Successful Tea Party Movement Must Include Pro-Life Issues, Not Just Economy

LifeNews.com Note: Tom Glessner is a pro-life attorney who is the president of NIFLA, the National Institute of Family and Life Advocates. NIFLA is an organization with more than 1,200 affiliated pregnancy centers that provides legal, medical and practical help for pregnancy centers across the country.

Political change is blowing in the wind but it is not the change promised by Barack Obama when he ran for the presidency. For sure, Obama has brought political change to the nation, but his transformational policies have meant bigger government, higher taxes, federal subsidies of abortion on demand, and greater governmental control over the lives of American citizens.

Hundreds of thousands of citizens across the nation have raised their voices to protest Obama’s policies of change. They are crying out for a different change that will honor the integrity of each individual and create an atmosphere where true liberty in all spheres of life – economic, cultural, and spiritual- reigns. Political pollsters are now predicting a huge seismic shift in the political landscape this November. The recent Glenn Beck sponsored rally in Washington D.C., attended by thousands upon thousands of grass roots activists, indicates that this public outcry of protest is real and powerful.

The Tea Party movement is comprised of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents from all walks of life. The political ruling elite, the corporate world, and the media have completely failed to comprehend this populist movement dismissing it as marginal, extreme and even racist. However, this movement is not composed of ignorant and bigoted individuals, as suggested by the political class. Rather, it is an authentic grassroots movement of thoughtful and patriotic people demanding real change from an out-of-touch political establishment.

The Tea Party movement, for the most part, centers its protest on economic issues and concern about the loss of freedom that an ever-growing federal government brings. These concerns are valid and appropriate. Most leaders of this movement also believe in the sanctity of life and the need to halt the wholesale destruction of innocent human life through abortion and other life related issues such as embryonic stem cell research. However, many in the Tea Party movement have made it clear that while they are sympathetic with the pro-life cause, the abortion issue is not formally part of the Tea Party agenda.

Economic issues are a vital concern; as is the growing size of the federal government and its overreaching into the lives of ordinary citizens. The overwhelming burden of excess regulation and taxation upon businesses and individuals is alarming. In the same manner, however, the killing of 1.25 million unborn children annually from abortion must be a grave concern. Accordingly, a failure by the Tea Party to incorporate the serious pro-life concerns of millions of Americans into its agenda will be fatal to achieving success.

Perhaps, the Tea Party should take a lesson from the old fashioned three-legged milking stool. When I was a child I visited my aunt and uncle on their dairy farm and was intrigued watching my uncle milk the cows while sitting on a three-legged stool. I asked him why he used such a funny chair to milk the cows. He explained that a four-legged chair can be unbalanced if one of its legs is a different length than the others and it could even tip over if you leaned backwards. A three-legged stool, on the other hand, balances evenly and won't tip over even if one of its legs is longer

We should learn something from the old-fashioned milking stool. There are three legs to a successful agenda that will change America for the better. Each leg is critical and the current grassroots movement for change in America will collapse if any of these legs is ignored. These legs are:

1) Revival of the Economy: This leg requires the establishment a strong robust economy that creates full employment and does not burden small businesses with taxes and oppressive regulations that hinder job development. Limited government and reduced taxation are at the core and are necessary to bring the nation out of the serious economic recession/depression in which we find ourselves.

2) Maintaining a Strong National Defense and Protecting Homeland Security: This leg requires a serious commitment by the government to win the war on terror and protect our country’s border from those who would illegally enter and do us harm.

3) Protecting the Family Unit and Restoring the Right to Life for All: The social issues – protecting the sanctity of marriage and restoring the right to life – are issues of equal importance. Millions of Americans, including myself, have placed these issues at the top of the priority list for the next generation of political leaders to seriously address.

To date, while it appears that most Tea Party leaders verbally support all three legs of this “milk stool” some, such as Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, assert that the social issues (and specifically abortion and the right to life) must take a back seat to the other two legs, which are seen as more important.

A further example of this viewpoint was shown in a recent interview of Sarah Palin with Sean Hannity of Fox News. Gov. Sarah Palin, a committed pro-life leader, was asked to name the top five issues facing the country today and the deaths of 1.25 million unborn annually from abortion was not on her list. If, indeed, this is the approach a new Congress takes after the November mid-term elections, then the agenda of the Tea Party movement will fail.

