Many of us thought that the nutso right-wingers would be trying to target the African-American President when he was elected, but now, the “tea party” grass roots right wingers are starting to attack the government by attacking IRS offices. I guess they decided it was too hard to try and off Mr. Obama, but the average guy who works for the government, often their neighbors and friends, they’re fair game.
Many conservatives would like to see the Federal Government disappear altogether except for national security and the military. The “free market” will take care of everything else. But who builds the interstate roads that people drive on? Who tries to keep food and prescription drugs safe? Who delivers the mail, invented the Internet (not Al Gore), builds and supports museums, and the arts? And who is supposed to be the counterbalance to unbridled lawlessness by corporations?
Would the country be desegregated without government? Would women have rights with government? One of the chief flaws in the argument of Chief Justice Antonin Scalia is that we should always interpret the Constitution in the way the “framers” meant. Of course, the Founding Fathers didn’t have penicillin, atomic weapons, or Britney Spears. By Scalia’s argument (and, I believe many within the Tea Party movement), blacks like myself should still be slaves (or at least segregated and limited to the worst jobs and lives), women should go back to being barefoot and pregnant and treated like chattel by their husbands and fathers, and there would be a safe, white man in the White House.
But, we have to pay for it. People who have must share with those who don’t. Paying taxes for the benefit of us all IS patriotic, and believe me; I pay a goodly amount in taxes. But if I have to pay more so that there’s enough police to help keep my family safe; or that the roads are good; or so that kids don’t go to sleep hungry, that’s fine with me because I believe that if we take care of those who don’t have, there’s a greater likelihood that that kid won’t grow up to shoot me in a robbery attempt. Perhaps that no-longer-hungry kid will come up with a cure for cancer?
President Obama hasn’t been a complete success; I would rank him a B-/C+ grade for his term so far; but even progressives (liberals to me) should take a step back and think, isn’t this better than George W. Idiot? And would a John McCain presidency be any better?
Anyway, these Tea Party folks are just racists who are still upset that they don’t have a white man in the White House. If John Kerry, or the philanderer John Edwards, or Bozo the f#$kin’ clown was doing the same things Obama’s doing, there wouldn’t be any Tea Party movement.
These people are dangerous, and as much terrorists as Osama Bin Ladin, or Timothy McVeigh.