Friday, April 1, 2011

Tea Party and Compromise

Tea party leaders and followers are upset that the leadership of the Republican Party is … compromising. Now that is pretty disappointing, I mean who would want their elected leaders to work together towards solutions to the problems facing the country. If they compromise, it might even mean that they realize they represent the interests of all of their constituents, not just the ones that scream loudly about the evils of big government and taxation. Some of these disappointed folks gathered at the Capital and chanted things like “Cut it or shut it!” They want massive spending cuts, and if enough Democrats won’t go along to make that a reality they want the Republican leadership to force a government shutdown. One tea party follower called the Republican leadership “cowards.” Obviously, people who want to work with their colleagues are cowards.

I’ll step away from the sarcasm for a second to pinpoint the problem here. The tea party movement was based on anger and platitudes and not real positions. Their goals were also fundamentally unconnected to real problems. If you are arguing for small government and lower taxes, it is easy to never be satisfied. What is small government? How do you know when government is small enough? What does the size of government really have to do with anything? Doesn’t it make more sense to demand efficient government, maybe even through specific changes like making the tariff system more uniform and logical? When you’re movement is all about being angry and nasty, it is hard to fathom why you would want to work with others. When you lead a major political party and want to be re-elected in a country where not everyone is in the tea party, it’s not hard at all to fathom why you might want to work with others.

The bottom line here is that the tea party movement is bad for America. Tea partiers are driven by anger, fear, and hate. They have vague and undefined goals that are divorced from mainstream American opinion and tend to be unconnected from real problems, solutions, or reality generally. They aren’t interested in working with people who have different views. When it comes down to it, this unwillingness to compromise is the big problem. Logic and reason dictate compromise. Solutions to real world problems require it. Compromise is not a sign of weakness or cowardice, but rather a sign of strength. In this case, the reluctance of tea party leaders and followers to do it is a sign of their weakness.

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