The Union and the Establishment, Which Group is Right?
I have done a bit of internalizing with the Union debate over the last few weeks. You know those times when you are driving in your car, with the radio off, just thinking. I believe I have come to terms with the form of my argument from the perspective of liberty. I would like to preface my entire discussion with the simple fact that we should always be suspicious when the elected government appears to be working in a freedom-oriented manner. Some of my peers will tell me that motives do not matter, and while I have a tendency to agree, something has never felt right with the swiftness of this legislation. If we as a group truly believe in freedom we have a duty to articulate this argument from the perspective of freedom and liberty, not based on political party lines. I have outlined five arguments based on a liberty perspective to the public employee union debate.
First, the public sector employees have one serious flaw in their argument over pay and benefits, and that is all pay is a result of tax revenue from the public. Yes, I understand some police forces are partially funded with ticket/fine revenue, and the BMV accepts payments for license plates, but overall public sector employees are paid by the taxpayers. Taxation is the redistribution of wealth for some other purpose, clear and simple. I am not advocating the abolition of taxation here, just making a point that revenue is being diverted from private sources to public sources. Government chooses the winner and loser of those resources.
The previous union pay argument in America (which confuses the argument between public and private sector union members) was at the hands of “greedy” management in the private sector. Private sector union members were asking for fair compensation based on the fact they made the owners, shareholders, and management very wealthy, thus a profit sharing motive was created. The public unions in turn should be working in the opposite direction and provide the tax payers the details on how they reduced expenses each year, as public employees are not sharing profits, but accepting forced handouts from the taxpayers.
Second, to remain consistent to the principles of liberty in my mind, unions pure and simple have the right to organize. Very few Tea Party members who believe in liberty should be able to argue with this point. With that said public sector unions have run roughshod over politicians for years, for two reasons. One, politicians are weak kneed, ambitious people, who care little for results and only for votes. Second the union holds a massive amount of “forced” donations to a potential opponent over the head of politicians with whom they are negotiating. With or without collective bargaining, which based purely on the principle of freedom should exist, elected officials fold each time to unions because of their deep political contribution pockets.
Third, in the 2010 election, Union members essentially split their support with 49% backing Democrats and 47% backing Republicans. Union dues, however, were not well distributed between the parties with over 90% in some cases following the Democratic candidate. Taking this logic all the way through, union political contributions are paid with union dues; public sector union dues are paid from the paycheck of public sector union members; public sector union paychecks are paid by tax dollars from tax payers (who vote more or less in a similar split fashion with the public sector union members).
In essence our tax dollars (and nearly 50% of public sector union contributions) are supporting candidates not endorsed by the donation base. This by far is the most extreme and inappropriate use of tax payer resources. However, if the donations were split based on public sector union voting record, this would reduce the unions bosses ability to coerce negotiation, so why not eliminate forced political contributions. This argument finally triggers a liberty sensor that appeals to me.
Fourth, the lazy public sector union member argument is simply an effort to apply a generalization to an entire class of people. It is simply not true in every condition. Firemen do not watch TV and cook chili all day. Not every BMV employee is rude. Police officers do not spend all their time in a donut shop, and teachers surely do not spend their entire day smoking in the teacher’s lounge. That is not to say that there are not some that do.
Every lazy public sector employee is being propped up by their productive counterpart, similar to the private sector. The only difference is that the collective bargaining process keeps the lazy insulated in the group. The private sector reviews people individually based on their performance to remain competitive, and many slip through the review process cracks each year, but the same measure could be applied to public sector unions as well. Thus allowing the unproductive, regardless of seniority, to be replaced instead of protected and retained.
The fifth and final argument is that Union members are making more, receiving better health care or pension benefits appeals to me as a bland argument. Why would a freedom loving person begrudge a Union member for making more than a private sector counterpart? The argument to me seems eerily similar to the argument that those making money and being more productive should pay higher taxes. Class warfare loses the liberty battle in my mind every time.
However, I will remind the reader of my first argument of where the public sector union receives their “revenue”, and that through tax dollars the employees and government has a fiduciary responsibility to put that money to the best use. The money comes from the productive members of society, so antiquated systems of pension plans and low contribution health plans should be reformatted to represent that of a private sector business.
