The “Community Organizerizing” (And Self-Destruction) of the Tea Party Movement

This post is probably going to annoy a lot of people. Well, I’m not perfect, and can’t please everyone. Some of the most activist members of the “Tea Party” movement have formed a group called “Tea Party Nation,” and are having their first convention February 4-6 in Nashville.

For some reason, there is a compulsion to go beyond actual protests of government and make it into a coordinated political organization, i.e. “community organizing.” When valid protests of the political process themselves become politicized, such organizations eventually join the government forces and abandon their initial purpose of attempting to make changes in government for the better. However, given that government itself is an inherently corrupting and fraudulent institution, it cannot ever be reformed.

This community organizing aspect of the Tea Party movement will cause it to self-destruct, as did the Ross Perot “reform” movement and Reform Party did in the 1990s. Some of the reasons also are the people and for-profit group in charge of this, who are charging over $500 for people to attend the event, and worse, are preventing the press from covering it except certain conservative news organizations.

An important aspect of last year’s tea parties is that many of them were spontaneous and were actual “protests” of what the federal government, both Congress and the White House, has been doing or has been planning to do (to us). The September 12th tea party protest in Washington was a planned event, but sponsored by many different organizations across America.

One can only predict that the organization will then become a political party, which will seal the movement’s doomed fate. In their need to change government and think that reforming it is anything different from rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, the activists themselves are merging their identities into their own utopian leviathan “good government.” As RedState.com’s Erick Erickson has stated,

I think the tea party movement has largely descended into ego and quest for purpose for individuals at the expense of what the tea party movement started out to be.

The other major aspect of this problem is that many of these Tea Party Convention community organizers are supporters of the US government’s wars and invasions and occupations abroad. The activists say they support “limited government,” except they support Big Government military socialism and government expansionism into other people’s territories that has done nothing but incite terrorism and destroy lives and property abroad.

Throughout history, war has been used as a means of justifying the existence of the state, and particularly the nationalized centralized state. President Abraham Lincoln used war to remind the secessionists of the supreme superiority of the federal government over the states and individual citizens.  Will the most vocal and political Tea Party activists join the Obommunists calling out the military and National Guard to suppress and stifle the secessionists of our time who want and have a right to their independence?  (If so, they also would have stood with the British government against the American Revolutionaries, too.)

Unfortunately, so many people are moved by the superficial emotionalistic rhetoric of certain ideas and not the substance of the ideas themselves, especially the Tea Party Nation’s use of the ideas of “liberty” and “limited government.” This reminds me of the disgusting portrayal of a Big Government Republican such as Scott Brown as the “Tea Party candidate,” which couldn’t be further from the truth. I have to listen to these talk show hosts in Massachusetts who were promoting Brown as such a candidate, knowing full well his voting record, and that he supports RomneyCare and other aspects of socialized medicine, and that he’s pro-abortion and supports Roe v. Wade, and that he opposed cutting the state income tax, and more. It really does seem to be the case that these talk show hosts were soothed by Brown’s pleasing superficial rhetoric while their continued unwavering love for the state and opposition to liberty was reinforced.

Above: Sherman’s March Through Georgia (as depicted by artist Alexander Hay Ritchie), a campaign of “total war” attacking civilians and everything in the soldiers’ path. It is bad enough to wage war on civilian populations of foreign countries as Presidents Truman and Bush and others have done, but Lincoln ordered attacks on civilians in his own country. That’s also bad, and tells us a lot about Lincoln. It reminds one of when British troops killed civilians at the Boston Massacre, and, given Lincoln’s actions defending powerful centralized government and opposing independence, it is not absurd to wonder whose side he would’ve taken during the Revolution.

I have no doubt that the talk show hosts and Tea Party conservatives in Massachusetts will naively support the Establishment Weld-Romney Republican candidate Charlie Baker for governor, and not the populist Anti-Establishment Republican candidate Christy Mihos. (They certainly wouldn’t support the libertarian, whoever that’s going to be.)

Local Conservative Talk Hosts Join Media In Elitist Snubbing Of Third Party

The Massachusetts Special Election to replace the late Senator Ted Kennedy (via current interim senator Paul Kirk) will be January 19^th, 2010. The candidates are Democrat state Attorney General Martha Coakley a.k.a. “Martha Cuckoo,” Republican state Senator Scott Brown a.k.a. “Mr. Handsome Movie Actor Face Guy” and libertarian Independent Joe Kennedy (not related to the famous Kennedys).

It is very cordial of the media to invite Joe Kennedy to debates. Now, Kennedy is an intelligent, private-sector “citizen candidate,” unlike the other two, and, although I did not agree with every one of his answers on the debates so far, at least he supports getting rid of the income tax and the capital gains tax, and wants to take US forces out of the Middle-East (and other parts of the world), and promises to work to repeal every part of any government health care bill that’s going through Congress now.  Kennedy has a genuine understanding of the Constitution and the nature of government, and doesn’t just repeat “libertarian think-tank statements.” He is also a non-lawyer. (Do we really need any more lawyers in Washington to further ruin our country? Mr. Handsome Movie Actor Face Guy and Martha Cuckoo are both lawyers.)

