In 2008, Barack Obama won, in large part, in the same way that Bill Clinton won in 1992, Ronald Reagan won in 1980 and 1984 and Jimmy Carter won in 1976. He ran against Washington. In that way, he was able to tap into a frustration long shared by a substantial segment of the American people, a suspicion of an ever stronger state.
At the same time, however, that this Democrat was running against our nation’s capital, he and his congressional allies were developing policies which would centralize more power in a city which has often become an object of ridicule for those living beyond its narrow confines. Peggy Noonan contends that he continued to push this contradictory message in his State of the Union address last week:
The central fact of the speech was the contradiction at its heart. It repeatedly asserted that Washington is the answer to everything. At the same time it painted a picture of Washington as a sick and broken place. It was a speech that argued against itself: You need us to heal you. Don’t trust us, we think of no one but ourselves.
The people are good but need guidance—from Washington. The middle class is anxious, and its fears can be soothed—by Washington. Washington can “make sure consumers . . . have the information they need to make financial decisions.” Washington must “make investments,” “create” jobs, increase “production” and “efficiency.”
At the same time Washington is a place “where every day is Election Day,” where all is a “perpetual campaign” and the great sport is to “embarrass your opponents” and lob “schoolyard taunts.”
Why would anyone have faith in that thing to help anyone do anything?
Once again, we’re struck the Democratic/leftist notion of “social justice”/progress, increase the power of the federal government. It is that very arrogance, that Washington knows best that has fueled the Tea Party movement.
*** OFF THIS TOPIC – RELATED TO A TOPIC AOF LAST WEEK ***
Out Wets Carlie’s old co. does not like her. They like Boxer – who I hate_ but I think this is a negative for Carlie, in a big way!
http://www.sacbee.com/static/weblogs/capitolalertlatest/2010/01/hp-campaign-con.html
Natch the McClatchy paper is all over it. As you no doubt know being a Californian they have hater the GOP for a century. They make it clear they think she was incompetent see para 3
I keep coming back to the “tea party movement,” and finding myself frustrated with its ostensible objectivity (but actual Republican Party nature – or worse?). If the arrogance in Washington fueled the growth of the Tea Party movement, why was there no Tea Party movement during the latter half of the Bush administration? The idea of an imperial presidency certainly grew during the Bush administration. Budget deficits certainly grew during the Bush administration. And the steps the Obama administration took to bail out Wall Street were in many cases a continuation of the steps Bush and Paulson took before the inauguration. I would have much more faith in, and respect for, the supposed Tea Party movement if it were not redolent of Republican Party dirty tricks…
Phil, the Tea Party movement has gained strength, by and large, outside of and oftentimes in opposition to the Republican Party apparatus.
Good question as to why there was no Tea Party movement during the Bush era, could be a product of the scale of Obama’s big spending initiatives. People voted Republicans out in ’06 and ’08 because GOP had lost sight of free market initiatives, hoped that Obama would deliver the “net spending cut” he promised (which W never did), then become frustrated when they saw him to be just like Bush on spending, only on steroids.
Mark Steyn has a column in the OC Register this week that makes the same point–Obama keeps telling us that Washington is the problem, and his solution is naturally, more Washington:
“The ever tinnier, more perfunctory sophomoric uplift at the start and finish can’t conceal the hope-killing, jobs-slaying, soul-sapping message in between, which is perfectly consistent, and has been for two years. As President Obama sees it, whatever the problem – from health care to education, banking to the environment – the solution is more Washington.
Simply as a matter of internal logic, this is somewhat perplexing. After all, when he isn’t blaming George W. Bush, Obama blames “Washington” – a Washington mired in “partisanship” and “pettiness” and “the same tired battles” and “Washington gimmicks” that do nothing but ensure that our “problems have grown worse.” Washington, Obama tells us, is “unable or unwilling to solve any of our problems.”
So let’s have more Washington! In our schools, in our hospitals, in our cars, in everything!
Which raises the question: Does even Obama listen to Obama’s speeches?”
http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/-231622–.html
I should also notes that, after 2004, deficits were declining under Bush, that is, until he had to work with a Democratic Congress.