In conclusion any liberty minded Tea Party member that opposes the public sector employee union should be able to agree with the points below:
1.) A liberty loving person would not be against a group of people forming a union, which is that groups right. A person who does not want to unionize should not be coerced to do so as well.
2.) Public sector employees receive their income from taxpayers, and have a fiduciary responsibility to cut costs wherever and whenever possible.
3.) Union political contributions do not match their members voting habits, and should either be distributed in percentage based on general election results, or eliminated entirely.
4.) Elected representatives (the establishment) have not acted in the taxpayer’s best interest in public sector union negotiations, hence the salary and benefit structure is out of standard for comparable private sector employment.
5.) Every public sector employee is not lazy, but a review process should be created outside of collective bargaining to eliminate the protection of the unproductive (see point #2).
6.) Class warfare arguments are baseless and inappropriate, unless the person making the argument can comfortably apply the argument to all situations.
If all of these conditions are not met, not only have we wasted resources, but we have alienated scores of people that believe in the liberty and freedom movement of the Tea Party. As I prefaced at the beginning of the article, we must remain suspicious of any government moving in a “freedom-oriented” manner based on the past history and an ever present alterior motive. In this case the rhetoric was consistent with freedom, but the results are yet to be seen.
Obama and the “I” Word
Libya is now the third war America has become embroiled in. Technically it’s higher than that as we have not truly finished World War II (bases in Germany and Japan), Korea or Vietnam. Unlike World War II action, there is no perceived, implied or actual threat to America from Libya. The leader of Libya was a few weeks ago on America’s Facebook page as a “Friend”. Funny how quickly things change with a government whose emotional baseline is equitable to a thirteen year old girl.
“Follow the Constitution” is a frequent chorus and a universal cause for applause at Tea Party rallies across the nation. Article one, Section 8 of the CONSTITUTION (most Tea Partiers like it better when it is yelled, hence the caps) states: “Congress shall have the power to declare war”. For over fifty years, Congress has been shirking this responsibility, leaving the commander in chief the sole responsibility for declaring war.
Truman bypassed Congress for Korea. Kennedy/Johnson sidestepped Congress for Vietnam. Bush 1 did the same for Iraq 1, Bush 2 for Iraq 2 and Afghanistan, while Obama has the US engaged with Libya (and continuing Bush 2 wars). The CONSTITUTION was written to limit the power of government, not to increase the powers of a specific office. Being the commander and chief of the military gives the President final say in matters of declared war, not the right to pick fights.
The founders intentions were to reduce the ability of a single person (such as a king, in their experience) to declare war, leaving the representative body of Congress the responsibility to declare and fund a war. In many ways the CONSTITUTION simply placed the President as single executive with some powers, but ultimately the task to approve bills set forth by the will of the people through Congress.
Which leads us to the question, does a President who declares war commit an impeachable offense?
The answer is clearly Yes, but the reality is a sound No. We have over fifty years of precedent showing us that impeaching a President for declaring war without Congressional approval is a worthless endeavor, judging by the failed attempts. The most recent occurring in 2008, as the Democrats abandoned a Dennis Kucinich sponsored resolution to impeach President Bush, understanding that war is profitable and great with voters for both Democrat antiwar voters and Republican neo-con constituents. Even “anti-war” President Obama was quoted in 2007 when asked a question about impeaching then President Bush, “I think you reserve impeachment for grave, grave breaches, and intentional breaches of the president’s authority.”
Apparently the last grave breach was Monica Lewinsky.
I for one would be very surprised if the anti-war Democrats or the pro-war neo-con Republican majority Congress began rattling the impeachment saber around for Obama’s involvement in Libya, even though they should be doing just that. The 2010 election was a call to Congress was to return to the rule of law in the Constitution, followed closely on the heels of a 2008 election to end our continual war and death machine.
It’s just one more inconsistency in a government that will never be of the people, by the people or for the people, as apparently this problem is not solved by “voting the bums out”.
Raising the National Debt Ceiling….Again
This blog post comes from local Tea Party favorite, Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones. I asked the Sheriff to provide his perspective on what real leaders would do when faced with the tough decision of raising the debt ceiling. His response is below.
