David Brooks' column today sort of pulls together a couple of yesterday's posts.
While Brooks is no fan of the Tea Party Movement, he believes that those ideas could dominate the next decade. It taps into American populist tendencies and has a great deal of passion, which sucks in supporters. Brooks points to public opinion polls that show that the public is supportive of the tea party movement.
According to the NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, 41 percent of
Americans have a positive view of the tea party movement. Only 35
percent of Americans have a positive view of the Democrats and only 28
percent have a positive view of the Republican Party.
I'm a little skeptical of those findings. Do average Americans really know what the tea party people believe? I don't. It's really just some half baked conspiracy theories about professors and rich people trying to cloud their minds and take their money and their guns. It's crazy stuff. It's Glenn Beck.
Why is this crazy stuff getting free reign on cable television? I'm used to crazy stuff on the Internet, but I can't believe the new depths of FOX News. Beck makes Hannity look like a wise sage.
As I said in the comment section of the Beck post, Beck is excused by people who should know better on the grounds that he is entertainment/politics in the vein of Jon Stewart. His exaggerations are excused and slanders overlooked, because he isn't supposed to be real news. He is comedian news, they tell me.
He is asshole news, if you ask me.
But Beck is part of the lunatic fringe, as Brooks calls them, who have been stirring up the tea party movement. They've been dipping the tea bags. Letting the kettle whistle. [stop it, laura.]
Brooks seems to think that this movement has legs and could be a major force in the Republican party. I'm not sure about that. But they must be watched.
Apt. 11d 
The tea party people don’t seem crazier to me than Al Sharpton or Michael Moore or the people who insist that Sarah Palin isn’t Trig’s mother. Nor do they seem crazier than the posters I saw last time I was in New Haven for conferences at which various members of the Yale community discuss the possible impeachment of President Bush. However, I agree with our hostess than populist, conspiracist movements (or movements led by grad students, for that matter) don’t usually get that far, and that People Like Us with fancy degrees, cosmopolitan views and six figure incomes will continue to rule.
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It’s really just some half baked conspiracy theories about professors and rich people trying to cloud their minds and take their money and their guns.
I still haven’t figured out how the bailout is appreciably different from letting rich people take my money. I’d be happy to vote for somebody crazy (let’s say Ron Paul crazy but not much past that) as a first step to getting a new party system.
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Oh, yeah, I agree that there are crazies on the left, too. I have mocked the “Sarah Palin isn’t Trig’s mother” types here. (too tired to find the link right now.) But the topic at hand are the Tea Party people, brought on by viewing of Glenn Beck and the David Brooks column.
I do take a slight offense at the final sentence though, y81. (only slight though) I don’t think that the opposite of tea party people are PLU (rich, educated, city dwellers). I actually like populism when it’s not mixed with crazy stuff. Dad wrote a book on it in 1974. Someone who chooses to throw their ideas out on a blog, rather than going through traditional writing outlets is going to have populist sympathies. I don’t think that the tea party movement is going to go very far, because it seems to be very shallow — a one-issue movement. Also, the local tea party protests were very poorly attended around here. I really question how many people buy into that stuff.
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I blame public opinion polling. With better information, leaders can shaft people just short of the point that will start a riot.
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Considering my brother-in-law and his wife are avid tea-partyers, I have to say that while there may be many crazies among them, there are plenty of normal folk among them too. In fact, what I’ve seen after spending time with some of them are a couple of things. 1) the normal people have used the crazy ideas to fuel real ideas, modifying them to make them less crazy; 2) some of those people are running for office, writing their legislators, etc. and effecting real action; but 3) even the normal people are holding onto ideas that don’t have a lot of reality or practicality behind them. Basically, they hate Obama. My relatives have lived for 8 years under Bush. My sister-in-law was only 32 then and barely paid attention to anything outside of her own little world. My brother-in-law is a doctor and doesn’t want healthcare reform because he’s worried he won’t be able to maintain a lifestyle to which he’s become accustomed. Really, this is the first dramatic shift in power in their adult lives. So they’re freaking out.
While those of us on the left stand aghast. But some of us freaked out in 2000. But eventually we settled into the new reality and wrote letters and went to the polling booth. I think that will happen to the right, too, is already happening sort of. The big question is, will it be enough to unseat the democrats in 2012 or sooner. Hard to say.
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I’m not sure what an example of non-crazy populism is. Bimetallism dressed in Christian fundamentalist garb–which would certainly be the archetype of populism–seems pretty crazy to me.
Now, doubtless, someone with more detailed knowledge than mine of American political history can find some minor movement that qualifies as populist without being conspiracist or otherwise crazy. But that’s not the rule.
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Bimetallism was a rational response to the high debt levels of the farmers who were the base of the original populism. They wanted the same thing the “too big to fail” crowd got, the ability to pay back loans on far better terms than they could have gotten at the time they borrowed.
