Like a lot of people, right or left, I think a lot of what the Tea Party people seem to be after is good. After all, who likes paying taxes and who does not want to limit spending. My problem is that they tend to protest the here and now, rather than to offer specific plans to remedy the things they feel are objectionable. Until they do, the effort will be no more than that of the original Boston Tea Party. History tells us that, although a popular cry of the time was “No taxation without representation,” the tea party had nothing to do with taxes or politics. In the mid-1770s, King George, in an act to “bail out” a failing East India Company, gave the company a monopoly for both the importation and distribution of tea. The result was to literally wipe out a major colonial business. Led by some Boston tea merchants, a bunch of disguised hot heads performed an act of piracy and grand theft in hopes of getting King George”s attention. It didn”t! It did however cause the shutting down of the colonial government and reinforce the enforcement of the “intolerable acts” so unpopular. To add insult to injury, for a while, in the market for tea in Boston, actual price went up due to the reduced supply.
I feel, too, that there are a lot of “realities” and very hard decisions that need to be faced up to. Things like “is health care a right or not?”: just how much defense spending is needed (rather than wanted?); and, given that 100 percent is not possible, what level of security/safety/life risk is acceptable? It seems as though too many of the Tea Party folks are those who feel the unfinanced wars are fine and, following Reagan, feel that deficits are not to be worried about. And that they have, by golly, paid their fair share which my generation knows is grossly untrue. Presumably they are not economic idiots and so tend to be smart enough to know that the humongous national debt needs to be dealt with and further spending reductions on things like education are not the answer if America wishes to remain great. Maybe “war bonds,” but more likely, much higher taxes to pay for what has already been borrowed and spent. Ain”t goin” to be easy, but it is necessary. And that brings up another hard decision, which kind of taxation does the country want ? progressive or regressive? Perhaps it is the Almighty”s way of punishing us for letting things get out of hand!
We Americans need to do a lot of serious thinking, develop rational priorities and make some very hard decisions. I”d like the Tea Partiers to come up with a platform of items they feel that need work ? both “what,” but more importantly “how” ? and present it for consideration. Plain protest simply is counterproductive!
Guthrie “Guff” Worth
Lakeport