As Sheriff of Butler County, Ohio, I know budget reductions are taking place on the local and state levels. Since 2009 my budget has been cut by $3.9 million. We have readjusted and reassigned responsibilities to operate within our budget.
In the latest election cycle, most of those running for Congress: Democrat, Republican and Independent alike, stated that they would be against raising the debt ceiling from $14.294 trillion.
The national debt ceiling is a cap set by Congress on the amount of debt the Federal Government can legally borrow. It was first set in 1917. Since March, 1962 the debt ceiling has been raised 74 times – 10 of those times occurred since 2001.[1] In March 2006 the ceiling was raised to $9 trillion[2] and today it is currently at $14.294 trillion. Since 1975 Federal debt has risen from $542 billion to $14.079 trillion.
Only our government would think raising the debt ceiling is a good idea.
“The most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight but has no vision.” Helen Keller. We must have vision for the future of our great nation.
We are living through the worst economic times. We have borne the brunt of our wages being held or reduced, our retirements lost or diluted, loss of jobs, and loss of property value. We have been tightening our belts with hope that it will somehow bring this great country back to where we once were a short time ago. It seems that when we try to move in the right direction, government officials are on the other end of the rope pulling us in a different direction. If we, the citizens of this country do not put extreme pressure on our decision makers, they will pull us over the cliff. All we can do is dig in our heels to slow this process down.
In the past, our leaders have chosen to kick the can – the debt ceiling – not down the road – but up the road. It appears, by all indications, they are going to kick it up the road for someone else to handle and fix.
My father would roll over in his grave knowing what debt our leaders have placed on future generations.
For example, our government borrowed nearly 40 cents on every dollar that it spent.[3]
Currently the federal government pays out $197 billion in yearly interest payments. At this trend, interest could cost the US government $750 billion a year by 2020.[4]
Hopefully with a little pressure on Congress, they will come up with a plan to cut the federal government’s budget and maintain our current debt ceiling. Sending a powerful message to the world that we are not a debtor nation, we take pride in not owing, and not becoming financially dependent and indebted to China. We should be ashamed and embarrassed.
God Bless the United States of America.
Sheriff Richard K. Jones, Butler County, Ohio
Click here for more details on the debt ceiling, including counter arguments and talking points when calling your Congressperson.
[1] CNN Money.com – Jeanne Sahadi, Senior Writer, February, 2011
[2] NPR.org – David Welna, March, 2006
[3] WSJ.com – J.D. Foster, February, 2011
[4] Pittsburghlive.com – Jack Markowitz, February, 2011
What Are the Unions Fighting For?
A recent article from the Mises Institute’s Thomas DiLorenzo highlighted a statement from the Wall Street Journal in reference to the fallacy of the Union argument. The statement is simply this, “The Wall Street Journal reports that state and local governments in the United States currently have $3.5 trillion in unfunded pension liabilities.”
The keyword in that statement is not the jaw dropping number ($3,500,000,000,000), but the term “unfunded”. Dictionary.com provided two definitions to the word “unfunded”: (1) not provided with a fund or money; not financed or (2) a Financial term, floating.
Unions are fighting to keep a dream alive, just simply that. The tax payers or new Republican leadership are not dipping into a special union retirement fund to pay for government operations to continue. This fight is about a dream. The elaborate gold plated pensions the Unions are crowding various state house’s for today, only exist on paper and in the hopes of Union members.
The last high profile guy to show wealth that only existed on paper is serving a life sentence for fraud. The Union Pension Ponzi scheme is more upside down than most, save Social Security and Medicare.
Unions are rallying to support an unfunded pension system. A system supported each quarter by a pension statement “floated” to their mail boxes. Regardless of the zeros and commas, the true fund is worth less than the paper it was printed on.
From this perspective the Union fight is headed the wrong direction, as to date the only group honest enough to tell Union members the money is just not there are those to which they are vehemently opposed.
As Mark Twain said, “There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.” In this case it appears all three are stacked up against the Union.
Stop the Debt Ceiling Increase
Debt Ceiling Overview: The Debt Ceiling is currently $14.3 Trillion ($14,300,000,000,000). We are expected to hit this ceiling (spending limit) shortly in the next few weeks. The reason we have a Debt Ceiling is that Congress authorizes the Treasury Department to take on a specific amount of debt; once Congress reaches the ceiling they have to stop adding debt or raise the ceiling. It is comparable to reaching the spending limit on your credit card.
