Stand By Your Man

It’s hard to get a fix on the Tea Party movement It's all over the lot. Its supporters just seem to be mad – period – and in a nasty anti-government mood. From what I can gather, the one common complaint among its diverse backers is their outrage over soaring Government spending and the growing deficit.

The irony of that is rich and abiding. In 1980 when Reagan ran on a ticket of increased defense spending, cutting taxes, and balancing the budget, he won going away. I recall my friend Tony Morris and I standing in the kitchen of a neighborhood friend who was hosting an election night party. The rest of the crowd was in the front room cheering Reagan’s victory while Tony and I, beers in hand, scratched our heads and said to each other: It’s not possible to do what Reagan promised. Of course, the math didn’t make any sense then, and it still doesn’t. Not surprisingly, Reagan ran up record deficits for the time, and we didn’t hear a peep from the Tea Party folks, who are just right-wing Republicans in new garb, that’s all.

Likewise, in 2000, George Bush fils “won” the Presidency on a platform of compassionate conservatism and promises to cut taxes. He barely “won” and proceeded to cut taxes even in the aftermath of 9/11 and in the face of two wars, asking no one but the troops to sacrifice. For the rest of us, he asked us only to go shopping. Even though he inherited a massive surplus, he managed to squander that and created massive budget deficits that in no time dwarfed Reagan’s by comparison. What’s did we hear from the Tea Party types? Not a word.

But, then, Barack Obama comes to town, inheriting the challenge of a major recession. He and the Democratically-controlled Congress enact a stimulus package that keeps the country from plunging into another Great Depression. They also pass health care legislation, which was at the core of his campaign, and which several Presidents starting with Teddy Roosevelt at the beginning of the 20th century had tried in vain to accomplish.

Health-care legislation was not just a big-spending, do-good, social program, as conservatives are alleging. Every serious economist and budget analyst of any political stripe agreed that the current health care system in America was broken and was unsustainable over time from a budget perspective. The President’s budget director, who had been head of the Congressional Budget Office, said that within a relatively short time the country would be paying so much in health care costs, Medicare and Medicaid, that it would overwhelm the Federal budget, leaving virtually nothing left for anything else, except for Defense and Homeland Security.

So, difficult as the timing was, health care reform was critical to long-term budget health and time was running out for us to continuing to kick that can down the road. Moreover, the health care legislation provides 30 million more Americans with health care, prohibits insurance companies from rejecting those with pre-existing conditions, and keeps children on their parents’ insurance plans until age 26. These are just a few of the immediate benefits with other major benefits kicking in later. All this, plus reducing the costs of insurance premiums which had become so expensive that millions of American citizens could no longer afford them. When these people got sick, they had the option of getting treatment or going bankrupt.

So, what did we hear from the Tea Party movement? Outrage – full throated outrage. Give them tax cuts, throw in a little old time religion, show a bit of the flag, and they’re content. But, ask them to sacrifice to keep the country from going off the rails and to help 30 million of their fellow citizens? Well, that’s another matter altogether. The irony is hard to miss. Here is a segment of society that is largely church-going, that professes to believe in the Bible, will fight to get prayer in the schools restored, and will be the first to join rallies against abortion and same-sex marriage. Yet, they draw the line when it comes to spending public money to help the poor and the disadvantaged in our society, conveniently forgetting that helping the poor is the greatest single moral mandate in both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. No other mandate comes even close.

I fear we are becoming a voting population of consumers rather than citizens, and both mainstream political parties are aiding and abetting the decline. The one, with perfect pitch for the worst instincts in all of us, appeals to our selfishness, resentment, and greed. The other party, timid and afraid it will lose the next election, trims its sails, distances itself from the President, and fails to speak out for the core principles that made the Democratic Party such an attractive force for good in our society and the world. If Profiles in Courage were written today, I fear it would have precious few chapters.

Gerald E. Lavey