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May 22, 2013
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 When Voters Disrupt the Tea PartyPosted on Nov 8, 2009Here’s a story you may have missed because it flies in the face of the dreary conventional wisdom: When advocates of public programs take on the right-wing anti-government crowd directly, the government-haters lose. This is what happened in two statewide referendums last week that got buried under all of the attention paid to the governors’ races in Virginia and New Jersey. In Maine, voters rejected a tax-limitation measure by a walloping 60 percent to 40 percent. In Washington state, a similar measure went down, 57-43. They lost in part because opponents of the so-called Taxpayer Bill of Rights measures (known as TABOR) did something that happens too rarely in the national debate: They made a case for what government does, why it’s important, and why cutbacks in public services can be harmful to both individual citizens and the common good. The idea that most voters hate government has an outsized influence on the thinking of both parties. Republicans try to exploit this feeling; Democrats try to get around it. Only rarely do those who believe in active government take the argument head-on and insist that many of the things government does are necessary and, yes, good. The media almost never discuss what the sweeping dismantling of public services inherent in the rhetoric of the anti-government movement would mean in practice. It’s far easier to replay footage from a few tea party rallies over and over, and discuss some vague “mood” in the electorate. Advertisement In Maine, one ad featured several taxpayers warning about what less government would mean in practice: “Our school budgets have already been cut. This would mean even less money for our classrooms. ... Community health centers could be cut. People rely on them, especially now.” A sympathetic-looking man then appeared on the screen to add: “My wife relies on our home nurse visits. What will we do?” Nor was the anti-TABOR campaign confined to what individuals get out of government. Another ad highlighted the larger social and economic impact of public education. “Without strong public schools, our kids won’t be prepared for good jobs,” the announcer said. “Maine’s future could be in doubt.” In Washington state—where tax limitation was opposed by leading moderate Republicans, including former Gov. Dan Evans and former Sen. Slade Gorton—the “No” campaign offered a cross-generational message, focusing on cuts in both school budgets and home care for seniors. Opposition to these measures went well beyond the ranks of ideological liberals. Recall that on the same day that Maine rejected TABOR, it also rejected gay marriage. In Lewiston, a socially conservative working class city, 59 percent voted against gay marriage—but 58 percent also opposed TABOR. It’s true that Washington and Maine have been reliably Democratic in recent presidential elections. But this is precisely why the defeat of these anti-tax measures was so important. Anti-government crusaders were getting ready to argue that if TABOR measures could pass in blue states, theirs was the wave of the future. “I think the Maine TABOR will sort of be a spark to other states,” Grover Norquist, the country’s premier anti-tax agitator, told voters during a visit to South Portland in October. “I’m talking to taxpayer activists and citizens’ groups, all of whom are looking to see that if Maine, a moderate Northeastern state, says, ‘Yes, let’s take a look at this,’ it then becomes a stronger sell in Arizona and Washington and Oregon and Florida.” By that logic, it’s now a weaker sell. That’s why conservatives hope no one pays attention to the news from Maine and Washington, where voters decided not to be part of a laboratory experiment being pushed by the Beltway right. But will President Barack Obama and his party take the lesson and go on offense against the simple-minded anti-government screeds now getting so much play? Obama took a brief whack at doing so in his September health care speech. He noted that his predecessors “understood that the danger of too much government is matched by the perils of too little; that without the leavening hand of wise policy, markets can crash, monopolies can stifle competition, the vulnerable can be exploited.” Why aren’t we hearing more of this? E.J. Dionne’s e-mail address is ejdionne(at)washpost.com. © 2009, Washington Post Writers Group  TAGS:
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By Anarcissie, November 18, 2009 at 10:14 am Link to this comment
bogi666—You’re welcome, but I think I’m mostly pointing out a train of thought which is sometimes avoided because Lincoln is generally treated as a demigod or a messiah rather than a politician who had specific ideas and did specific and sometimes rather unpleasant things in pursuit of his beliefs and interests.