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The CIO (responding to y81).
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I can get behind populist anger over the role that race and class plays in determining future outcomes. I’m suspicious of college rankings. The high level of income inequality in this country needs to be rectified. I would like more people participating in politics. Those are very sensible populist concerns, but when they get into the conspiracy stuff, I just walk away.
How fascinating that your BIL is a tea party follower and he’s a doctor, Other Laura. Because aren’t the tea party people really anti-rich people? Have they enlarged the umbrella to include every Obama-hater? If so, then that’s much more scary.
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Because aren’t the tea party people really anti-rich people?
Based on little more than some old knowledge of who is likely to organize, I’d guess that the tea party people are people who are relatively well-off, but relatively disadvanted by either the recession or what they expect Obama to do.
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I’d like to know more about the tea party people — What do they believe? Is there some manifesto of the movement? Gingrich had one, in the “contract with/for America.” It stated real positions you could consider and support or oppose.
Is the tea-party movement about hating Obama? or about hating a set of policies?
And, if we’re talking nebulously about “tea-party” people, I’m guessing that they hate a certain kind of rich , not all rich people. I think there’s a tendency out there for a certain type of conservative to believe that some activities were subsidized, and others were not (not sure where education for doctors falls on this continuum). They hate the rich people who were subsidized while not hating the others. My problem with the logic is that all rich people are/were subsidized (is that a Carnegie quote?)
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I realize using my bil and his wife as an example is probably not capturing the variety that is the tea party. But let me offer this. They are woefully uninformed about politics, about the world. That seems to me to be a common thread for many tea partiers. They don’t read the bills or try to get any kind of objective information about policies. They latch onto sound bytes and misconceptions that fit their world view.
My bil doesn’t *think* he’s rich for two reasons. 1) He grew up working class–the family worked for GM. He still very much thinks of himself rooted in that lifestyle and in fact, primarily socializes with the extended family, who are all very much still working class. 2) He has no idea that his salary is that much larger than everyone else’s. He once said to Mr. Geeky that he didn’t understand why we couldn’t buy this or that or go on this or that trip, when obviously we made the same amount of money as he did. It turned out that my bil’s salary was quadruple Mr. Geeky’s. He was shocked. But I think he’s forgotten that. He has amnesia when it comes to making realizations like that.
I think the anti-rich sentiment is anti Wall Street fat cat. Doctors, after all, worked to get where they are, at least. And plus, they save lives! Wall Street people make money for doing nothing.
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Harry B- what’s the CIO that you refer to? A quick google gets me things like one half of the AFL-CIO (Council of Industrial Organizations?), or the Zimbabwian secret police, but nothing that is obviously populist but not crazy, unless the right half of the AFL-CIO is what you’re referring to and it had that role. (I don’t know tons about that particular union group.)
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” It turned out that my bil’s salary was quadruple Mr. Geeky’s”
I think this is fascinating, the real lack of knowledge (and, I guess, “forgetting”) of what people earn (and what level of lifestyle different earning levels support).
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And, I blame some of the problem on the American secrecy about personal salaries. It’s such a taboo topic that most people have no idea what even people who they know quite well make. And, as AmyP likes to point out, how much people spend (which we can see) doesn’t necessarily correlate well with what they earn, leading to further mis-assumptions about income.
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I think the anti-rich sentiment is anti Wall Street fat cat. Doctors, after all, worked to get where they are, at least. And plus, they save lives! Wall Street people make money for doing nothing.
I agree with this. Those who have wealth (even in a small way) but aren’t connected to Wall Street took big losses in most cases and watched others get bailed out. It is harder for them to borrow money if they need it while big banks have been recapitalized at government expense. Those who are retired cannot earn any interest in a safe investment at a time when equity investments have tanked and seem too risky for those not working. If working, they are facing higher taxes to pay for the bailout.
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” If working, they are facing higher taxes to pay for the bailout.”
Who is facing higher taxes? Have my taxes gone up, and I just haven’t noticed it? Or are we talking about someone somewhere else? Or is this the theoretical higher taxes?
(I think my taxes should go up, but I don’t think they have).
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It’s the theoretical higher taxes. But I agree that your taxes should go up.
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I don’t think the brother-in-law doctor is so crazy. Our hostess has been pretty explicit–our president has been less so–about the desire and need to reduce medical professional’s incomes.
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Based on the first comment, I’d be happy to see y81’s taxes go up also.
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Umm, I would consider myself a tea partyer, and I don’t believe in conspiracy theories and the like.
For the most part sane tea partyers believe in less government, fewer taxes…most closely falling in with a libertarian point of view.