Then you have no place in the TEA party movement. It is not a Republican party movement, but Taxed Enough Already is certainly not a natural home for the average Democrat or a left-leaning independent.
I smell a rat in the whole comment. If you are inclined to agree with the TEA party movement, you are not ambivalent about your associations. Therefore, to strafe it with points about the Bush presidency smacks of trying to stir up a little discontent.
Look at Obama’s initiatives, the cost of his stimulus scheme, the deficits he alone has added to the mess and then tell me that he didn’t take any mess Bush made over 8 years and send it sky-rocketing in just a few months after taking over.
Had Bush won a third term and done what Obama has done, I believe the TEA party would be there with the same message. This is about out of control government spending, growth and change we do not accept.
I would like to think – I really would like to think – that the Tea Party movement would have arisen under a 3rd term Bush administration (if that administration had continued to operate the way it did as it was winding down last fall). I just don’t believe it. I am not trying to strafe the movement. It just seems to me to have arisen not coincidentally at the beginning of the Obama administration, when I think – if it were truly not Republican in sentiment or affiliation – it should have arisen far earlier.
I am not ambivalent about my affiliations; I just did not think that I had to announce my affiliations in order to comment here, nor did stating my affiliations seem to affect the logic or appropriateness of my comment. I am a 46-year-old man in a long-term relationship with another man who generally votes Democratic but has recently felt those roots giving way a bit and is trying to see if another home might feel better aligned with his values and his conclusions about the way the world works.
Is this a forum for debate or for preaching to the choir?
Phil, perhaps you should look up the term, “Concern Troll”.
Let me assure you, DaveP., Phil is not a troll. (I happen to know the guy.)
#7: “I would like to think – I really would like to think – that the Tea Party movement would have arisen under a 3rd term Bush administration (if that administration had continued to operate the way it did as it was winding down last fall). I just don’t believe it. I am not trying to strafe the movement. It just seems to me to have arisen not coincidentally at the beginning of the Obama administration, when I think – if it were truly not Republican in sentiment or affiliation – it should have arisen far earlier.”
What difference does it make, Phil? Are you saying that it makes the group’s objectives and ideals illegitimate? I’m not following what your point is.
Phil, I can not get past the bold and underlined part of your comment.
I am guessing that “worse” than Republican is ……. Ron Paul?
As a life long Republican, let me assure you that I would be pleased to see nearly 100% of the Republican incumbents replaced with TEA party representatives who will go to Washington and take on the heavy lifting without being turncoats who quickly dedicate themselves to incumbency and wearing the purple sash of entitlement and elitism.
First of all, my thanks to Danny for verifying that I am not any kind of troll. I am sure you get trolls – I’m not criticizing anyone who thought I was a troll – it’s just that I was not trolling.
Second, I think it makes a great deal of difference whether the Tea Party movement erupted under Bush or under Obama. If it did not erupt under Bush, but should have erupted under Bush, then I must question the objectivity of the movement – it suggests that it is political in nature, and ought to call itself a republican movement. Overspending is overspending – we ought to be irritated by it regardless of the party affiliation of the overspender.
If the Tea Party movement IS republican in nature, then it is just another hack movement, linked to the current two-party system. I don’t care if it IS linked to the current two-party system; I just want it to SAY that it is. Does that make a difference? Yes. If in some ways the previous republican administration has been analogous to the current democratic administration, then we ought to repudiate the excesses that underlie both. Otherwise, we are throwing stones at the crows we dislike, and leaving alone the crows we like.
I started out my political journey as a vehement democrat, and now I am not sure where I stand. I dislike the extent to which Obama preached change and yet has ended up playing cozy with the likes of Pelosi. I think the health care bill was too much, too fast. By the same token, I am uneasy about any opposing movement that simply wants to preserve its own advantages.
This government spends too much. It has spent too much for the past several decades. It has spent too much under republicans, it has spent too much under democrats. And a cost overrun that benefits a military contractor is no less vexing and worthy of condemnation than an entitlement program plagued by fraud.