeless because they CHOOSE to be. Anyone can see that they are going to become homeless if they don't do something, ergo they don't need to be. A poor series of choices can result in eviction, sure. But long before that occurs a family can secure another roof over their heads and food to eat. This doesn't need to be at gov't expense, but it can be: I am not advocating that gov't totally turn a blind eye to the impoverished and disadvantaged: but any help people receive needs to be obtained for work: no freebies....
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