ACTION

T.E.A. Party Doubles-Down on Failed

Over-Involvement Policy and Social Conservativism

                In 2010 the remarkable effect of the T.E.A. (Taxed Enough Already) Party’s Anti-Big Government; Pro-Constitution; and Pro-fiscal Responsibility Platform was truly the news of the hour even if the lamestream-mainstream media were not willing to cover it and Time magazine refused to even consider it a newsworthy movement.  Besides the resurgence of conservatives in the U.S. House of Representatives, a shift of over 600 state legislature positions from liberal to conservative hands was an outstanding result by any fair measurement.  Only trouble?  Three shoo-in semi-conservative U.S. senators were defeated by three T.E.A. Party favorites each of whom proved to be unworthy and ineffective candidates . . . and the liberal Obama-supporting U.S. Senate under Harry Reid continued unbroken to obstruct citizens’ movements for responsible-responsive governments.  At present Reid’s Senate has NOT passed a budget in over 1,190 days just six days short of three full years.  Over the same time period, the House of Representatives under Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi also failed to pass a budget, but the Republican-controlled House after the 2010 “miracle-election” has passed two significant Paul Ryan budgets.  Just imagine how different things might be if the T.E.A. party had not interfered in Colorado, Nevada and Connecticut.  Now it appears that mistake in judgment is about to be repeated in the case of several well-respected Republicans; two quite prominent and most notably, Utah’s Orrin Hatch, a damned decent man in my not-so-humble opinion.

            Today rather than getting credit for the modern miracle they pulled off,  and almost pulled off . . . in many places the T.E.A. (taken enough abuse?) Party is villified and has lost much popularity.  Rather than being seen as the “savior of conservativism,” by Republicans, many moderate Republicans regard the T.E.A.s as a threat and a group of butt-inskies.  Has something gone wrong?  If so what?   What can we learn from the relatively few but remarkably stupid mistakes of 2010? 

1. 1.       In each of these three cases, rather than emphasizing the T.E.A. Party “Contract from America,” the T.E.A. Party chose to become extremely involved in the early primary and election process itself.  In fact, today, the T.E.A. Party emphasis on the Contract from America has virtually disappeared:  a grievous error.
2. 2.      In each of these three cases, the T.E.A. Party, rather than playing the role of impartial protectors of the Constitution emphasizing to voters how they ought to be making decisions, decided instead to immerse itself in the political in-fighting. 
3. 3.      In two of the cases, Colorado and Nevada, the T.E.A. Party embarrassed itself by getting involved with virtually inarticulate SOCIAL-CONSERVATIVES who were easily maneuvered into ugly and untenable positions by experienced liberal politicians.  In Connecticut, their glorious candidate was a sorry excuse for a politician – who vetted that woman – witchcraft, indeed?   Looking at the Contract from America . . . where exactly are we to find any social-conservativism at all?  Or Witchcraft?   If the T.E.A. Party  wants its newly arisen social-conservativism to become the new replacement for the long ineffectual Republican litmus test . . . I guarantee that will be the end of the T.E.A. Party’s ability to create meaningful change in meaningful areas such as those 10 planks of the Contract from America.  In each of these three over-involvement instances, the candidates seemingly refused to mention the Contract from America, but were certainly not reluctant to talk about abortion, creationism in schools, and prayer in schools.  By the way, very little progress has been made on the Contract for America precisely because the U.S. Senate was not won by the Conservatives.  So what’s to be done?
4. A.      Politics is very expensive, messy and often is NOT conducive to a climate of change.  Avoid actual politics.   Educate, proselytize, be missionaries for the Constitution; for fiscal-responsibility; for small, effective government.
5. B.      Next to the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution, the most remarkable document for freedom and capital R-type Republicanism from paragraph A before this was the T.E.A. Party’s Contract from America.  When the T.E.A.s virtually abandoned this key document, they abandoned their identity.
6. C.      Right now 75% of the conservatives in politics are Republicans.  If and when, however, liberal Democrats cannot get elected and liberal Republicans cannot get elected and Progressive anythings cannot even win primaries, then the T.E.A. Party will need to shift to carefully monitoring both parties as fiscal- and Constitutional-Conservativism becomes a winning proposition in both parties.  Till then 75% of the time the T.E.A. Party should support the Republican and 25% support some version of a Blue-dog Democrat or Independent. . . but should NOT get involved with primaries, and elections directly.   Just help people learn about the Contract for America; and fiscal- and Constitutional-conservativism don’t interfere.  Also T.E.A Party volunteers can serve a very big role in 1) helping to get out the Conservative voters and 2) serving as watchdogs at election precincts (do the job of election volunteer, but remain alert to potential voter fraud situations).
7. D.     The T.E.A. Party can learn a lot from the Libertarian father-son combo of Ron and Rand Paul.  The Pauls’ stance on small government, fiscal-responsibility, low taxes, welfare, abortion and military excursions away from America’s shore’s are well-known.  What’s worked for the Pauls?  1) emphasizing the T.E.A. Party positions found in the Contract for America more than any other approach which covers low taxes, small government, fiscal-responsibility, and to a  lesser extent 2) welfare- reform. 