Report thisBy bogi666, November 18, 2009 at 8:22 am Link to this comment
Anarcisse, thanks for the info
Report thisBy Anarcissie, November 16, 2009 at 2:01 pm Link to this comment
I think you’ll find that the theory of the government being mystically identical to the people goes back before Walter Lippman. For instance, Lincoln’s “government of the people, by the people, for the people” suggests pretty much the same idea. Lincoln, while he was opposed to slavery, said he would accept slavery if it would preserve the Union, which obviously had a quasi-religious significance to him, although its working-out in practical life was pretty Bismarckian. I sometimes wonder if he read Hegel: “Es ist der Gang Gottes in der Welt, dass der Staat ist.” (“The State is God’s path in the world,” for those of you whose German is rusty.) I guess he didn’t need to. The mystical state is all around us.
Report thisBy ardee, November 16, 2009 at 1:37 pm Link to this comment
ThomasG, November 16 at 4:05 pm
Thanks for contributing nothing whatever to this discussion.I assume you will be occupying the childrens table at your families Thanksgiving meal…
Report thisBy bogi666, November 16, 2009 at 1:08 pm Link to this comment
The government is not the people, this was propaganda concocted in the 1920’s by Walter Lippmann for the purpose of “Manufacturing Consent”[Author Noam Chomsky} a strategy for business, government and religion to manipulate the population into thinking that what they were being told by the ruling class elite was what they, the people, thought. This is “Manufacturing Consent” and Noam Chomsky wrote a book explaining the “Manufacturing Consent” process. Noam is a contemporary philosopher of Linguistics at MIT.
Report thisBy ThomasG, November 16, 2009 at 12:05 pm Link to this comment
Anarcissie, Nov.16 at 1:34pm,
ardee can’t imagine anything, everybody knows that, he has demonstrated that fact over and over and over and over————and over and over. Got that?
Report thisBy Anarcissie, November 16, 2009 at 9:34 am Link to this comment
Go ahead and describe it then. First we will need a definition of “the people” which admits of extensions, whatever that may mean. I take it you are not talking about “the people” as merely a collection of persons.
I can imagine all sorts of things, but we need to get imagined things on the same page, so to speak, in order to discuss them coherently.
Report thisBy MarthaA, November 16, 2009 at 5:23 am Link to this comment
Anarcissie, November 15 at 7:56pm,
Anarcissie said: “I can’t imagine what “an extension of the people” might be”.
MarthaA’s answer: To the extent the people of the Common Majority participate, government is an extension of the people. Without the people of the Common Majority’s participation, there is no extension of the people.
The people of the Common Majority in Florida participated better than the Common Majority of my State of Oklahoma, because Florida Congressman Alan Grayson is an extension of the people. Praise the Lord for Congressman Grayson, may more and more of the Common Majority become aware and many more entensions of the people like Alan Grayson follow in his footsteps.
Mass unified participation in democracy on the part of the 70% Common Majority Population is an absolute necessity in government if the people of the 70% MAJORITY Common Population want an extension of the people representing them in Congress and government.
Report thisBy bogi666, November 16, 2009 at 5:20 am Link to this comment
I haven’t seen any reports of Norquist and his ilk protesting the Federal dole to CORPORATE WELFARE KINGS financed by issuing Bonds, to fund the Federal deficit, with the interest and principal paid by individual American taxpayers.
Report thisBy ardee, November 16, 2009 at 4:55 am Link to this comment
I can’t imagine what “an extension of the people” might be.
An dthat, Anarcissie, is the flaw in your ideology. You cannot imagine.
Report thisBy Anarcissie, November 15, 2009 at 3:56 pm Link to this comment
You have some pretty mystical ideas there. I can’t imagine what “an extension of the people” might be. As for “the will of the people”, I doubt if there is any such thing. Group will is rather like group mind: it’s not inconceivable, but we don’t see any examples of it around. As for moving forward, what is moving? Which way is forward?
