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PAGE 4, MAY 10, 2010, THE ISLANDER
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It’s not about tea
By Paul Jacob
Those who adore modern, unlimited
government have a problem. A few
problems, actually, but biggest is their
obvious inability to say “no” to govern
ment growth.
Today’s politicians and pundits
seem completely incapable of prioritiz
ing anything. After all, in their minds,
every need represents a right to gov
ernment support or a mandate for
government action. If a constituency
likes a program (and what constitu
ency objects to money being thrown at
them?), what can they say against it?
But these folks have a second prob
lem, a practical one. They have oppo
nents. The bulk of the American popu
lace, in a sense. But, in particular, the
Tea Party protestors.
These new opponents are not pro
testing tea, but rather ever-growing
government, politics-as-usual for both
major parties.
The Tea Party name, of course,
comes from a legendary event from
the days of colonial unrest, prior to
the secession of the colonies as the 13
United States.
But let’s not get hung up on the
name. The actual meaning of the his
toric Boston Tea Party is irrelevant to
modern-day Tea Party protestors, who
are most concerned with a few core
issues, the very issues that the people
who are now in charge don’t want
addressed.
Indeed, our rulers are in a bit of a
panic. That’s why they, their core sup
porters, and the mainstream media
have been so keen to portray Tea Party
protestors as racist. It is gutter politics.
Just what we’ve grown to expect.
The best they can do is to ask where
the protests were in the Bush Admin
istration, when the bailouts began and
the budget had gone all out of whack
and deficits soared and debt ballooned.
Why wait till a black man hit the
White House?
First, get real. Does anybody really
believe that, if Hillary Clinton had
been elected instead of Obama, the Tea
Party protesters would be copacetic?
No. But protesters under a Clin
ton administration would be labeled
“angry white males” (remember?) and
we’d be informed that men outnumber
women at the rallies.
The truth of the matter is that most
of the protestors of all genders and
races were complaining to their friends
and co-workers and congressmen about
the Bush bailouts. (Remember, the
bailouts were passed over the protest
of the vast majority of Americans, a
super-majority, but with the support of
both parties.) It is not for nothing that
Bush’s support plummeted in his sec
ond term, and Congress’s hit the toilet
and flushed.
And then came Obama — a spender
so incredible that he could make Bush
seem like the very watchword of com
mon sense and fiscal responsibility.
What happened, Tea Party critics,
is that the federal government, united
under the Democrats, went on a spend
ing binge to dwarf the already-atro-
cious fiscal folly of Republican gover
nance. And hence the need for protests.
Apparently, the promised Obamaniac
“change” was only going to be a whole
heckuva lot more of the same-old,
same-old.
It would be misleading, however, to
focus on the problems of the Democrats
and not mention, in passing, the great
er problem facing the GOP. Without a
leg to stand on, Republicans must come
back, somehow, and take Tea Party
fervor to GOP success. Which is why
Republican politicians are now so amo
rously courting the Tea Party folk.
Their trouble — if you share Tea
Party concerns — is that they cannot
be trusted. Tea Party people should
respond with all due skepticism. For it
is the Tea Party that must change poli
ticians, not allow politicians to change
the Tea Party.
Tea Partyers want to cut spending,
rearrange priorities. Once in office,
Republican politicians will not want to
irritate any constituency and will want
to use their majority power.
One issue that will test the ability
of the Tea Party to maintain its com
mitment to getting America’s finan
cial house in order is our role as the
world’s policemen. That term “the
world’s policemen” used to be quickly
dismissed as hyperbole. Today, it is
so obviously true as to not warrant
debate.
America’s empire costs money. And
we are going broke. It makes no sense
Common Sense
By Paul Jacob
Fearing Free Fall
The European Union is bailing out isn't easy.
Greece. Fearing financial contagion,
EU's policy wizards decided to throw
100 billion euros at Greece, in tandem
with demands for austerity.
New spending restrictions are tough
enough to elicit the verdict of "savage"
from Greece's public employee unions.
But are they "savage" enough?
The euros-to-the-rescue scheme
occurred only after collapses of Por
tuguese and Spanish bonds. As men
tioned last Friday, things aren't good
on Europe's other southern peninsulas,
either.
The "Domino Theory" remains a
dominant metaphor. Once, we feared
countries would fall like dominos to
communism. Now, it's like dominos into
insolvency.
But propping up a tipped domino
to say we need to cut back on govern
ment spending, and then to demand
we continue to spend like a Roman
emperor on foreign garrisons.
The Defense budget gets listed as
23 percent of current spending, though
I’m not sure one can exactly trust our
accountants. The mere interest we pay
on past war spending is over $57 bil
lion, and the cost of the conquest and
occupation of Iraq is over $720 billion,
while that of Afghanistan is a by-no-
means-small $268 billion. Call me old-
fashioned, but over a trillion bucks is
nothing to sneeze at.
And, from a political perspective,
defending neo-Wilsonian internation
alism is just another way to push Bush
or back Obama. It is no kind of protest
at all.
Indeed, Tea Party folks should come
out against eternal meddling abroad.
For the Tea Party to follow Sarah
Palin’s failed McCain-style foreign
policy, rather than the traditional con
servative and libertarian position of
Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), could seal
the movement's fate... and perhaps
America’s, too.
America is fast approaching the
Greek Track. This is no Olympiad.
We are reaching the last stages of
a predictable coruse of events, when
people allow too much of government.
Real insolvency follows political brain-
death.
It’s time to get back to basics. Stick
to the core issues. Advance principles.
Consider major breaks with the recent
past, for the recent past has been one of
outrageous folly. □
Drastic solutions, like expelling the
duplicitous Greek nation-state from the
EU? Not on the table. The apparent
aim of the bailouts? Keep as many of
the major players responsible for the
fiasco in as good a shape as possible.
If, on the other hand, every poli
tician were fired and every contract
with unsustainable giveaways to pub
lic employee unions were dissolved as
part of bankruptcy, might future policy
makers be a little more cautious?
Meanwhile, the dominos keep fall
ing. The day after announcing the bail
out, the euro plummeted.
My question: What happens when
"too big to fail" is applied not to a tiny
country like Greece, but to the good ol'
US of A?
What if we're too big to bail out? □
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