What’s sort of worked for the Pauls?  3)  Lumping both major parties together as irresponsible (and they sure are) on taxes and big government and fiscal responsibility and 4) pointing at one as champions of an evil and counter-productive welfare-state and at the other of a bloated and almost-imperialistic warfare state? 

What’s absolutely failed to work for the Rands?  5) Social-liberalism on matters like drug-legalization;   and abortion; and 6) any hint of criticism of the American military in war zones.  <when Ron Paul talks about military bases in 156 countries and 120 troops in Gemany and Japan combined – he finds many more sympathetic ears than when he criticizes military missions>.  The Libertarian position on items 5 and 6 virtually guarantees a maximum of 20% support and as little as a 10% following anywhere in the nation – very ineffective.  Ron Paul should realize where his power lies and refuse to comment ever on items 5) and 6).  If he did that, he’d largely be a T.E.A. Party man and find high-receptivity among 45% of the voters minimum.  I love the T.E.A. Party, but have been embarrassed by its gaffs with the three Senators in 2010 and with virtually everything since then.  What works for the T.E.A. Party?   The Contract for America.   Make a new one quickly that reflects 2012 reality.  Refrain from picking candidates until they are nominees.  Refrain from any and all social-conservativism.  Fiscal- and Constitutional- and small-government-conservativism is not only a winner . . . it’s also precisely what the nation needs right now.

Ya’all live long, strong and ornery,

Rajjpuut

                “Our moral, political, and economic liberties are inherent, not granted by our government. It is essential to the practice of these liberties that we be free from restriction over our peaceful political expression and free from excessive control over our economic choices” (excerpt from the TEA Party Contract from America which is shown in full in the footnotes).

Rasmussen Polls Show Virtually Unchanged

Political Viewpoints over Last 40 Months

            Social-conservatives in the next few months will have to decide if they want to solve the problems that matter in this country and govern the United States of America and make her great again or if they'd prefer to feel themselves "right" within their own tiny-twisted minds and leave the power, control and tax money all in the hands of President Obama and his neo-Marxists.  They can be "right" or they can find peace knowing they've saved the country . . . they absolutely canNOT do both!  That is the point of this blog . . . .

                America was moved to a point of absolute crisis this week. Today the Obama administration made an “endrun" around Congress (and changed the Constitution’s rules on Naturalization without amending the Constition) by making legal aliens of illegals and proposing the use of regulatory means within the Department of Homeland Security “on a case-by-case basis” to allow amnesty for illegal aliens deemed NOT to be a threat (no criminal record). Meanwhile President Obama is on vacation considering a “bold new jobs initiative” including a brand new round of federal stimulus.  More insidiously, for the last eight months the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been moving (also by fiat regulatory powers) to covertly enforce the Cap and Trade bill that failed to pass Congress in 2009 and 2010 and has begun by closing down coal mines and restricting oil drilling.  In a nutshell, these examples well illustrate what’s wrong with the nation today and why fiscal- and Constitutional conservativism as demanded by the TEA (“Taxed Enough Already” or “Taken Enough Abuse”) Party is the only route to saving our country.

                Few clear-thinkers among us would deny that America stands at a crucial point in her history: most all obvious signs point to decline and potential ruin, but opportunity to realign with our greater earlier history also beckons us toward the future. If ever there was a time for a true statesman or stateswoman to emerge, now is such a time. What do we mean by a “statesman?” How might we recognize him? We will explore the “pros and cons” of this question in the paragraphs that follow . . . .