Unfortunately, the state-biased media seem to be snubbing Kennedy, and in some cases he has been accused of being in the race to confuse people to think he is actually “Joe Kennedy,” the former Congressman and nephew of the late Senator Ted Kennedy, to take Democrats’ votes away from Martha Cuckoo. On the other hand, some people such as SaveWRKO’s Brian Maloney are accusing candidate Joe Kennedy of having a “fraudulent candidacy,” who is there to “undermine Brown.” You can hear for yourself whether Kennedy is a serious candidate or not in this debate with Dan Rea on WBZ, this interview of Kennedy with WGBH’s Emily Rooney, and this debate on WGBY in Springfield. I believe he is sincere.

However, it is extremely disappointing to tune in to WRKO and WTKK to hear the local radio conservatives’ sickening love affair with this male model Scott Brown, who is really a Bob Dole-John McCain-Lindsay Graham-Nelson Rockefeller “moderate” (i.e. statist-socialist-Keynesian) principle-compromising Republican. Not the kind of candidate with whom you would expect these “conservatives” to engage in such kissy-face romance. They seem manipulated by his pandering rhetoric of tax-cutting and war mongering. Unlike Kennedy’s promise to repeal any government medicine proposals, Brown has stated that compromises should be made so that more people can get insurance. Brown does not recognize that the reason health care and insurance prices are so high is because of government regulations and bureaucracy already in place. Brown supported and voted for Mitt Romney’s fascist mandatory health insurance law, and Brown still supports that, despite its vast failures. I think the conservatives are in a fantasy world in their support of Brown, just as they fantasize that the US government’s invasions and occupations in the Middle-East can prevent terrorism when in reality such policies are provoking terrorism, and just as leftists fantasize that raising taxes will help the poor or schools or do anything but line bureaucrats’ pockets.

I think these conservatives use certain psychological defense mechanisms to shield themselves from reality including distortion and denial. Plenty of times these conservatives have discussed how both the Democrat and Republican parties are “statist” parties, yet respond emotionally to the Republicans’ constant rhetoric of “low taxes, cutting spending and waste,” etc.

After all the Tea Parties and Town Hall meetings, and 9/12 and similar protests, and criticisms by conservatives of “out-of-touch Republicans” as well as Democrats, and talk of a third political party, the conservatives still seem to want to run around in circles and repeat the same mistakes. Conservatives seem to be suffering from the dysfunctional Keynesian short-term immediate gratification  of “getting a Republican in there (any Republican, including Big Government socialist ones)” to change things, rather than employing some more thoughtful strategies of long-range planning to restore our liberty that government has been encroaching and usurping from us. You would think that these intelligent guys on local Boston radio wouldn’t be engaging in the kind of childish snubbing of Kennedy that they have been doing. He is actually the one candidate who makes actual references to the Constitution.

When I refer to “conservatives running around in circles,” here are some examples. In 1994, an election year much compared to 2010, Republicans were swept into Congress and took control as the majority party. However, the new Republicans joined the old Republicans and Democrats to further entrench Congress as a one-party, tax-and-spend tyrant. Republicans continued to sign on to $trillion-dollar pork-filled budgets and increasingly burdensome regulations. Rather than push for any real reform as the majority party, the Republicans were more concerned with President Clinton’s sex affairs in the Oval Office. And further back in time, Ronald Reagan promised to cut whole cabinet-level department, and not only didn’t do that, he added several new bureaucracies, and signed every pork-filled Congressional budget.

The childish snubbing by these “conservatives” of Joe Kennedy coincides with how Scott Brown snubs Kennedy at the debates, referring to Coakley as though she is his one and only opponent, as 2006 Republican gubernatorial candidate Kerry “Muffy” Healey would talk to Deval Patrick and ignore Independent Christy Mihos and Green Grace Ross.  Muffy challenged the Democrat to a one-on-one debate in 2006 and now Scott Brown challenges the Democrat to a one-on-one debate. It is these Republicans who are the elitists, and the local radio conservatives, who constantly accuse Democrats of elitism, become elitists when they do the same kind of snubbing.

Could it be that these radio conservatives have a “man-crush” on Scott Brown a.k.a. “Mr. Handsome Movie Actor Face Guy”? Well, one of them sure exhibited that kind of thing with Willard Mitt Romney during the 2008 presidential campaign, either because Romney was paying him, or because of man-crush. It was sick, the way he would constantly fawn over Romney. “Mitt Romney will be a great president… Mitt will be a ‘Mount Rushmore’ president.” Yes, he said that! In fact, just recently, this particular talk host said that if Scott Brown wins this senate election, he might even be considered as a vice presidential candidate in 2012. Yes, he said that, too. There must be “man-crush” things going on with these people. They have been sounding irrational.