The Debt Ceiling vote could come as soon the end of February, coupled with a vote on the operational budget of the US government, whose funding ends on March 4, 2011 (since they did not pass a budget in 2010). A coupled vote like this smells of a back room deal similar to the Pelosi/Reid Healthcare bill, and lacks the transparency of a clean up or down vote. Coupling this vote will provide politcal cover for members on the debt ceiling fence, in districts where Tea Party values are held in high regard.
Why this is important? The Tea Party sent the new Congress to Washington to curb spending, not to increase the debt we take on. This vote is incredibly symbolic in that it will be the first vote where the new “Tea Party” Congress increases the amount of debt we are taking on.
- Bottom line: An increase in the debt ceiling is unacceptable. During the election the Republicans said the following in the Pledge to America, “Instead of pushing off our long-term fiscal challenges, we will reform the budget process to ensure that Congress begins making the decisions that are necessary to protect our entitlement programs for today’s seniors and future generations.”
An increase in the Debt Ceiling voids new Tea Party Congress promise of standing up against spending. Within three months of their election, the new Tea Party Congress will have defaulted on their commitments.
- Current Counter Arguments (the opposition will use this to say the debt ceiling should be increased!)
Statement: “The US Government would default on its loans if it did not increase the debt ceiling.”
Answer: Not True. The US Government can exist on existing revenue without increasing the debt ceiling. The interest on the debt will be almost $500 Billion ($500,000,000,000 — wow) next year or $42 Billion/month ($42,000,000,000). The average inflow of revenue for the US Government averages $200 Billion ($200,000,000,000) per month, with some months easily exceeding that level.
This $42 Billion/month average equates to roughly 21% of the average monthly revenue inflow. This equates to a household reaching the credit card spending limit, but continuing to pay their minimum due. This is not a default situation (as not paying would be).
Statement: The White House is stating that it will be “devastating” or “a national catastrophe” not to raise the debt ceiling.
Answer: Fear is the trump card of politics (see Patriot Act, TARP 1, TARP 2 for examples). Do not fall into it! By not stopping the spending now, we are merely extending credit that is already well overextended. The debt ceiling should not be increased.
Statement: “Significant spending cuts will accompany any increase in the debt ceiling.”
Answer: Spending cuts will not make up for what will most likely be $700 billion to $1 Trillion increase in the Debt Ceiling. The previous Debt Ceiling vote in February 2010 increased the ceiling by $1 Trillion ($1,000,000,000,000).
Would Congress offer a significant cut (in 2011, not over 10 years) that would equate to a $1 Trillion increase in the debt ceiling? Will that be in the bill? If not, the “significant cuts” are only loose commitments. We should continue to press to cut spending, but we should not be accepting loosely defined cuts at the opportunity to increasing the deficit. An increase in the debt ceiling regardless of spending cuts is unacceptable.
Call your Congressmember to let them know you want them to vote No on any increase in the Debt Ceiling (and that spending cuts should happen without the need for this leverage).
Chamber Threatens Local Control
Dusty Rhodes (D), Hamilton County Auditor and voice for Hamilton County fiscal conservatism has agreed to complete a regular running “insiders” view of Hamilton County’s status. His articles will be published regularly through the CTP blog site, to illustrate his views of fiscal conservation, limited government, and free markets in government action (or inaction).
The Cincinnati Tea Party does not (and cannot) endorse any specific candidates. Dusty Rhodes, Hamilton County Auditor, and Dennis York, the Shelby County Auditor, composed the blog below, entitled, “Chamber Threatens Local Control.”
The latest offering in what appears to be a continuing series of proposals to “change the way we govern ourselves” comes from Ohio’s Metropolitan Chambers of Commerce and the Ohio Chamber of Commerce. This one carries the ambitious title “Redesigning Ohio: Transforming Government into a 21st Century Institution”.
The common themes to these “studies” are that (1) the state is facing a fiscal crisis, and (2) we should take this opportunity to transform our state and local governments. The Chamber’s report is no exception with the usual buzzwords: “getting more for less”, “building a strong state economy that can compete in the 21st century” and “our state government must become more flexible, adaptable and innovative”.