America must be forewarned. A nation that fails to protect the lives of its most vulnerable members has set a course for itself that will lead to its eventual destruction from within. The killing of future generations through the act of abortion has already taken a toll on the demographical future of the nation and the Western world. Unless this trend is stopped then, notwithstanding the impact of the Tea Party movement, our culture and nation will have effectively committed suicide.

The invention of the three-legged milking stool was truly ingenious. Will the current populist movement for change understand this and formally incorporate the life issues into its agenda? Time will tell and the future of America hangs in the balance.

You CAN NOT separate social from economical. It is not humanly possible. You can NOT pretend to ignore the crucial, fundamental principles of the Constitution that made this country the best ever and possible for free enterprise. Natural Rights should be the core, because without it, your freedom can NOT exist.

YES I CAN! If I want to deal with social issues, I look to platforms OUTSIDE the Tea Party. The Tea Party is for Fiscal Responsibility and Taxes. That's where it came from, that is what its mission and core values are about and that is why it was named after the original "Tea Party." As I said to another poster ...If we start including gay rights, abortion, Christianity, and everything else, and try to stuff it into the Tea Party,the result something that looks like the old Democrat Rainbow Coalition.

The Tea Party is only a small PART OF the Conservative Tsunami wave that is forming. It is coming tidal wave with tremendous power that is about to make some major changes on the political landscape. That wave is made up of many groups. Some focus on Anti-Gay, Pro-M/F Marriage, Anti-abortion, Pro-Christianity, Anti-Mosque etc etc etc ... and among the "etc" is the Tea Party, focusing on Fiscal Responsibility. It is a PART of the wave, part of something much bigger, but IT IS NOT that bigger thing.

We must not confuse the limited Tea Party's mission with another far greater mission of a far larger phenomenon. Whatever the heck Glenn Beck did last week "is" that phenomenon. It doesn't need signs, it doesn't need rabble-rousing political speeches, it transcends race and even religious differences. It is beyond that, it is bigger than that and it is the God-driven values fueling the power.

This special thing that is happening is not what the Tea Party is, but the Tea Party certainly is a PART of greater wave. As individuals, we can join the "wave" in several ways. The 40 days is one, the Black Robe Regiment another, The Anti-Mosque group or the Anti-abortion group ... AND, among those the Tea Party, (the fiscal responsibility group).

In these many groups making up the Conservative Tsunami, all of the Christian and Social values you are discussing and say MUST be there ... they are there. The best example is the 8-28 Rally last Saturday. You were looking at the wave ... within it were all of the things you say must exist, and also in it were Tea Party people ... just a smaller (fiscally-responsibility-driven) group among all the groups there. We don't want to make the Tea Party into something is is not, NOR do we want to belittle the Tsunami rising up (stuffing it into a very limited Tea Party Mission Statement).

Most people still do not realize what is happening or understand the significance the swell rising up beneath the waves. However for some, when we step back and understand what we are seeing it becomes clear and we notice something ...

The Bush is afire with the glory of God, but only he who sees takes off his shoes.

And looking around, not everyone is barefoot ... YET!

It has everything to do with social issues and the basis of the Constitution and the Rights defined in our Founding documents which is based on Natural Law Theory. I am not injecting religious views here—just our basic foundation of government which I think the Tea Party CAN NOT ignore, otherwise, they have no authority to demand anything.

I think we can ABSOLUTELY and MORALLY agree on this point. And I know you were not injection religious views, I understood what you were saying. And I agree with it. This is what Beck is saying, that it comes back to the "individual" and the moral character of that individual ... that's what you are saying, and I so agree.

My fear is that the media has a "shortcut" way of using a "term" to tag a lot of people wrongly. As people ... I believe foolishly ... try to turn the Tea Party Movement into something more than it is, then it becomes an EASY TARGET for the libs and lefties. If the Tea Party sticks with FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY and stays away from gay marriage, they are not a target. My purpose here is to protect the Tea Party. But then you look at what Beck did ... absolutely amazing. How could anyone (with an IQ over 12) come out "against" anything he did or said? Not possible, they can't be a target, no signs, all people and religions represented, ... so well done. It is to THIS group that I belong. Yes I'm a Tea Partier, bring up Fiscal Responsibility and you'll get an ear full from me. But it is far more important to be a part of the BIGGER wave that's coming ... the Conservative Tsunami that will change the political landscape in November. We got a "peek" at it on 8-28. If I was the Dems, I'd be building an ark. :-)

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