Obviously, if there is an identifiable government, then some people are part of the government and others are not. Therefore, the government is not identical to the people nor an extension of it—rather, we have two classes, one with more power than the other. The basis of the government is that it is at least nominally the only agency in a community which has the legitimated power to initiate force and terror. As such, it naturally attracts people who are interested in power over others, those same corporatists you don’t seem to like, and we can all observe the result, and the worse result of attracting war freaks who use the power of the government to involve their whole communities in war. It seems like a high price to pay for a road; one might want to look into other approaches.
Report thisBy Frank, November 13, 2009 at 8:53 am Link to this comment
The explanation for the vote results are quite simple:
“A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.” - George Bernard Shaw
Some other gems…
“In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other.” -Voltaire (1764)
“Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.”
-Frederic Bastiat, French Economist (1801-1850)
“I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.”-Winston Churchill
“No man’s life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session.” -Mark Twain (1866 )
“The government is like a baby’s alimentary canal: a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.”
-Ronald Reagan
“If your government is big enough to give you everything you want, it is big enough to take away from you everything you have.”.-Paul Harvey, 1952
“Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.” -P.J. O’Rourke, Civil Libertarian
Report thisBy ardee, November 13, 2009 at 4:29 am Link to this comment
Oh, come on.
Obviously, if the people are identical with the government, you don’t have or need a government.
Sorry, more thought required. Govt. as an extension of the people is a natural definition . If the govt is there to support and abet the will of the people that is, instead of the will of the small minority of well financed corporatists.
Even if the people of a state are of one mind the mechanisms for moving forward is still necessary, unless you envision some spontaneous moment when everyone suddenly picks up a shovel and repairs the roads, or fights the fires or pays for the schools and all the other myriad of details requiring an infrastructure….
Report thisBy fjsteiger, November 12, 2009 at 9:30 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Hudson, Packard, Studebaker, Nash
Bush and Cheney made it crash
Chrysler, Plymouth, DeSoto, LaSalle
Edsel, Essex, where are they now?
Oldsmobile, Pontiac, and Willis too
Gone like the shit from the Seattle zoo
Report thisBy mandinka, November 11, 2009 at 3:42 pm Link to this comment
EJ hasn’t ever seen a tax or a governmnet agency that he doesn’t love other than the military. The difference between the 2 state votes is a requirement for a balanced budget and that the legislators are listening to the voters. What we as a country is a government that refuses to listen to the voters. Overwhelmingly they want a Balanced Federal budget. Until an amendment to the constitution is passed that requires it the teabaggers are absolutely necessary to reign in the wasteful spending and pork as well
Report thisBy Anarcissie, November 11, 2009 at 3:32 pm Link to this comment
Oh, come on.
Obviously, if the people are identical with the government, you don’t have or need a government.
Report thisBy phasor, November 11, 2009 at 9:33 am Link to this comment
“We the people” = the government.
The government is how we the people determine our destiny as a society. After all, we all live in this society - The American society.
And, yes, there’s corruption and myriad of other problems in government. The solution is not to eliminate government but to change it.
Report thisBy Trailing Begonia, November 11, 2009 at 6:20 am Link to this comment
Ok, I have to confessed that I didn’t read the article in detail and just scanned thru it. So, am I to understand that the idiots voting for MORE taxes is a good thing? How preytell can you justify that? Anybody that looks around sees how our taxes are being squandered in payoffs, bribes, warmongering and everything else that’s wrong and inmoral, why in the world would anybody in their right mind vote FOR that? Have we collectively lost it as a society? Should we all be committed to lunatic assylums or just shot on the spot like rabid dogs?
And as for the bit of calling these nuts “government haters” by virtue of doing that you are legitimizing them and they are nothing else than a bunch of racistis, blind by hatred and ignorance. It’s takes intelligence and balls to hate and oppose the government, these people have neither, all they have is contempt and deep-seeded hatred for the color of the skin of the man in office. The rest of us dislike him for who (not what) he is: another corporate shill.