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The CIO developed with the aim of busting the hold that the conservative AFL had over labor organising in the US (communists were among the leading forces within the CIO, but it was not a communist organisation by any means). I’d have said it was populist, and definitely not crazy (but I may be wrong about it being populist, since it’s not clear to me what that means). The AFL-CIO is the result of the merger between the two warring factions. The CIO won in the short term, the spirit of the AFL won in the long term.
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But Misty, how does your “less government (i.e. services), fewer taxes” characterization comport with the famous “get your government hands off my medicare” sign (which my parents actually saw at a health care rally, so it’s not just apocryphal)?
Do tea-partiers also oppose medicare? social security? the armed forces? national parks? health care research? Do they not oppose them, but think that spending priorities should be changed?
How about stands on abortion and flag burning and religion in public places?
And, I’m really trying not to be rhetorical — I would like to hear the answers of someone who considers herself a tea-partier. I’m also not necessarily looking for a justification of why the position is compatible with the theory (less government/fewer taxes), just an understanding of the spectrum of beliefs that’s supposed to fall under the label.
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So, the tea party people are just libertarians, albeit MAD libertarians?
OK. Not that the fiscal policy of libertarians hasn’t been demolished by the past 8 years, but whatever.
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Wendy, I don’t think that any libertarians would consider that their fiscal policy had been tried the last eight years. I don’t think libertarian fiscal policy will ever be tried because I don’t think it makes a whole lot of sense. Also, there is no such thing as a non-mad libertarian.
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“get your government hands off my medicare” sign
That’s what one thing that scares me about health care reform. Once you get an entitlement, you can’t get rid of it or even reform it with massive difficulties. People don’t remember where it comes from or that their “right” is X% of everyone’s salary.
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I can’t help thinking about this video. “Mad mad mad! We’re mad men!”
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…”Once you get an entitlement, you can’t get rid of it or even reform it with massive difficulties”…
Is this the flip side of the difficulty of raising taxes? No politician wants to raise taxes, just as no politician wants to cut services that people say they support.
…”People don’t remember where it comes from or that their “right” is X% of everyone’s salary”…
Similarly, employees often have no idea how much employers pay for their health plans – money that (arguably) comes from their paycheck.
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One of the main problem with the tea party movement has to be its open ended definition. I’ve understood it to be an extreme form of libertarianism that arose in response to the Wall Street bailout. But misty and GeekyMom’s BIL have a different understanding of it. Shrug.
I’m on various political e-mail lists. I got one from a conservative group yesterday, which said that tea partiers should avoid centralization and keeping a consistent message, because they would become like big government. The tea party movement should avoid centralization in all forms. Seems like a death sentence.
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Similarly, employees often have no idea how much employers pay for their health plans – money that (arguably) comes from their paycheck.
It’s on my check, but I didn’t even look until I wanted to see if I had one of the Cadillac plans. Just under the wire.
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So much of the health care cost as it currently works is hidden. Not only do employees not look hard at their employers’ portion of their health insurance. But most don’t understand that, if they are privately insured, they’re paying more for the same services at the same doctor/hospital, in order to make up for Medicare/Medicaid/charity care that’s done at a loss.
If you’ve ever been to the doctor or PT or what have you and seen them change your care plan once they learned your insurance coverage, you’ve experienced this phenomenon. (For example the orthopedist who offered to put pins in my broken arm because it would heal three weeks faster. Seriously.)
BTW I am not against universal coverage. This is a problem with the fee-for-service model, not with government-provided payment.
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Could you possibly take things a little more out of context? I don’t imagine you could if you tried. Oh well, the Left is all about feel-good nonsense anyway. Look around at countries that implement your ideologies…they have all fallen!! Good Luck!!
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Nice to have a reasoned argument from a conservative here….
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Look around at countries that implement your ideologies…they have all fallen!!
Wait, did something happen to Sweden, Norway, and Germany while I was sleeping? I knew I should start the day by looking at the news…
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Are you guys sure you aren’t responding to spam? The other comment from that name doesn’t fit the topic and the url looks wrong.
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Oh, I’m not sure I’d call what I’m doing “responding”. I hoped it was rather “making a joke”, though I guess it probably was hard to tell because it wasn’t very funny.
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Why don’t you click on the link and see what it is? I’ve spent too much time getting rid of trojans to try it myself.
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I wouldn’t agree with a ‘get your government hands off my medicare’ sign because that is a really self-contradictory statement. Anyone who participates in Medicare is tacitly in support of government involvement.
I suppose now that we’re looking at it more closely, there is no real central definition of the tea party movement. It’s kind of how you can show up at a gathering for some topic (say, vegetarianism) and get people who go along the wide range of the spectrum, from both extremes. Yet you can make a general statement like “Veggies are the best” and everyone will agree with it 🙂
One of the things that sticks with me most about the TEA party movement is the slogan “Taxed Enough Already”.
I could not sign onto a total libertarian movement because I am anti-abortion/pro-life, and a lot of libertarians would not be.
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