The Tea Party appears to be gaining strength, but I still think it's doomed to be a fringe, splinter element in American politics. The reason was recently revealed by the figure who has emerged as its most visible spokesperson--Rand Paul. This candidate for the US Senate from Kentucky showed his true stripes when he stated he didn't believe the government--federal or state--had the authority to force lunch counters at public restaurants or stores like Woolworth's to serve blacks and other minorities. This is the crux of the libratarian agrument and the long-simmering rage of the Tea Party--government is too big and the individual should be not be subject to it. Why not just have 50 separate states like Reagan said he wanted, but then he seemed to have forgotten why we fought the Civil War. Paul says he himself is against discrimination, but doesn't believe the government has the right to tell a privately owned business it can't discriminate--even if that business is serving the public.
The Tea Party has gained strength because there are a lot of people who don't like taxes at all and haven't put two and two together and realized those taxes pay for things like schools, libraries, police, and cleaning up disasters like oil spills and hurricanes. The anti-taxers have joined up with the libratarian ideologues like Paul and the hysterical bigots who just can't stand the idea of a black president or anyone speaking Spanish and want things back to where they were when white people were the unquestioned top dogs.
I recall an older male relative of mine a few years ago telling me he was in a convenience store behind two Hispanic guys and they were speaking Spanish to each other. My relative actually said to them, "Hey, this is America. We speak English here." Now I can see gettting a little miffed if you were asking directions of a complete stranger or conversing with a shop-owner in a major city of the USA and this stranger or shop owner didn't speak English. Maybe you wouldn't be justified, but I could empathize with your feelings. But dictating what language people should be speaking to each other is going a bit far and this is the sentiment of the Tea Party and of the Arizona immigration law. Yes, undocumented workers should not be here, but there is nothing wrong with teaching multicultural studies in state-funded schools or giving anyone the history of the country they or their ancestors are from originally.
I believe there are legitimate concerns about the size of the defeceit, but that is only part of this movement's concern. I think many have this unrealistic dream of living out on the prairie where the only law is the sherriff in town and a man and his kinfolk live on their own land and the damned goverment leaves everyone alone expect when there's a big disaster. They want to go back to 19th century, no regulation. let business do what it wants and if they go bankrupt so be it, or if they cheat everybody blind, so what? They think the world is too big and they want it simpler and their government simpler and smaller too. Honey, I got news for you, the world is bigger and more complicated and we ain't never goin' back to the way we were. So you can sing that song all you want, but those scattered pictures and hazy watercolor memories are gone for good.
