By E. Thomas McClanahan, Kansas city Star Editorial Page columnist
Democrats and other skeptics are desperate to dismiss the tea parties that popped up across the country today. Kansas City political consultant Steve Glorioso told The Star they were being staged by the "same far right fringe characters driven in large part by talk radio."
This eagerness to explain away this movement is telling, suggesting the skeptics see these gatherings as a real threat. Certainly the tea parties have an anti-Obama slant, but what we're seeing is something outside the normal dynamics of Democrat-Republican tension.
In fact, as Glenn Reynolds writes, in some cases established politicians haven't been allowed to speak at all.
The good news for Republicans is that, while the Republican Party flounders in its response to the Obama presidency and its programs, millions of Americans are getting organized on their own. The bad news is that those Americans, despite their opposition to President Obama's policies, aren't especially friendly to the GOP. When Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele asked to speak at the Chicago tea party, his request was politely refused by the organizers: "With regards to stage time, we respectfully must inform Chairman Steele that RNC officials are welcome to participate in the rally itself, but we prefer to limit stage time to those who are not elected officials, both in Government as well as political parties. This is an opportunity for Americans to speak, and elected officials to listen, not the other way around."
Likewise, I spoke to an organizer for the Knoxville tea party who said that no "professional politicians" were going to be allowed to speak, and he made a big point of saying that the protest wasn't an anti-Obama protest, it was an anti-establishment protest. I've heard similar things from tea-party organizers in other cities, too. Though critics will probably try to write the tea parties off as partisan publicity stunts, they're really a post-partisan expression of outrage.
This is a genuine grassroots phenomenom. Various facets of the GOP coalition and conservative movement are trying to leverage this movement, but the movement was there first, and it took off after Rick Santelli's famous rant in Chicago. It isn't clear yet what the tea party movement is all about, but it can't be dismissed as something that simply arose from shadowy GOP organizers.
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That depends entirely on
That depends entirely on where on the Laffer Curve you are when you cut taxes. Of course if you cut taxes to a low enough point, receipts decline. Similarly, you can not raise taxes to any rate you want either, since very high tax rates would choke off the economy and thus kill the tax base. Certainly my original post could have been less glib and more carefully worded.
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Laffer curve, because it's a joke...
If it only works on paper, it doesn't work.
Gee I don't know how I can be more clear about funding the government, I pay taxes. According to voo doo logic if you put money into the economy via tax cuts it's supposed to stimulate the economy and increase the GDP. (Of course when that happens the repubs want to cut taxes again and so we never get the increase in revenue.) If, on the other hand we put money into the economy via federal spending that ends up as wages as a stimilus that won't grow GDP (this is where the voo doo kicks in)because the economy, in voo doo theory, knows that this increase in the money supply and velocity is just different.....yeah
If we don't protect the freedom of speech how will we know who the a$$#@les are?
It is a genuine grass roots movement
The only real solution to the financial meltdown is private investment, but the new administration is successfully frightening away any and all players. With all the spending, taxes are certain to rise and the brunt of the burden will fall on the shoulders of job-creating small businesses. Government over-spending is not the answer. Those who are reacting with genuine protests of the tea party variety have a right to voice their concerns. The constant blather and blame of the Bush administration from the left is insipid. The last time the budget was balanced and the US had no debt was when Andrew Jackson was president. The only way the Obama administration will succeed is to create a climate that encourages private investment and to forego the introduction of any new entitlement packages. The Democrats in charge need a wake up call. The Federal Government is already too big. Right-wing extremist conservative Republicans, Huzzah. Tea, anyone? I prefer oolong.
Can't disagree with that
And then when we factor in graduated taxation, that adds a whole 'nuther wrinkle to the equation, too -- because clearly if you have a stipulated 70% highest tax rate (as it was when Reagan came on), the impact of that highest rate will differ if it kicks in for incomes over $5,000,000 versus, say, $300,000.
It Depends
That depends entirely on where on the Laffer Curve you are when you cut taxes. Of course if you cut taxes to a low enough point, receipts decline. Similarly, you can not raise taxes to any rate you want either, since very high tax rates would choke off the economy and thus kill the tax base. Certainly my original post could have been less glib and more carefully worded.
well
'tain't.
http://www.factcheck.org/taxes/supply-side_spin.html
Please
Radicalizedmoderate: Oh, I've already paid my taxes, thank you. But funny thing about those Republicans who "want to spend and spend without raising the loot to pay for it"... every time they cut taxes, tax receipts mysteriously go up. How is that possible? Please don't let your head explode.
But once again, you have refused to address the issue of how we actually pay for the stuff you want. Get your head out of the sand.
edith: You are either ill-informed or a propagandist. Yes, the national debt doubled under Bush from around $5 trillion to about $10 trillion. According to Obama's ten-year plan using his own fudged numbers, the debt would double again to $20 trillion. But a GAO analysis revealed that if Obama gets all the new social programs he wants, the national debt will actually increase to somewhere north of $30 trillion. Hope and change, indeed.
San Franciscan with an interest in what people think
Dear feduptaxpayer,
I promise you that I was proudly born in San Francisco and have lived in the city and or its suburbs all my life except for a few months a year when I live in Sydney, Australia (as I am doing at the moment). I am a registered voter in San Francisco...proudly a Democrat. I have worked in local media (radio and print) for more than 40 years and have been an avid reader of on-line newspapers for the past five years. I enjoy engaging in debates on America's past and future. Participating in such forums as this is one of the things that makes America great.
I have never seen the Daily KOZ, though, as an avid viewer of Countdown with Keith Olbermann (via my Slingbox at 10am Tuesday thru Saturday), I am aware of it indirectly.
I know this response has given you plenty of fodder for reaction. Go 4 it. Or as your last president once said, foolishly, "Bring it on."
edith edith edith....welcome back, Internut has missed you
And you're not a libertarian, chazzy. A libertarian's head would have long ago exploded over the savagery the Republicans.... have wreaked on the concept of fiscal responsbility
I am so amazed by your mystical ability to mis read my voter registration card from wherever you are hiding today. I did indeed abandon the republican party a bit over 21 years ago over Mr Reagan's profligate spending....after a brief ten year membership inspired by the well intentioned, misguided, incompetent peanut prince.