Pundits Push Myth of Tea Party-Republican Rivalry

Let's get this straight once and for all: The vast -- and I mean vast -- majority of those who identify themselves as Republican voters, or as independents who likely will vote in Republican primaries in 2012, has no problems with the tenets and beliefs of the tea party movement.

It's a laugh-out-loud moment when national political pundits continue to have weighty discussions about a "battle between the GOP establishment and the tea party." Make no mistake: Such discussion is designed to create that very division. Because it doesn't exist right now.

Let's break down the essential elements of the tea party's policy positions and see what if anything separates those positions from those of the large majority of potential GOP voters next year.

Oh, my gosh! Tea partiers want to see a reduction in the size of government. Imagine a Republican with half a brain who hasn't come to the conclusion that a growing federal government is their enemy. Good luck finding them, because polling data says they are rare. Republicans and tea partiers agree.

It doesn't mean that Republican officeholders have always lived up to that standard. Many have voted and otherwise supported expanded government and excessive spending, including during the George W. Bush administration.

Of course, it's important to remember that much of that overspending has been a reaction to 9/11 and the military response that it triggered. By the same token, the federal Department of Education didn't disappear, as once promised. In short, everyone gets the point that being a Republican in 2012 is a far more fiscally conservative proposition than it was just a few years ago.

What about taxes? I can't find in the polling data many Republicans who favor eliminating the Bush tax cuts, or many who buy into the concept that a family earning $250,000 a year is "super wealthy," and should therefore be punished with higher taxes.

You more or less can't find a Republican candidate for any office who wants to tax much of anything at all. Many of them are proposing tax cuts, in fact.

How about immigration? In general, those who identify themselves as tea partiers want to see order restored to the immigration process. They oppose using federal or sometimes state government money to support those who are here illegally. They point to border nations Canada and even Mexico, both of which are stricter about non-citizen residents in their countries than America is.

Let's look at health care. It's almost astounding the number of people who identify themselves as Republicans who want a complete repeal of ObamaCare. The only component of ObamaCare that polls well with some in the GOP is the requirement that insurance companies cannot box people out of the health care system because of pre-existing conditions. That's hardly reason for Republicans to fight tea partiers.

What's really going on is the same thing that we witnessed in 1980. Ronald Reagan was portrayed as an impetuous and unstable arch-conservative who would push the nuclear button in a New York minute. Yet his economic policies now are the standard for all Republicans, even though when he first revealed them, they were considered untested or even "voodoo economics." That coined phrase came from none other than the man who would become Reagan's vice president, George H.W. Bush.

And that's my point. The differences between the elder Bush and Reagan in 1980 were far more pronounced than any of the differences that exist among any of the major GOP candidates for president today.

For whatever reason -- be it ignorance or something more nefarious -- much of the national media wants to portray a divided GOP. They are hopeful that the Republican who emerges as the party's presidential nominee will be identifiable with what these pundits consider to be a major rupture within the GOP. They're nuts.

I must have given a hundred interviews to reporters on this issue over the last year. Inevitably they will then quote different parts of what I said. But not one has written the first thing I always tell them: The tea party is a state of mind.

For whatever reason -- be it ignorance or something more nefarious -- much of the national media wants to portray a divided GOP. They are hopeful that the Republican who emerges as the party's presidential nominee will be identifiable with what these pundits consider to be a major rupture within the GOP.
The reason is no real mystery. Wire service journalism detaches journalism from location - initially from the town to the state, from the state to the country, and ultimately from the country to 'the cloud.' "Cloud computing" is the perfect analogy for what they mean by "citizen of the world." IOW wire service journalism has no allegiance, except to its own self. Thus, rules whose raisons d'être are patently to make journalism interesting and therefore profitable are sold by journalism as rules "in the public interest."
The people who are the market for journalism are interested, willy nilly, in reports of threats to their well-being. And since the people depend on our republican form of government, it's profitable (and fun) for journalists to report that republican government "doesn't work."

This seems the perfect opportunity to express what the grass roots Tea Party movement represents for me.

I often hear that Conservatives has a goal of a smaller government and to some extent that is correct. However, a more correct expression is that the Tea Party Patriot’s goal is for a constitutional government.

I see and hear many ill informed gullible people who believe that political entities bought the Tea Party movement to exploit the Tea Party Patriots.

As the Tea Party gained in numbers and its voice became heard there were many politically entities that wanted the attention of the Tea Party Patriots. This is normal and does not in any way corrupt the movement. What transpired for the most part was not that the Tea Party movement joined some other faction but rather other factions were encouraged to join the Tea Party movement.

The Tea Party movement is not a political party and that is the key component to understanding the Tea Party movement. The Tea Party is an idea, the idea that the Constitution is the nation’s owner’s manual. The Tea Party Patriot’s candidates will check the owner’s manual before enacting any legislation to ensure that the Constitution granted government the power to enact that legislation.

The owner’s manual with its 27 updates clearly instructs the government how to function. It contains more than adequate detail describing how the government can use the powers granted to legislate.

Many wonder how a disjointed, unorganized, and unfunded Tea Party Movement would go about creating a constitutional government. Start with the premise that government is constitutionally corrupted. The notion of creating a third political party was discarded because it would take too long to achieve any meaningful change The Republican primary was the vehicle selected to bring about change in the fewest number of election cycles.

The idea was to oppose incumbent Republicans who had adopted the corruption of government and abandoned Conservative values. There were some successes in the primary. These candidates that were successful in the primary went to the general election to defeat corrupted Democrats. There were some successes in the general election. The next obstacle was to discover which of the successful candidates would remain true to the Conservative goal of a constitutional government and remove those who did not at the next election.

All in all, I think that first election cycle was productive.

Perhaps all the negative media attention is because the Tea Party Movement does not approach the government with an offer to exchange their votes for additional favors. The Tea Party is unique in that for the first time in my life time there is a movement demanding less from the government.

Will it continue to work and can it succeed. I think it can and I think the more Americans who come to understand the value of the American Constitution and the founder’s vision for America the stronger the grass roots movement will become.

It is almost as simple as Christianity. The only requirement to becoming a Christian is to accept Jesus as your savior. There, you’re a Christian. The only requirement to becoming a Tea Party Patriot is to uphold the Constitution. There, you’re a Tea Party Patriot. In all matters political, merely consult the Constitution. The Constitution clearly enumerates what powers of legislation the government has. Contrary to the myth, you don’t need a law degree or a college education to understand the Constitution. In fact in today’s liberal staffed universities that education may be an obstacle to understanding the Constitution.

At this moment in time, the Tea Party Movement has the advantage of an administration with a socialist vision for America, which serves to create more Americans who want to become aware of their owner’s manual.

I am continually puzzled why the liberals don’t take some steps to clean out the incumbent corrupted Democrats. The Tea Party Movement has shown the way and having your children and grandchildren thank you is a great reward.

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