TEA Party Continues Reagan Tradition
Time to Institute His Economic Bill of Rights
Just as Hall of Fame Denver quarterback John Elway became famous for a 98-yard drive through a snowstorm in the waning moments of a playoff game that won the game for his Broncos and came to be known as “The Drive,” so too in late 1964, Ronald Reagan gave a speech supporting Barry Goldwater’s presidential Bid. Goldwater’s famous book was called “The Conscience of a Conservative,” Reagan’s famous speech came to be known simply as “The Speech.”
During “The Speech” Reagan told the story of a Cuban refugee who had escaped Fidel Castro and that island’s communist tyranny. The refugee later became an American businessman and much later met two of Reagan's friends. Reagan described it this way in “The Speech” and considered even more powerful than Goldwater’s entire book.
“In the midst of his story my one friend turned to the other and said `we don't know how lucky we are' and the Cuban stopped and said `how lucky you are? . . . I had some place to escape to,' and in that sentence he told us the entire story,” Reagan continued, “If we lose freedom here there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth. And this idea that government is beholden to the people that it has no source of power except the sovereign people is still the newest and most unique idea in all the long history of man's relationship to man.”
Six months ago Bill Wilson, President of Americans for Limited Government, said,
Six months ago Bill Wilson, President of Americans for Limited Government, said,
“As the federal government continues to expand beyond its constitutional boundaries here in the early part of the 21st century, Reagan's timeless warning against the grand designs of centralized planners deserves renewed attention. In his speech, the future president also suggested that a forceful response was needed to reclaim the principles of the founding period otherwise ‘history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening.’”
The TEA (Taxed Enough Already; or Taken Enough Abuse) Party movement coming one generation after Reagan’s first presidential election victory honors Reagan’s legacy and the legacy of our Founding Fathers. It’s no coincidence that TEA Party activism rose up shortly after our newest President passed his $787 BIllion stimulus program. Barack Obama’s progressivism (Marxism, actually) and the entire Obama agenda, seemingly all designed to rush the country down the path toward the abyss while spitting on the Constitution and all the principles that made this country great. The same principles that Reagan harkened to every day are the principles Barack Obama denigrates into oblivion.
In response to Obama’s nauseating socialism, Reagan nostalgia and Glenn Beck’s eye-opening revelations have created a whole new generation of Americans that Wilson said in the blog quoted above
“. . . are willing to take up Reagan's challenge and restore constitutional checks on federal power. The current administration's on-going efforts to “Europeanize” the American economy with new entitlement programs and coercive mandates has helped to focus public attention back onto the ideals of the founding period. Best seller lists are replete with references to the key figures responsible for the American Revolution.
“. . . on July 4, 1987, President Reagan delivered a radio address that discussed a series of proposed constitutional amendments aimed against deficit spending that would be folded into an “Economic Bill of Rights.” Reagan had discussed his plan at great length the day before during a ceremony held at the Jefferson Memorial. Although his comments were overlooked in the news media at that time, they are remarkably detailed and highly relevant to the fiscal challenges of 2010.
“It's about time we constitutionally mandate the Federal Government to do what every American family must do, and that is balance its budget,” Reagan said in his address. “That doesn't mean taking more out of your pocket by raising taxes. In fact, our Economic Bill of Rights suggests a balanced budget amendment should contain a provision requiring more than a mere majority vote in Congress -- which is all it takes now -- to raise your taxes.”
Voters, whether Republican, Independents, Democrats or Libertarians like Rajjpuut showed up en masse on Election Day, 2010, to express their outrage with tax and spend politicians . . . especially those with the gall to refuse to read and understand the expensive bills and entitlements they were passing. Rajjpuut’s suggests that the TEA Party and the Republican Party take this opportunity to revisit America’s Economic Bill of Rights which Ronald Reagan created out of his deep love for this country:
America's Economic Bill of Rights
July 3, 1987
Preamble
The Founding Fathers of our country knew that without economic freedom there can be no political freedom. Their rallying cry of "No taxation without representation" reflects that fundamental precept. They knew that the right to earn your own keep and keep what you earn is central to America's understanding of what it means to be free. This country was built by people seeking to support themselves and their families by their own labor, people who treasured the right to work and dispose of their earnings as they saw fit, people who were willing to take economic risks.
Over the past 40 (now 64) years, however, the growth of government has left our citizens with less control over their economic lives. What America needs now is an Economic Bill of Rights that guarantees four fundamental freedoms:
• The freedom to work.
• The freedom to enjoy the fruits of one's labor.
• The freedom to own and control one's property.
• The freedom to participate in a free market.
