The Tea Party, Rights, and Obama (Part 3), 8-29-2010

 [Continued from The Tea Party, Rights, and Obama (Part 2), 8-29-2010. sch 3/16/23.]

Before running off to change the Commerce Clause, look at the Supremacy Clause, also. Give a look at The Federalist 33 and 44, and consider again the European Union's Greek crisis. Do the tea parties understand the effects of disunion? Do they understand disunion follows secession? Have we too long allowed the South's Lost Cause to remain in our national consciousness till romanticism replaced commonsense?

I think the tea party pines more for a world that never existed than it offers any solutions to the problems faced by the majority of Americans. I think it is more inchoate than a true movement. I think it is created by people who feel their power slips away the more democratic becomes America. I think it does appeal to racists and the ignorant and the easily cowed. 

I do not think the tea party completely lacks a point. I think the same point exists across the political spectrum: governmental imbalance exists in the United States. I sense it here as I never did before., but I knew it existed for a long time. Perhaps, the very know-nothing faults of the tea party crowd gave them the ability to voice better all our worries.

I have written elsewhere about a constitutional convention, and constitutional amendments. Why do I never hear any such proposals from the tea party crowd? Silence about what these people want would change not only reinforces their image as the political equivalent of the id, but also as nothing but Obama haters.

[Well, thing shave changed a bit since 2010. There is a call for a convention, which looks rooted in the tea party, if not the MAGA, movement. sch 3/17/23.]

Am I correct that we share a feeling of governmental imbalance? Think about this from Federalist 45:

... The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security. As the former periods will probably bear a small proportion to the latter, the State governments will here enjoy another advantage over the federal government....

How many wars have our politicians got us into since 1948? The Cold War, Korea, Vietnam, the War on Poverty, the War on Crime, the War on Drugs, the Afghan War, the Iraqi War, and the War on Terrorism are all I can remember. Is everyone willing to forego these wars? Who is not willing to get the federal government out of the political crusades propagandized as wars, and explain why not? Federalist 45 explains how giving the federal government power to wage these domestic "wars", we increase its power.

I say do not blame the politicians for this increase in power, when we ask them to take on the power. If we do worry about losing rights to the federal government, then let us exercise the necessary prudence by not seeking action from the federal government. Let us vote against politicians who want to go to war as a moral crusade. Let us exile any person, group, or special interest advocating the need for more governmental police power. Why not a moratorium on new laws? Perhaps Congress needs to examine the laws on its books.

[One thing learned while in prison, I think 2011 but maybe 2012, from The Wall Street Journal was that the federal government had no idea of how many criminal statutes were in the United States Code. To be continued in The Tea Party, Rights, and Obama (Part 4), 8-29-2010 sch 3/17/23.]