Quote from phenomena:
Yes, we are small pro government. Yes, we have been kicking ass and taking names since we began, now with roughly 1/3 of the usa behind us after only a few years of existence. Yes, the neocons are attempting to hijack our movement and rebrand themselves so as to avoid being associated with the republican debacle of the last decade. The Angle/Palin segment of the Tea Party, which is a minorty, represents this effort. We are trying to gut them out, while simultaneously milking them for money and votes. After we are the distinct majority, they'll vote for our small government candidates anyways, because their alternative will be left wing. We are a grass roots movement, and positions on specific issues vary from group to group. However, the common theme is limited government, and a desire to reduce the common size and scope of government.
We generally favor lower, and flatter taxes. Many favor a move toward more consumption based taxation. We are nearly all proponents of Laissez Faire economic policies. Favoring as little government intervention as possible. Government participation, if it is to occur, should be minimal and temporary. We have the fundamental belief that allowing people to keep more of what they earn increases overall size of the pie, by incentivizing people to earn. Laissez faire policies create more wealth than interventionist policies by a large multiple. Nearly every emperical scenario supports this assertion. Not implimenting Laissez Faire policy comes at the high price of stiffled innovation, less efficiency, and the creation of less wealth overall. We have seen how Western Europe now has more millionaires per capita than the United States does. We believe this has very much to do with our parasitic taxation. For example, our corporate taxes are virtually the highest in the developed world. Also our "capital gains" tax, which discourages investment. If we are to reinstate policies of growth and innovation, these punative tax measures which punish investment(the fuel of innovation) must cease. (Then again, many of our opponents see the fact that Western Europe has more millionaires than we do as a sign of "progress" on our part)
We want wasteful beauracracies to be terminated, as they are exceptionally burdensome on the taxpayers and rarely serve their stated purpose. For example the Dept of Education, which was created in 1979. Since then our students' scores have gone down the toilet compared to other developed nations. Before 1979, states each had their own dept of education, and states competed for the highest scores on standardized tests, and for high graduation rates. The quality of education was often a big draw for companies considering a certain location to set up operations etc. Now, thanks to the dept of education, and no child left behind, all public schools now pretty much suck equally. There are numerous examples of wasteful and ineffective federal departments which serve little purpose other than to provide jobs for beaurocrats, and to siphon out of the federal trough. I could go on all night, but I just offered one example. You guys would be shocked at some of the "departments" that exist, what their "duties" are, and their corresponding budgets. We are opposed to big government, interventionist endeavors such as the multi billion dollar, multi decade "war on drugs", which served as a convenient scapegoat to rub one off on constitutional rights, not to mention the billions it's tagged on to the correctional and judicial budgets.
We believe that the government has no right in our private or personal lives. We are anti patriot act. Most of us see how the divorce rate skyrocketed after the establisment and growth of "family courts", and would like to remove the state from the convention of marriage altogether. Hence rendering gay marriage a non issue. Most tea party members defer to the fact that the government should have no business in our personal affairs on the gay issue. Because of this, there is now actually some tea party support from the gay community. We have the belief that what consenting adults do with each other is no business of the state. We think it's a tragedy that our "land of the free" now imprisions a higher % of their own population than any other nation in the world. As you can see, we are a diverse group of people and represent a diverse group of beliefs and values, who have all been drawn together under the common desire to have the government out of our lives, and out of our finances.
We overwhelmingly favor a non interventionist foreign policy. The majority of us were anti iraq war. Most of us were pro afghanistan invasion(they were supporting and harboring the guys who attacked us), but disapprove of our presence there now, nearly a decade later. It's well past time we were gone. We don't believe in policies of "nation building", and interventionist plans. You will find some variablity here, but most of us are fine with having allied nations, but tend to dislike the dispersal of financial foreign aid. We are strong believers in free trade, and oppose protectionist policies. We are overwhelmingly pro LEGAL immigration, and anti illegal immigration. We are overwhelmingly anti amnesty, pro border security. We believe America has a right to select an immigration policy which is in the interest of America. This means securing our borders, and selecting individually, case by case, who will allowed to immigrate.
Despite the propaganda, we are not "pro big business", in fact, we believe that the number one argument against big government is that industrialists always come take it over. If government weren't so disproportionately bloated and powerful, then buying it out would cease to be a lucrative endeavor. Small government is the best way to protect the public from predatory corporations. If corporate buyouts of congress and back room deals btwn politicos and companies ceased to occur, this would create the most free and fair environment for competitive industry. We know that small and midsized businesses have always been the backbone of our economic engine, and that they are now becoming an endangered species. We know that the ability of large corporations to buy out government officials or courts has always been the source of their unfair advantages over other businesses.
We know that the nature of power is to corrupt, and that there is no perfect human. Even if you find an uncorruptable person, or an entire administration ( if such a thing existed), then what about when they were replaced? Common sense denotes that the best way of keeping corruption out of government, is to limit the size and scope of government.
We are overwhelmingly pro 2nd amendement, and mostly pro choice. Again on abortion, most of us defer to the fact that the state has no business in our affairs. Some support the deferral of the abortion issue to individual states. On the second ammendment we defer to our constitution, and to how remarkably safe other developed nations with desirable gun policies are (switzerland, israel) .The largest point of ambivilance within the Tea Party is probably the death penalty. It seems to me like were split pretty close down the middle on that one.
Last but certainly not least, THERE IS NO RACIAL COMPONENT TO OUR PLATFORM WHATSOEVER. We are not racists, stated or implied. Racial views are not a part of our movement. Never have been, never will be. In fact we are highly opposed to any racially based policy whatsoever. We have eleminated any and every element of racism in our movement as soon as we've identified it and will continue to do so. Furthermore we have minority leadership, and lots of minority support. There are numerous black tea party supporters, and one of our strongest leaders (Lt. Col. Allen West) is a black man. And of course, our historical founder Crispus Attucks, who effectively started the American Revolution, was also a black man. We have centuries of minority support and leadership, since long before it was politically en vogue.
I hope I have answered some basic questions regarding what our movement is about. Please feel free to let me know if I can answer any other questions.