            Political work in many ways is like being a combination mechanic and back-slapper. Yes, the final “work” gets done by others who must be encouraged to do vast legwork -- but first of all there is a need for the ‘mechanic’s eye for reality’ so that real problems get dealt with in realistic fashion. For example the reality is that 95% of our present problems have fiscal and bureaucratic over-reach as part of their central cause. That truth must be honored, but then again it’s also clearly a people-business. So let’s talk today about the reality of the problems and more importantly about the reality of the people-perspective necessary for a new true statesman to emerge and to lead us out of these stagnant and dangerous 2011 waters . . . .

            Although a good 30% of Democrats deny that the country is facing any fiscal problems (that is, no problems at all with respect to National Debt; Debt Ceiling; Bond Downgrade; Excess Government Spending; Ongoing Deficits; UNfunded Liabilities in Major Entitlement Programs) or troubles with the size and scope of government . . . the vast majority of Americans know better. Poll after poll shows that roughly 72% of the total populace agrees that these two areas are the source of the nation’s problems.   Voters showed their recognition of these truths in the 2010 elections when they voted overwhelmingly for candidates favoring fiscal- and Constitutional-conservativism. So what tools does the statesman have at his disposal in facing these problems? And what approaches should be avoided?

            The good people at Rasmussen Reports (which has been the most accurate among pollsters for the last dozen years) periodically runs a poll concerning the make-up of the voting populace. That poll consistently confirms what has been reputedly true over the last forty years . . . the nation is “center-right” politically. And yet, you correctly observe, tax-and-spend progressive politicians have dominated the country since Calvin Coolidge left office. The eight years of Ronald Reagan mark the only true conservativism within the Oval Office during that 82.5 year span. Why?

            The problem is that while fiscal- and Constitutional conservativism are ultra-popular stances . . . social-moderation combined with social-liberalism dominates the American scene. Live and let live socially (that phraseology is sure to upset the anti-abortion folk, no?) is the predominant political stance in America. Reagan with his affability, his great sense of humor and his capacity for succinctly nailing the opposition to the wall with their own outrageous behavior and beliefs (“Tear down this Wall, Mr. Gorbachev!” “Government is NOT the solution to our problems, government IS the problem.” “Concentrated power has always been liberty’s greatest enemy.”) was precisely what American needed in 1980 and has needed for the last 82.5 years and indeed throughout the total 234 years of the nation’s existence.  And Reagan stayed out of people’s churches and bedrooms.  He was a no-nonsense fiscal- and Constitutional-conservative with an appealing and practical ability to work with people of almost any political stripe. What was Reagan’s secret weapon allowing him to appeal to voters while so many conservatives thoroughly “turn-off” the vast majority of voters? Tolerance!

            Reagan began as a New Deal Democrat, a huge fan of the person and policies of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.  He served as the President of the very liberal Screen Actors’ Guild for several years . . . he only slowly came to conservativism. He realized that (within limits) there was a need for both “loading the cart” by (after national defense was taken care of) encouraging free markets and business and “unloading the cart” by taking care of infra-structure and people. What’s the correct proportion of the balance between loading and unloading? Perhaps a 90-10 split with government spending 10% of the nation’s resources (GDP)?  Reagan’s own numbers showed an 81.5% to 18.5% balance.  In any case rather than being an ideologue, Reagan was open to discussion on the issues and postulated an 80-20 rule when it comes to calling another politician “friend.” “If a man votes with me 80% of the time, I consider him my friend, my ally.” So he was big on getting consensus rather than running roughshod over other people’s positions.

            Let us look at what Rasmussen polling tells us of what we can expect when we find a new Reagan. Only two political descriptions are rated as more positive than negative by the voters: “conservative” and “moderate.” 42% of voters regard it as positive if a candidate is labeled as “politically conservative.” For a comparison:  only 24% of the electorate regards “progressive” (the current euphemism for “liberal”) as positive. Both “liberal” and “progressive” are regarded as far more negative than positive terms. So again the conservative viewpoint is affirmed but the country doesn’t elect conservatives with any consistency . . . 60% of the nation calls itself either “moderate” or “liberal” on social issues . . . and that 60% finds an awful lot to hate in social-conservativism . . . an awful lot to vote against and be turned off by.