Report thisBy Anarcissie, November 10, 2009 at 11:03 am Link to this comment
E. J. Dionne is a ruling-class propagandist who happens to work what we might call the left side of the street, although pseudo-left might be more accurate. The false binarization of the question of government size and power into two pretended propositions, “government is always good, and more is better” and “government is always bad”, etc., serves the purpose of obfuscating and concealing political facts, and also divides people into competing teams whose primary thought is to win rather than ask what they’re fighting about. Or it attempts to. While there’s a sucker born every minute, there are nevertheless only a finite number of them.
Report thisBy Night-Gaunt, November 10, 2009 at 10:02 am Link to this comment
“‘Let it grow because occasionally it works the way it was designed’ still seems like a pretty weak argument.”-Sollipsis
I agree and you misunderstand me to think I was saying that—-I had not in any number of words. Separate the gov’t from church and corporation to start. Make it to where it is a service again, not for the rich white man’s club. Make our law makers actually research and type up whatever bills they want to pass themselves. All by themselves and you would find them making bills of less than 10 pages and readable to the average American. Something that is lacking right now because they have an army of staffers to do it for them which is why they are mostly ignorant of what they pass. A travesty and what should be a crime.
Take all the money and power out of it forthwith. No more money to play in our politics and it will eventually weed out those who make it their lives leaving only the truly dedicated who would only run to do a job not to get wealthy and powerful. That must end for it pollutes our political system with legal bribery. Also sunset provisions on every law so if they want a certain law they must vote on it every year. Expect fewer laws.
We need to end the two right wings of the corporate party i.e. Democrats & Republicans. Both infiltrated by the most extreme Christian supremacists. I can go on but I hope I have added clarity to what I said before.
Report thisBy Dan Farhmer, November 10, 2009 at 9:09 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Jim Yell et al,
Report thisIts about the corruption and inefficiency. Yes we all can agree that taxes do serve a purpose. I think few are outright against any taxes to fund roads, various programs etc.
Our government has a way of running up costs to enrich someone on the back end. I remember living in a small town trying to fund new road development with local city taxes. The fed got involved and quadrupled the cost. In the end, much money went to a politically connected group to conduct study after study. We exhausted the majority of funds navigating the maze and never got anywhere. We abandoned the cause after we were fleeced.
That is not government service. Its corrupt at its worst and inefficient at its best.
They dine on the finest foods while you struggle with the grocery bill. Waste your money without a care in the world.
Its sad that you are ok with that.
By sollipsist, November 10, 2009 at 8:01 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
“what he is saying is that gov’t isn’t all bad all the time. We can use it as a tool for good. Can’t you differentiate the two?”
Seems like you’re glossing over one of the main points.
“Government-haters” is a gross oversimplification of a wide range of people who believe that the growth of the power, size, and funding of the government should be limited in some way.
‘Let it grow because occasionally it works the way it was designed’ still seems like a pretty weak argument.
Report thisBy rollzone, November 9, 2009 at 11:06 pm Link to this comment
hello. just more litmus paper for the proletariat. why mention truth in propaganda ads. big government is good for government. lean government would be good for improving public schools, transportation, energy regulation enforcement and future policy, reducing crime, increasing private investment, and the entire entitlement attitude of a growing generation of losers. lean government is smart and effective, while bloated bureaucratic ineptness employs legions of otherwise delinquent misfits, that swell their burden into ginormous incompetence and ineffectiveness, while yielding henchman powers of greed and corruption. smaller government has proper checks and balances, which are disappearing into the night. the vote only reflects a well spun advertising campaign of a teflon socialist.
Report thisBy Rick Roth, November 9, 2009 at 9:58 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Here’s John Fund’s WSJ op-ed piece from late October. Oops.
I guess the revolution got stalled outside the city gates.
Report thishttp://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704224004574489252589009002.html
By sharonsj, November 9, 2009 at 4:21 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
I pay hefty school taxes although I have no kids. I do it because I want Americans educated. Unfortunately, based on comments I read on many web sites, a lot of people are stupid and prefer it that way. I used to think that if only people knew the facts, we’d all be okay. But it turns out that if you have a mindset from the beginning, facts have no affect. That said, we need a government that cares about the people, not about bank CEOs, lobbyists, and whomever can grease their palms.
