Academic

TEA PARTY UPDATE: Sen. Ronnie Chance and Rep. Matt Ramsey: Tea Party Reflections. What we found ?

By Glenn Reynolds

TEA PARTY UPDATE: Sen. Ronnie Chance and Rep. Matt Ramsey: Tea Party Reflections.

What we found most striking about the tea party we attended, and those that we observed taking place elsewhere, is how it departed from the normal partisan atmosphere one comes to expect at political rallies. Those in attendance were for the most part not political activists, and most did not come to support one party or oppose another, though certainly there was an emphasis on limited government that once was, and must become again, the rallying cry of the Republican Party.

We say once because during the presidency of George W. Bush, Republicans in Washington abandoned their economic principles. Spending rose and the earmark culture flourished. As has often been said, Republicans went to Washington to drain the swamp, but instead joined the alligators.

Thus, the furious reaction by many on the left to the tea parties. . . . The fact that the tea parties represent a grassroots movement only perplexes the cynics further, because Obama’s election to the presidency has been marketed as the apotheosis of grassroots populism. It is as if the true believers of ever-expanding government have actually convinced themselves that only hedge fund managers on Wall Street could possibly oppose the government takeover of the private sector. Of course, they’ve also convinced themselves that a federal government unable to balance its budget — or even to finish its budget on time — year after year is somehow going to introduce sound accounting to the private sector.

Indeed.

Full post as published by Instapundit.com on April 21, 2009 (boomark / email).