            So we return to our clear and obvious thesis: while fiscal-progressives (a.k.a. liberals) and Constitutional-progressives (a.k.a. neo-Marxists) are killing the country with their socialistic policies . . . our own social-conservativism is sharpening the knife and putting it into their hands.  How? By polarizing the voting populace into social-conservatives vs. everyone else and watering down all respect for fiscal- and Constitutional-conservativism. The reason the TEA Party was so effective in getting results in 2010, when they stayed out of politics and nominating and instead played kingmakers and idea salesmen, was that fiscal- and Constitutional-conservativism was served and issues like absolute anti-abortionism, prayer in public school, evolution in the biology classrooms of public schools, etc. are not discussed. 

When the TEA Party went too far and got into running for office, however, candidates perceived as “extreme” and “weirdo” (such as Sharon Angle, Christine O’Donnell and Ken Buck in Nevada, Delaware and Colorado respectively) emerged and totally turned off the voters and cost the Republicans a share of the Senate which would have made a huge difference in the last four key votes in Congress (debt-limit; Bush Tax Break Extension and budget for 2011 finally; finally passing a 2012 budget; and Cut-Cap and Balance legislation). All of these issues resulted in unsatisfactory legislation when a far more satisfactory result would have been possible if the G.O.P. controlled Congress. How important is this? 

Consider this, once Paul Ryan’s budget proposal was submitted and passed in the House, the Obama budget proposal was introduced into the Senate where Obama’s Democrats had controlling numbers. What was the result? Mr. Obama’s proposal was defeated in the Democrat-controlled Senate by a 0-97 vote. Even Obama’s Democrats understood the writing on the wall. Conservative thinking is ruling the day, but the public still strongly resents holier-than-thou social-conservativism and insistence by conservatives on their perceived-right to enter people’s religious or sexual sanctuaries will not be tolerated by the electorate. For a final proof of this: remember that 59% of the populace is 100% opposed to the ultra-social-conservative stance of ZERO abortions in cases of incest, rape, extremely young mothers, or a threat to the life or health of the mother while 76% of Americans believe there are far too many abortions in America.

We saw Rick Perry this week giving us a great example of why strict adherence to fiscal-conservativism and Constitutional-conservativism is the only reasonable approach.   Serving as an extremely bad example, Perry preceded his recent entering the presidential fray with a big-spectacle event a “prayer-fest.” This played well in Iowa; it will NOT win him votes in the vast majority of states. Perry then goes to New Hampshire and cannot answer a simple schoolchild’s question about the age of the earth (4.5 billion years roughly) and, after tut-tutting to the kid that “there are gaps in the Theory of Evolution” (yes, there are, but nothing like the obvious contradictions and shortfalls of the sacred books of ALL our religions) tells the schoolboy that in Texas they teach both Creationism and Evolution in school. 

Mr. Perry, in short, is a fool proposing foolish things. Literal 7-Day Creationism is a religious tenet that should be confined to private schools funded by private and/or religious resources and NOT taught in public schools funded by the taxes of Jews, Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus, agnostics, atheists,  Shintos and Rastafarians as well as Christians. Mr. Perry, is proving himself unable to keep his eye on the twin balls of fiscal- and Constitutional-conservativism . . . indeed by advocating literal 7-Day Creationism be taught in public schools he is violating the tenets of the 1^st Amendment. I don’t know about you, but Rajjpuut’s “God is way too large to fit into Mr. Perry’s tiny church.”** And that is exactly why, expect for Ronald Reagan, Conservativism has been such a failure over the last eight decades. 

If conservatives learn nothing from the TEA Party’s successes and failures . . . they need to learn this: there are no areas of an individual’s life more private or more sensitive than religion and the bedroom and any effort to tell that person how to believe or what to do in either the church or the bedroom will only foster the grossest of enmities.

Rajjpuut believes that the TEA Party, when it sticks to its ten listed principles in the Contract from America@@, is the strongest force for political good in the nation. When it abandons them a la Angle, Buck and O’Donnell only bad things are possible. There is no document greater and none more ignored at this time in America’s history than the Contract from America. This is the truth as Almighty God has allowed me to see it, ignore this truth at risk of ruin to our great nation.

Ya’all live long, strong and ornery,

Rajjpuut

** These are the very words Rajjpuut’s father spoke as he “ex-communicated” himself from church a long time ago after a priest avowed that Gandhi “would burn in hell along with all those other heathens because he didn’t welcome Christ into his soul” and then refused to “recant” under my father’s withering interrogation. When it comes to religion, the best advice of all is “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” Rajjpuut suspects that Christ would welcome Gandhi into his soul in any case.  As to their relevance today, we (you and I) didn't rule on the abortion issue in Roe vs. Wade in 1973, but we should also not be so stupid as to deny that it's the present law of the land and has been for almost 40 years now and is unlikely to change . . . mostly because of the stance of absolutists among the anti-abortion people.  Refusing abortions in case of rape, incest, for very, very young mothers and in cases where the mother's life or health are at risk deeply angers 60% of the American public.

