“This country is going down.”
- Nevada voter quoted in the New York Times -10/30/10.
Democrats are headed for what, President George W. Bush called in 2006 a “thumpin.”
But people are not voting for Republicans so much as they are voting against Democrats. Most polls show Republican Congressional leaders are the least popular politicians in America.
Polls do show people are dissatisfied with the overall state of the country and see both parties as part of a larger problem. The anger with how the country is run that began to show in the 2006 election and so permeated 2008, is even stronger in 2010.
Struggling Americans knew that Bush and the Republicans threw them overboard. They thought Obama and the Democrats would pull them out of the water. Now they feel Obama has flown over them much like Bush flew over New Orleans after Katrina.
Average voters believe their situation gets worse no matter who is in power. When they look at the ruling parties they see a Republican Party that has abandoned fiscal responsibility and run up the deficit and a Democratic Party that has failed to protect the little guy.
What they see makes them angry.
In the past, when a government has not addressed its people’s anger it is swept aside. Often the political center takes control and tries and fails to bring a sense of order. When they fail, they are replaced by radicals.
The Tea Party is the result of a similar anger.
The message of the Tea Party is the country is broken and neither party can fix it - but we can. Their success occurred because it directly addresses people’s anger at the inability of Government to protect them and the perceived collapse of normalcy. The Tea Party has not stirred up anger, it simply has harnessed what has been building since in this country since 2005.
It doesn’t matter to voters if the Tea Party candidates have their facts straight.
That’s not important.
What is important is that government economic policy - be it the Democrat’s Keynsian economics or the Republican’s Laffer curve - have failed. That is why they are being evicted and laid off. “Celebrating Diversity” has only led to a socially divided society that that is falling apart. They think the experts were wrong on education which is now why Johnny still can’t read and their technical assistance is in India.
In the Tea Party mind, all of this is the result of failed policies, which were imposed by a growing and paternalistic government. Tea Partiers came of age when belief the government was lying and corrupt was the norm. Whether watching LBJ on Viet-Nam, Nixon on Watergate, Reagan on Iran-Contra or Clinton with Monica, the assumption has always been the government is not telling the truth.
On top of it all that they feel laughed at.
It stings when the pundocracy laughs at Sarah Palin’s short reading list, or Christine O’Donnell’s economic history. They feel the condescension when both women’s education is laughed at. Who has time to read when you are holding down to two jobs to keep the house? So what if it took both women a long time and a lot of schools to get a degree? Only 40% of American’s have a degree. Who can afford it with the cost of education rising faster than inflation?
To the Tea Party voter it feels like they have just been told by the elites “Let them eat cake,” and this stokes their anger even more.
The Tea Party has taken this anger and moved into the political space vacated by disenchanted centrists. Many voters supported the Democrats in 2006 and 2008 with the goal to change the system. The Democrats were going to end the harsh policies of Bush and protect the little guy.
Now in 2010, those voters don’t think that happened.
Obama brought in an economic team that seems more intent on protecting the banks than the homeowners they are evicting. Finance and Health reform seem tilted towards the industry they are supposed to regulate not to the consumer they are supposed to protect. Afghanistan grinds on, GITMO is open, Bush policies on government spying and surveillance remain in place. Bush’s frat house of insiders has been replaced by insiders from the chess club. Demoralized and disappointed centrists are staying home.
When the centrists stay home and the radicals are enraged, revolutions occur.
But in our political system being told to eat cake does not lead to the Bastille, it leads to the ballot. Rather than taking their anger to the barricades Americans sweep their governments away by voting.
In 1932, angry voters swept away the ruling classes of the day and brought Franklin Roosevelt to power. Roosevelt re-formed government’s function and role in society to what we see today. That was a revolution from the left.
In 2010, voters who are equally angry and afraid are poised to sweep away the current ruling class and again change the government’s function and role in society. What we could be witnessing this November is an equally strong revolution from the right.
The pundits could be wrong. This elections isn’t a repeat of 1994. It could be a repeat of 1932.