Report thisBy Anarcissie, November 9, 2009 at 2:36 pm Link to this comment
I’m asking why E. J. Dionne pretends fall for the Republican / rightist b.s. about their favoring small or no government.
Looks like a case of one hand washing another to me.
Report thisBy Night-Gaunt, November 9, 2009 at 2:13 pm Link to this comment
It was in an interview I saw a few years ago. He wasn’t going to say he would rather turn time back to before 1756 when if you had the money you had the fire protection. But is was proven to be more of a problem for when the fires weren’t put out on someone who couldn’t pay for the fire protection is caused much more damage than otherwise if the fire had been put out earlier. It was B. Franklin who proposed a fire department to help everyone who is on fire. In the end I bet that Norquist does want it that way as would Ron Paul and his son Rand.
They want a play to live society and if you don’t have it? They don’t have a good answer for that. The life span for the poor would be short since they would starve to death sooner and not be a drag on their society.
Report thisBy Anarcissie, November 9, 2009 at 1:10 pm Link to this comment
As far as I know, Norquist and his friends are very much in favor of “a strong defense”, that is, aggressive war, expanding imperialism and big “defense” contracts. Then there are many billions needed for police, judges, jails, and surveillance. That is before we get to corporate Welfare and bailouts. It goes without saying that Norquist and company expect the government to pay its debts to them and their friends, plus interest. All that is most of the Federal budget. The business about shrinking government or drowning it in a bathtub is purest hot air, a blatant fiction for abject suckers, unless Mr. Norquist is a lot dumber than I think he is. Now, does anyone want to say why our author here pretends to fall for it?
Report thisBy Night-Gaunt, November 9, 2009 at 12:26 pm Link to this comment
When Norquist was confronted about the logical outcome of what he and his ilk want he backed down a tad. He was for police and fire protection for all but not much more. Just those tax payer hand outs to keep the corporate mill working as it farms jobs out over seas for less and less. Just what our economy needs to continue to head toward that third world status they want us to be in. Slavery for us and everyone not them.
Sollipsist, what he is saying is that gov’t isn’t all bad all the time. We can use it as a tool for good. Can’t you differentiate the two?
Report thisBy the tshirt doctor, November 9, 2009 at 12:16 pm Link to this comment
Purple Girl,
Report thisPublic Servants would if the government didn’t go to globalization and our big businesses move their factories to viet nam and costa rica.
By Glen Wayne, November 9, 2009 at 11:34 am Link to this comment
The Fall Of President Don ePie Nov. 09, 2009
Status quo Is that quid pro quo?
Does anyone know how to get P. O to go?
How do we get the Caddy out of park?
Say smooth talkin Don: ‘It ain’t that dark’
Change ain’t goin down,
and the street is restless
and won’t buy a slogan stuck in invest us.
The sweet life ain’t a Vespa.
The masters of the sac and the gold
cheer for the trillions bonus change
Back scratching with Tics for this and tacks for that
for money back there is no rub
Float a banker in the tub
for the bubble bonus is for nothing
and us marks are for free.
Save some tea,.... the bags for me
the tea-bagger taunting,... just let it be.
Read the leaves of a colored Don
Report thisDevil spawn don’t get me wrong.
Change will be comin recall the wall
The ists grew cold and faltered
to grow more strong and altered.
By Anarcissie, November 9, 2009 at 8:34 am Link to this comment
The Right is not opposed to government or to taxes. Quite the contrary.
Report thisBy Jim Yell, November 9, 2009 at 8:22 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Years ago I fretted about how much money I paid in income taxes, but then one day I grew up and realized that without the taxes our streets would look much more like a 3rd World country than they do.
And, of course there are those pesky little details like clean water, what to do with sewage, police protection, museums, and on and on. I think that the top percent of bureaucrats need their income decreased and the lower paid groups need an increase, but all in all I am thankful that the system works more than not. And, as I enter early old age I am relieved to have paid my share and can hope not to be kicked to the curb, at lest in total.
