It's a Bit Pre-Civil War Up in Here ...

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

This tea party stuff is spooky.

It's not just the tea parties, it's the symbolism behind them and the parallel track with history. The inability of organizers to explain why they've done this now as opposed to the past several years of ballooning deficit spending under the previous administration. That clearly exposes the partisan nature of it - therefore it's hard to fake the funk of this as "non-partisan" when it's driven by clear irritation over the election of a Democratic president (or that other reason over the shade of his skin). And, oh, has anyone asked another key question: do you see any people of color at these events? Not really - which presents a persistent problem: calling events that only represent one particular segment of the population "movements." Or saying "Americans" feel a certain way when it's really just a slice of demographic. That talk always makes the rest of us nervous.

Not certain if it's set in, yet. The reasons for that bit of nervousness aren't the more obvious. The anxiousness some are feeling is slightly obfuscated by the partisan lining in the conversation. The Republicans organizing, showing up and dumping tea bags all claim it isn't a Republican thing. Democrats may pick at it, but can't claim much and may be afraid that if they get too opposed to the concept, it'll backfire. So, it's a bit disingenuous and historically inaccurate to say these are "non-partisan" events grounded in a non-partisan tradition. All of this is political, making a political point and by virtue of that ... it's partisan. The original Boston Tea Party was, by all accounts, a partisan event organized by organized folks who had a desire to get heard. Do something dramatic; get King George's attention; piss him off and holla: pollute the Boston Harbor at a time when environmentalism wasn't exactly vogue. 235 years later, judging by the murky dark of Beantown's water, some probably wish their scrappy, headstrong Founders hadn't did that. But, good thing is we got a country out of it. And what a powerful, don't-frack-with-us farm this is

We can reconcile two centuries later that the tea party was a necessary thing ... to get to where we had to go as a nation. In some respects, it's probably necessary now - if all you're focused on is taxes. Agreed that the tax code is whack. How it's structured, the unfair burden on many of its citizen: from working poor squeezing dollar out of dime to comfortably rich just hoping not to turn up poor. Maybe the impact of taxes doesn't come from what we see subtracted from our paychecks. Perhaps it is the goofy shock we feel after witnessing how that money is spent, much of it dumped into the shape-shifting black fiscal hole of government. And, like tailgating sports fans dishing amateur analysis, we think we know how to spend it better. And maybe we do. From the ashes of that outrage could rise a prime lesson in good governance, a place where public officials make real effort to partner with citizens on matters of budget. Rushed and half-hearted committee hearings in empty rooms doesn't cut it; press conferences after the fact paves the road to resignation, ouster or unrest. The sincere and creative solicitation of citizen input on tax and budget policy may be painful, but it sure beats social unrest and anarchy.

There's something in the air about organized re-enactments of an event which prefaced a rather violent American Revolution. Not to mention the fact that a modern tea party is a bit of a misnomer since the first one in 1773 protested the tyranny of a monarch-based government. Why bite off that? In a sense, it's corny and unoriginal since, these days, we elect our governments. Yet, even the President feels it, the student of history that he is, explaining why he's playing Empathizer-in-Chief and calling for a tax code revamp. While knowing the tea parties are really post-election grievance sessions brought to you by the cats who lost, President Obama still understands the volatile political nature of the American anti-tax legacy.

Enough about the tea parties though, since parties come and go. What's more unsettling is the alignment of American Revolution themes with pre-Civil War sentiment and climate. It's the odd appearance of history repeating itself, or at least a failure to understand lessons of the past. Why is Texas Governor Rick Perry ® even entertaining the thought of "what might come out of" Washington "thumbing [its] nose" at the American people while using the words "union" and "dissolving" in the same sentence? True: he didn't say "secession" outright. But, the language is used soon after the Texas House pushes a Resolution promoting "state sovereignty" under the 10th Amendment, reigniting the states' rights debate. And neither is Perry completely rejecting the thought of secession, with follow-up rhetoric suggesting a clever conservative credentials match in a caustic primary against Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson (R-TX).