To secure these freedoms, I propose the following initiatives:
The Freedom to Work: You have the right to pursue your livelihood in your own way, free from excessive government regulation and subsidized government competition.
1. To reduce subsidized government competition with private citizens, I will establish a bipartisan Presidential Commission on Privatization to identify government programs and activities that can be accomplished more effectively in the private sector. I will also instruct the executive branch to find additional ways for contracting outside the government to perform those tasks that belong in the private sector. As to those activities that should properly remain in the government, I have asked the President's Council on Management Improvement to accelerate its productivity improvement program by one year and to adopt private sector practices where they would promote efficiency.
2. To reduce the burden of government regulation, I have reconstituted the Task Force on Regulatory Relief, chaired by the Vice President, to root out unnecessary restrictions on the individual's pursuit of a livelihood.
The Freedom to Enjoy the Fruits of Your Labor: You have the right to keep what you earn, free from excessive government taxing, spending, and borrowing.
3. To protect you from over-borrowing by the government, I will ask the Congress to adopt a balanced budget amendment, a line item veto, and legislative changes that will restore integrity to the congressional budget process.
4. To protect you from over-taxing by the Government, I will propose as part of the balanced budget amendment submitted to Congress, a requirement for a supermajority vote by Congress before your taxes can be raised. This reform will help make permanent our recent progress in lowering your tax rates, broadening the tax base to ensure fairness, and indexing rates so that inflation cannot push taxes back up.
5. To protect you from excess spending by the Federal Government, I will propose Truth in Federal Spending
Legislation that will:
A. Require that every new program established by legislation increasing Federal spending be deficit-neutral by including equal amounts of offsets.
B. Require that every piece of legislation mandating an increase in private sector costs or imposing new regulations include a financial impact statement detailing:
—The impact on private costs;
—The impact on prices for the consumer;
—The effect on employment;
—The impact on the ability of U.S. industries to compete internationally.
C. Require that every piece of legislation forcing increased expenditures by State and local governments include an assessment of the spending impact, the likely source of funding, and the ability of these governments to fulfill the mandates of the legislation.
The Freedom to Own and Control Your Property: You have the right to keep and use your property, free from government control through coercive or confiscatory regulation.
6. To protect your right to own and use your property, my administration will pursue our successful efforts in the courts to restore your constitutional rights when the government at any level attempts to take your property through regulation or other means.
7. To protect intellectual property and to encourage creativity, I will urge that the Congress act on my proposals to provide adequate domestic and international protection to Americans who create new ideas and invent new goods and services.
Freedom to Participate in a Free Market: You have the right to contract freely for goods and services and to achieve your full potential without government limits on opportunity, economic independence, and growth.
8. To reform the present welfare system that promotes dependency and destroys families and communities, I have proposed a welfare reform initiative that will lift the least fortunate among us up from dependency by creating incentives for recipients to become independent of welfare as full participants in the American economy.
9. To prepare our youth for participation in today's economy, I will ask the Congress and the States to enact proposals that will protect the rights of parents to guide their children and select from a broad array of educational options that emphasize excellence, character, and values. I will also promote programs to assist problem students to complete their education and to encourage dropouts to return to school.
10. To arm American workers and businessmen for full participation in an increasingly complex world economy, I will press for the Congress to act on my trade, employment, and productivity proposals to:
—Increase job retraining and other initiatives which improve opportunity for the American worker.
—Encourage science and technology by increasing support for basic research and development.
—Enact antitrust, product liability, foreign corrupt practices, and other regulatory reforms that place American
enterprise on a level playing field with foreign competitors.
—Improve America's ability to secure free and fair trade without resorting to protectionist measures that destroy jobs and
harm the consumer.
Makes a lot of sense doesn’t it? Truth in spending by the Obama administration alone would be a wonderful thing but all of our presidents and far more importantly all of our congresses have been guilty of excess taxation and super-excess spending. This is where our present $14.1 TRillion National Debt and current $112 TRillion in Unfunded liabilities (not including welfare programs but only Social Security, Medicare and the federal side of Medicaid) come from . . . Truth in Spending; and requiring a “¾ super-majority” before any tax can be made law; or any present tax can be raised seems like simple, solid common sense. Rajjpuut would also insist that any tax can be cancelled and any old tax decreased by a simple majority. Reagan’s words bear repeating:
“We the people deserve to know that our jobs, paychecks, homes, and pensions are safe from the taxers and regulators of big government. Jefferson warned us of this threat 200 years ago,” he said. “Our Economic Bill of Rights is designed to protect the economic freedom of all Americans and to keep our country growing and prospering.” AMEN!
Ya’all live long, strong and ornery,
Rajjpuut