Only the mega rich can hope to thrive without government and that is because on the whole they aren’t much better the organized gangsters. People! The government as it has been the last 40 years is our only hope and yet it is constantly threatened with being dismantled by the ignorant rich we place in high office. We had 8 years of the worst brigandage and it will take 40 years to recover and that only if the lunies stop supporting actions against their own long term interests.
Report thisBy Purple Girl, November 9, 2009 at 8:12 am Link to this comment
If Gov’ts so bad then we should convert to Anarchy instead of a Democracy?
Report thisSchuster hit the nail on the Head if Public Servants feel Gov’t is a detriment to the American people, they should quit.
If you feel as though you are ‘working behind enemy lines’ while in the US House of Representatives, you are an enemy of the US.
We are a Democracy, so To claim Gov’t sucks is to say Democracy sucks. Would a Monarchy or dictatorship suit them better?
By sollipsist, November 9, 2009 at 7:42 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
This is weird.
This article wasn’t about specifics or exceptions; the basic point is: “more government good, less government bad”.
I’m willing to support any good idea, from either side side of the ideological fence. But a fundamental acceptance of increased government power and control—assumed or democratically mandated—just seems like a bad idea.
Is that really where we want to be?
Report thisBy MarthaA, November 9, 2009 at 7:35 am Link to this comment
ardee, November 9 at 7:53am,
ardee said: “But the aims of Norquist and his ilk is not to ease the burden on the taxpayer but to strangle and make ineffective our govts ability to work for us.”
MarthaA’s answer: Your above quote is worth repeating, as it is the sole purpose of Norquist, Michele Bachmann, Dick Armey and the like that lead the Republican proletariat tea baggers against themselves to strangle and make ineffective our government, which is what Hitler did before he took over complete government control. This strangling of the government is a part of the Hitler Type Agenda being led by the Republican Party’s Conservative EXTREME and the public must not follow their sophism and propaganda to further destruction of the United States.
My state of Oklahoma is a Republican State of majority poor people, so I can’t say that the majority of the people will do what is in their best interest, because Oklahomans are susceptible to following the Republican scapegoats of sophism and propaganda against their best interest and have no idea what they are doing.
Report thisBy the tshirt doctor, November 9, 2009 at 6:54 am Link to this comment
boy, you government junkies sure do amaze me.
“...the vulnerable can be exploited.” this is like the gay people can’t get married, isn’t it? and who’s fault is that? government?
i think you, E.J. Dionne, have got conservatives mixed up with republicans. those “conservatives’ in the tea bag marches, their republicans who think their conservatives. all you have to do is ask them about the war. if they support it, then they’re republicans. if they don’t support it, they’re conservatives.
Report thisBy Miko, November 9, 2009 at 6:47 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
TABOR doesn’t cut any government services; it just prevents politicians from drastically increasing the current size (i.e., faster than the rate of inflation) unless they get permission from the voters via referendum. Colorado has such a system and the TABOR-referendums are often approved. The only thing that TABOR does is restore democracy to the system by ensuring that the people have a chance to vote on whether they want new projects or not.
Since being anti-democratic is unpopular, it’s not surprising that the enemies of TABOR have masked their true motives and instead embraced fear tactics (“oh no! they’re coming for our schools!!!!”).
Fear is always an effective tactic in the short-run, but it’s also a great way to guarantee that you’re going to lose in the long run.
Report thisBy ardee, November 9, 2009 at 3:53 am Link to this comment
I find this a pointed indication of the perceptiveness of the voting public, a much maligned entity of late. When given logic and fact our electorate seems quite capable of making the correct choice in the voting booth.If those who work for true equality, in marriage as well as everywhere, take heed they will continue to speak to the truth of that matter and they will, eventually, succeed.
Taxes are the butt of many jokes, are a not so much fun part of citizenship, are, obviously misused far too often, a correctable situation. But the aims of Norquist and his ilk is not to ease the burden on the taxpayer but to strangle and make ineffective our govts ability to work for us.
Report this