We students of history see a few murky parallels emerging while some Republican politicos play to what they think their base wants to hear and conservative talk show hosts see the ching-ching of ad dollars. Some say that, perhaps, we're overreacting a bit. But are we? Raging tea parties and rants about a "socialist" President and Congress; rising gun sales, fear of encroachment on 2nd Amendment rights and mass shootings; hints at secession; talk of US/Mexico border militarization and the intensity of a drug cartel insurgency drawing in aggressive US response; the backdrop of economic destabilization and festering "Main Street" anger at "Wall Street;" the implosion of the Republican Party and new whispers of a breakaway conservative body politic. It's feeling early 19th century "up in here," as they say: from the banking recession of the late 1830s; to the US/Mexican War in the late 1840s; to Southern, Democratic charges of Northern interference in their "way of life" translated into worries over the rapid spread of industrialization triggering the obsolescence of agri-based economies; and the ingredients for political upheaval which led to the founding of the Republican Party - an offshoot of the Whig Party - in 1854. These are some of the events which led to the outbreak of Civil War in the United States.

Open protest and political disagreement are healthy signs of a healthy democracy. If the tea parties weren't all that partisan and really focused on an overhauled tax code, other folks might join in, as well. The troubling vibe, however, arises from the combination of history-deficient Americans along for the ride and dangerously fringe political elements which know history and see an opening for a certain kind of outcome. Mixed in with that is the uncertain economic climate, leading to an explosion of unemployment, poverty and the expansion of folks who are left with nothing to lose. We need to approach the times with caution and awareness or debt won't be the only thing we leave our kids with.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/charles-d-el...u_b_188532.html

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

So you're saying those tea parties were attended by disaffected Obama voters? People who voted for, and expected, change?

Because it's my impression that the people attending those parties are mostly Ron Paul voters and P-O'd conservatives. What change were they expecting given that they never even voted for the change platform?

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

So you're saying those tea parties were attended by disaffected Obama voters? People who voted for, and expected, change?

Because it's my impression that the people attending those parties are mostly Ron Paul voters and P-O'd conservatives. What change were they expecting given that they never even voted for the change platform?

I don't know. I was out of the country on the 15th.

[Dr. A ♥ O 203]

16 states have invoked the 10th amendment not 21 like some of the other threads on here had me believing.

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=30917

Check out the comments on this page. Some of them are are calling for a revolution. This is very dangerous ground some of these people are treading in this time as per the article in this thread said.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

16 states have invoked the 10th amendment not 21 like some of the other threads on here had me believing.

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=30917

Check out the comments on this page. Some of them are are calling for a revolution. This is very dangerous ground some of these people are treading in this time as per the article in this thread said.

As spooky as it is, I don't think we should be afraid. The Right Wing Extremists are trying so desperately to undermine the new administration and they'll be damned if they're going to sit idle and wait for Obama's agenda to prove itself. IMO, where this talk of secession has its roots is when AG Holder talked about reinstating an assault weapons ban. If you follow the money of who is behind the movement, you'll find the gun lobby...which has a knack for attracting hysterical lunatics as members.

[jundp 191]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

How many days has our new president been in office? How many years before that was someone else in office? How quickly do you expect change to occur?

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

How many days has our new president been in office? How many years before that was someone else in office? How quickly do you expect change to occur?

The Right Wing Extremists don't care. Obama could be the most successful president we've had in a long time and they still wouldn't acknowledge it. They are so balls deep into their rigid, myopic ideology, that nothing will stop their delusional minds into believing whatever they want to believe. They are beyond hope.

[stangguy 0]

While the news surrounding the sovereignty movement is relatively new, California passed their declaration of sovereignty in 1994. Also, several states proposed or adopted their declarations before Obama was even considered as being able to beat Hillary in the primaires. It isn't so much a reaction to Obama as the overal situation of the country right now. Though, much of this reccesion B.S. is an overreaction by individuals and businesses alike.