Health Care and Our Inalienable Rights

January 2, 2010

© American Thinker 2009 Link to this article at American Thinker

With threats from federal officials to seize control over the health care system and further intrude into our private matters, many Americans are trying to find ways to protect their lives and liberty. Given America’s dysfunctional economic situation that the federal government caused and has been making worse, government can only make the health care system go from dysfunctional to despotic. The regulations, mandates, and restrictions currently in place already violate the individual citizen’s God-given, inalienable natural rights to “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” referred to in the Declaration of Independence.

Leftist supporters of government health care do not seem to understand or are hostile to the concept of the individual’s right to life and liberty. Leftists prefer that the collective have power to make demands on the individual, and that the individual be dependent on the state for cradle-to-grave care. A system of cradle-to-grave care necessitates state control over the individual, as we have seen in places such as the former Soviet Union, and eradicates the individual’s right to control one’s own life. It is a system of massive invasion of liberty.

There are now efforts to have states “nullify” the dictatorial mandates of health legislation being considered by Congress. By nullifying ObamaCare, a state declares those intrusions as void or not applicable in that state. Some people view the Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as recognition of such states’ rights. Unfortunately, others express doubts that states will be able to constitutionally nullify these proposed federal health care laws. Some view such nullification efforts as merely symbolic and not enforceable.

While the Tenth Amendment protects states’ rights, the Ninth Amendment is geared more toward the individual’s natural rights not included in the Bill of Rights. The Ninth Amendment of the Constitution states,

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Constitutional law expert Randy Barnett has written that the Ninth Amendment protects the natural rights that we have “prior to the formation of government.” Barnett views unenumerated rights in the context of “presumption of liberty.” This is a reasonable interpretation, as the Founders believed in the aforementioned natural rights. The Bill of Rights can’t possibly enumerate all individual rights “endowed by their Creator,” which is why the Founders included the Ninth Amendment.

There is no explicit Constitutional right to “privacy,” although while the Ninth Amendment can be used to protect an individual’s natural right to privacy, the Fifth Amendment‘s protection against “self-incrimination” can and should be a vehicle to protect an individual from being compelled to report one’s insurance or medical status to the government. Would George Washington and his fellow revolutionaries approve of jail for citizens who don’t report such personal information to the government? I think not.

With our inalienable rights to life and liberty, one might assume that among our unenumerated rights would also rest the rights of voluntary association and contract (such as the relationship between a doctor and patient) and the right to not buy insurance if one doesn’t want it, as well as the right to opt out of a government health scheme. One might also assume that individuals have an inalienable, natural right to not report their medical status to the government.

The Founders were clear that such unenumerated rights would be recognized by natural law — that is why they wrote and unanimously approved the Declaration of Independence — but our natural rights may not be protected by constitutional law. Barnett has also wondered whether “mandatory insurance” is unconstitutional. However, given that our natural rights are inalienable, meaning that government may not take them away for any reason, it really should not matter if any of the health care proposals in Congress are unconstitutional. As economist Hans-Hermann Hoppe explains,

As the Declaration of Independence noted, government is supposed to protect life, property, and the pursuit of happiness. Yet in granting government the power to tax and legislate without consent, the Constitution cannot possibly assure this goal but is instead the very instrument for invading and destroying the right to life, property, and liberty … the Constitution is itself unconstitutional, i.e., incompatible with the very doctrine of natural human rights that inspired the American Revolution.

A part of the Declaration of Independence that might recognize the rights of both the individual and the states to reject harmful federal dictates reads:

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it… it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

The government has become uninterested in securing our rights as it instead invades them. We need to “throw off” such proposals that further assault our rights. Throughout this health care debate, we have seen officials conniving to pass legislation as quickly as possible. Legislators have included quite invasive requirements, including draconian IRS provisions. One wonders whether those lawmakers actually know that health care in the U.S. is dysfunctional because of the regulations, bureaucracy, and intrusions already in place. Congress’s actions now seem almost conspiratorial, given how so many Americans oppose these sweeping changes.

Eventually, this health care legislation will become a government-run, single-payer system, as is the intention of the politicians in control.

Whether the states can nullify federal health mandates and intrusions is unclear, but the individual surely has a right to not participate. However, such attempts of individual non-participation could get one thrown in jail, which shows what a gross violation of one’s natural, God-given rights these federal orders will be. Additionally, the quality of a government doctor’s care will probably not be as good as that of a private doctor currently in business.

Economist Gary North has written about how the current government-regulated health care system may be culpable for the death of his son. Given how government has run other activities, one can speculate whether there will be an increase or a decrease in the occurrence of medical “errors” when government controls the health care system. But if the ignoramuses and hooligans of the United States Congress actually do pass this tyrannical, Soviet-like medical scheme, Gary North has this perhaps more useful advice: “Do not get sick.”