PaulSoHard
03-04-2012, 02:54 PM
Per Jack Hunter: http://www.ronpaul2012.com/2012/03/04/supporting-santorum-means-rejecting-the-tea-party/
The Tea Party’s primary goal from the very beginning was to target government spending and debt. Some members were more fiscally conservative, some were more socially conservative, some were independents and some were even folks who might have voted for Obama but had become scared of what the Democrats were doing to the country.
But the Tea Party also represented Americans who were fed up with what the Republican Party had done to our country, showing as much anger toward the big spending Bush years as they did Obama. Before the Tea Party, big government Republicans could more easily win re-elections with a wink and a nod to conservatives, despite their horrible records. After the Tea Party, big government Republicans feared the conservative grassroots, who often targeted such Republican politicians precisely because of their records.
The Tea Party represented independence.
Rick Santorum has always represented everything the Tea Party purported to stand against. The Washington Examiner’s Timothy P. Carney has noted:
“As a member of Senate leadership, Santorum literally was an agent of the GOP establishment during passage of No Child Left Behind, the expansion of Medicare, and the overspending of the Bush era.”
Reviewing Santorum’s book “It Takes a Family” Red State’s Ben Domenech was even more explicit:
Does Rick Santorum have any clue what the Tea Party movement stands for? Is he being purposefully obtuse here? Doesn’t he realize that the big government solutions he advocated for in his book are exactly the reason so many Tea Partiers today don’t call themselves Republicans any more? Certainly, Santorum was a crusader for social conservatives during his time in office… but he was never categorized as someone with robust views on the size or scope of government. As Jonathan Rauch wrote in his book review of the Senator’s ‘It Takes a Family,’ “[Santorum's] first priority is to make government pro-family, not to make it small.”
Whatever Santorum is as a candidate for the 2012 nomination (besides laughable), he is not and will never be a “Tea Party candidate” by any definition but his own. While he and other candidates may long to adapt the Tea Party label to their own political comebacks, the truth is that the Tea Party exists mainly as a rejection of a permissive attitude toward massive government spending and “compassionate” programs by people who loved playing the statesman role in the GOP over the past decade. And Tea Partiers know it.
Do Tea Partiers still “know it?” Or have they forgotten what their movement was supposed to be about?
The kind of Republicans who embraced phony conservatives like Santorum in the past represented the same, old hypocritical GOP that liked to talk conservative but always spent as much money as the Democrats. The Tea Party was, first and foremost, a reaction against this politics of old.
But Santorum unquestionably represents the big government politics of old. To a tee. A Tea Partier who champions Santorum as one of their own is like the New York Yankees championing a member of the Red Sox as one of their own. The former has always been defined primarily by its opposition to the latter.
Tea Partiers who now embrace Santorum should stop pretending they belong to any sort of independent, anti-establishment movement. They belong to the Republican Party. The GOP establishment has been trying to figure out how to corral the Tea Party back into the party machine since day one. With Santorum, they could very well have their solution.
How can the Tea Party be so blinded by Santorum's big-government record. I love these lines:
Do Tea Partiers still “know it?” Or have they forgotten what their movement was supposed to be about?
The kind of Republicans who embraced phony conservatives like Santorum in the past represented the same, old hypocritical GOP that liked to talk conservative but always spent as much money as the Democrats. The Tea Party was, first and foremost, a reaction against this politics of old.
The Tea Party’s primary goal from the very beginning was to target government spending and debt. Some members were more fiscally conservative, some were more socially conservative, some were independents and some were even folks who might have voted for Obama but had become scared of what the Democrats were doing to the country.
But the Tea Party also represented Americans who were fed up with what the Republican Party had done to our country, showing as much anger toward the big spending Bush years as they did Obama. Before the Tea Party, big government Republicans could more easily win re-elections with a wink and a nod to conservatives, despite their horrible records. After the Tea Party, big government Republicans feared the conservative grassroots, who often targeted such Republican politicians precisely because of their records.
The Tea Party represented independence.
Rick Santorum has always represented everything the Tea Party purported to stand against. The Washington Examiner’s Timothy P. Carney has noted:
“As a member of Senate leadership, Santorum literally was an agent of the GOP establishment during passage of No Child Left Behind, the expansion of Medicare, and the overspending of the Bush era.”
Reviewing Santorum’s book “It Takes a Family” Red State’s Ben Domenech was even more explicit:
Does Rick Santorum have any clue what the Tea Party movement stands for? Is he being purposefully obtuse here? Doesn’t he realize that the big government solutions he advocated for in his book are exactly the reason so many Tea Partiers today don’t call themselves Republicans any more? Certainly, Santorum was a crusader for social conservatives during his time in office… but he was never categorized as someone with robust views on the size or scope of government. As Jonathan Rauch wrote in his book review of the Senator’s ‘It Takes a Family,’ “[Santorum's] first priority is to make government pro-family, not to make it small.”
Whatever Santorum is as a candidate for the 2012 nomination (besides laughable), he is not and will never be a “Tea Party candidate” by any definition but his own. While he and other candidates may long to adapt the Tea Party label to their own political comebacks, the truth is that the Tea Party exists mainly as a rejection of a permissive attitude toward massive government spending and “compassionate” programs by people who loved playing the statesman role in the GOP over the past decade. And Tea Partiers know it.
Do Tea Partiers still “know it?” Or have they forgotten what their movement was supposed to be about?
The kind of Republicans who embraced phony conservatives like Santorum in the past represented the same, old hypocritical GOP that liked to talk conservative but always spent as much money as the Democrats. The Tea Party was, first and foremost, a reaction against this politics of old.
But Santorum unquestionably represents the big government politics of old. To a tee. A Tea Partier who champions Santorum as one of their own is like the New York Yankees championing a member of the Red Sox as one of their own. The former has always been defined primarily by its opposition to the latter.
Tea Partiers who now embrace Santorum should stop pretending they belong to any sort of independent, anti-establishment movement. They belong to the Republican Party. The GOP establishment has been trying to figure out how to corral the Tea Party back into the party machine since day one. With Santorum, they could very well have their solution.
How can the Tea Party be so blinded by Santorum's big-government record. I love these lines:
Do Tea Partiers still “know it?” Or have they forgotten what their movement was supposed to be about?
The kind of Republicans who embraced phony conservatives like Santorum in the past represented the same, old hypocritical GOP that liked to talk conservative but always spent as much money as the Democrats. The Tea Party was, first and foremost, a reaction against this politics of old.