@@ http://www.thecontract.org/the-contract-from-america/

In short:

1.        Protect the Constitution

2.       Reject Cap & Trade

3.       Demand a Balanced Budget

4.       Enact Fundamental Tax Reform

5.        Restore Fiscal Responsibility & Constitutionally Limited Government

6.       End Runaway Government Spending

7.        Defund, Repeal, & Replace Government-run Health Care

8.       Pass an ‘All-of-the-Above” Energy Policy

9.       Stop the Pork

10.     Stop the Tax Hikes

In full:

The Contract from America

We, the undersigned, call upon those seeking to represent us in public office to sign the Contract from America and by doing so commit to support each of its agenda items, work to bring each agenda item to a vote during the first year, and pledge to advocate on behalf of individual liberty, limited government, and economic freedom.

Individual Liberty

Our moral, political, and economic liberties are inherent, not granted by our government. It is essential to the practice of these liberties that we be free from restriction over our peaceful political expression and free from excessive control over our economic choices.

Limited Government

The purpose of our government is to exercise only those limited powers that have been relinquished to it by the people, chief among these being the protection of our liberties by administering justice and ensuring our safety from threats arising inside or outside our country’s sovereign borders. When our government ventures beyond these functions and attempts to increase its power over the marketplace and the economic decisions of individuals, our liberties are diminished and the probability of corruption, internal strife, economic depression, and poverty increases.

Economic Freedom

The most powerful, proven instrument of material and social progress is the free market. The market economy, driven by the accumulated expressions of individual economic choices, is the only economic system that preserves and enhances individual liberty. Any other economic system, regardless of its intended pragmatic benefits, undermines our fundamental rights as free people.

Note: The percentages shown mark what percentage of the public respondents who thought this particular item belonged in the final “contract’ from among the 28 originally named principles created by the TEA Party . . . Hence the title Contract from America.

1. Protect the Constitution

Require each bill to identify the specific provision of the Constitution that gives Congress the power to do what the bill does. (82.03%)

2. Reject Cap & Trade

Stop costly new regulations that would increase unemployment, raise consumer prices, and weaken the nation’s global competitiveness with virtually no impact on global temperatures. (72.20%)

3. Demand a Balanced Budget

Begin the Constitutional amendment process to require a balanced budget with a two-thirds majority needed for any tax hike. (69.69%)

4. Enact Fundamental Tax Reform

Adopt a simple and fair single-rate tax system by scrapping the internal revenue code and replacing it with one that is no longer than 4,543 words—the length of the original Constitution. (64.90%)

5. Restore Fiscal Responsibility & Constitutionally Limited Government in Washington

Create a Blue Ribbon taskforce that engages in a complete audit of federal agencies and programs, assessing their Constitutionality, and identifying duplication, waste, ineffectiveness, and agencies and programs better left for the states or local authorities, or ripe for wholesale reform or elimination due to our efforts to restore limited government consistent with the US Constitution’s meaning. (63.37%)

6. End Runaway Government Spending

Impose a statutory cap limiting the annual growth in total federal spending to the sum of the inflation rate plus the percentage of population growth. (56.57%)

7. Defund, Repeal, & Replace Government-run Health Care

Defund, repeal and replace the recently passed government-run health care with a system that actually makes health care and insurance more affordable by enabling a competitive, open, and transparent free-market health care and health insurance system that isn’t restricted by state boundaries. (56.39%)

8. Pass an ‘All-of-the-Above” Energy Policy

Authorize the exploration of proven energy reserves to reduce our dependence on foreign energy sources from unstable countries and reduce regulatory barriers to all other forms of energy creation, lowering prices and creating competition and jobs. (55.51%)

9. Stop the Pork

Place a moratorium on all earmarks until the budget is balanced, and then require a 2/3 majority to pass any earmark. (55.47%)

10. Stop the Tax Hikes

Permanently repeal all tax hikes, including those to the income, capital gains, and death taxes, currently scheduled to begin in 2011. (53.38%)