As far as Obama's policies I consider it probably the biggest expansion of unconstitiutional spending since Roosevelt's New Deal.

As far as this all being a bit pre-Civil War, there are only 2 ways to change the contsititution, and the easiest involves bloodshed.

[scandal 951]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

<disclaimer> I don't make a habit of posting in the Off-topic slugfests, so consider me an utter noobie here</disclaimer>

I actually don't give a ####### about the original posting. I'm butting in because of Lucky's signature line:

"Tyrants from Hitler to Mao to Stalin have sought to disarm their own citizens, for the simple reason that unarmed people are easier to control. Our Founders, having just expelled the British army, knew that the right to bear arms serves as the guardian of every other right. This is the principle so often ignored by both sides in the gun control debate. Only armed citizens can resist tyrannical government."

-Ron Paul, June 26, 2006

Recognizing that these are Paul's words, not yours (http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul374.html , e.g.) , what possible basis does either Paul (or you, since you quote him) have for this preposterous statement? Hitler? Mao? Stalin? You really think they gave a solitary second's thought to the weighty matter of disarming their citizens?

I can just picture Mao running around the hillsides of Qinghai, collecting all the muskets from the yak-herders

[Dr. A ♥ O 203]

While the news surrounding the sovereignty movement is relatively new, California passed their declaration of sovereignty in 1994. Also, several states proposed or adopted their declarations before Obama was even considered as being able to beat Hillary in the primaires. It isn't so much a reaction to Obama as the overal situation of the country right now. Though, much of this reccesion B.S. is an overreaction by individuals and businesses alike.

As far as Obama's policies I consider it probably the biggest expansion of unconstitiutional spending since Roosevelt's New Deal.

As far as this all being a bit pre-Civil War, there are only 2 ways to change the contsititution, and the easiest involves bloodshed.

http://www.dailymotion.com/playlist/xk3ri_...-chomsky91_news

[peejay 327]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

How many days has our new president been in office? How many years before that was someone else in office? How quickly do you expect change to occur?

The Right Wing Extremists don't care. Obama could be the most successful president we've had in a long time and they still wouldn't acknowledge it. They are so balls deep into their rigid, myopic ideology, that nothing will stop their delusional minds into believing whatever they want to believe. They are beyond hope.

Ha! So what is a "Right Wing Extremist"? Anyone that doesn't embrace the cult of Obama, worship his every utterance, or look at him with the same rose colored glasses as your fellow Obamatolagists?

Considering that Obama didn't win the election by anything close to a landslide even after 8 years of Bush ought to tell you something. Does it upset you that everyone hasn't bought into, submitted to, and fully embraced the Obama program 100%? And if they don't...they are "Right Wing Extremists". Ha!

You need a reality check.

[NickD 203]

Good thing about these tea parties, finally some USC's are standing up for our rights, how come there wasn't any tea parties during the Bush administration? Does it take eight years of loss of freedom and jobs to wake people up?

Not only federal, but state as well, our governor took quite a beating last week in Madison, well a verbal beating.

[fozzie 41]

I think one of the original points was that these protest didn't occur when Bush was president! Why? Is it not largely his fault? Woud they be happening if McCain was in power and doing the same things as Obama? Do't forget McCain pushed a platform of change too.

[DeadPoolX 9]

Why now? Obama promised 'change' and it turned out to be just a campaign slogan. Nothing more.

How many days has our new president been in office? How many years before that was someone else in office? How quickly do you expect change to occur?

The Right Wing Extremists don't care. Obama could be the most successful president we've had in a long time and they still wouldn't acknowledge it. They are so balls deep into their rigid, myopic ideology, that nothing will stop their delusional minds into believing whatever they want to believe. They are beyond hope.

Steven, you know as well as I do that there are just as many Left Wing Extremists as there are Right Wing ones. The difference is that now there's a Democrat in the White House, so you hear the Republicans making a stink. Go back a few years and the entire situation was reversed.