Once you get past the lofty rhetoric you find little more than warmed over and previously rejected “wish lists” and left over big government schemes.
Among the specifics: they suggest eliminating the 10% and 2 ½% property tax rollbacks. These state-funded rollbacks were a trade-off for passing the State income tax in the ‘70s and then increasing it in the 80s. Now they want to treat it as a “gift”. They propose cutting back the Local Government Fund which will impact basic services (police, fire and roads) provided by cities, villages and townships.
The Personal Property reimbursement has entered a phase-down period. In this case, the State eliminated our local Personal Property income resource, replaced it with the Commercial Activity Tax, and then pulled the revenue to the State level with eventually nothing to replace it with on the local end.
They discuss reducing or eliminating the Homestead property tax exemption for senior citizens. One of their suggestions is to “means test” on an income basis. There is no provision for the resources necessary to collect that information and update it every year. Ironically, after a high labor transition period, the program has just settled into an easier to administer format. Now they want to change it back.
They actually want to create new agencies and pay them to be the master manipulators of how local governments are funded and operated. They advocate strongly for pushing decision making downstream and then, in a strange twist of logic, also advocate for centralizing power by basically starving local units out of business. Such loss of local control would be devastating to the voters ability to hold government accountable.
They say that State taxes are not the problem compared to the rest of the country, but that local taxes are too high. Perhaps that is because the State has not shouldered their share of the cost of delivering services which forces local governments to go to the voters to seek to raise the necessary funding locally.
The problem with this and other similar “studies” is that they distract us from seriously dealing with the fiscal problems and offer the false hope that fiddling with the time-tested structures of government will be some kind of “silver bullet” to fix the mess.
In fact, consolidation and creating bigger entities seldom results in better service, improved efficiency or savings. What it does is move government further away from the people.
Our problems today are the result of excessive spending by politicians who over committed finite resources and unresponsive bureaucracies that acted as though they were beyond reproach. Weak political leadership that could not say “no” to the next big project, favored program or idealistic editorial board is largely responsible for our collective situation.
Let’s stop wasting time getting starry-eyed over glossy reports, “ivory tower” studies and complicated proposals. Taxpayers want results, not thinly disguised efforts to diminish local control and consolidate authority in bigger government.
So I voted…
I held my nose and voted for some Republicans (and skipped over some others). I voted for a Democrat. I voted for a Libertarian, and I placed another vote for a candidate from the Constitution party.
If the Republicans think that the Tea Party groundswell is supporting them as a great alternative to the current political class, they should just wait to see what happens in the 2012 primary. I know I can’t.
Governor Strickland Sued for Union Entanglement
Lawsuit alleges Strickland administration and OSFC placed union financial interests and remaining in office above fiscal responsibility in building schools.
1851 Center for Constitutional Law
208 E. State Street
Columbus, Ohio 43215
COLUMBUS – Tax dollars have been wasted and continue to be at risk due to an unlawfully cozy relationship between the Strickland administration and labor unions, claim a group of Mansfield-area taxpayers. The residents today filed an Ohio Corrupt Activities Act complaint against Gov. Ted Strickland, Ohio School Facilities Commission (OSFC) Executive Director Richard Murray, the Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) and others. The suit will demonstrate members of the Strickland administration, organized labor, and Murray used the OSFC and school building construction contracts to engage in pattern of corrupt activities expressly prohibited under Ohio’s RICO laws.
The complaint, filed with Richland County Common Pleas Court, is available here.
The taxpayers charge that labor unions and Murray used bribery, intimidation, and obstruction of justice to further union financial interests, through projects funded by the OSFC, while the Strickland administration aided and abetted the conduct for its own political gain. The lawsuit seeks to prohibit future distribution of state tax dollars by the OSFC to fund union-friendly “Project Labor Agreements” (PLAs) and prevailing wage-only projects.
The complaint also details how Murray orchestrated secret meetings between labor union leaders and school superintendents. At the meetings, unions offered political support in facilitating passage of local school district tax levies for building school buildings in exchange for the superintendents’ promises to use expensive union-only labor when later building those schools.
The 1851 Center for Constitutional Law, a nonpartisan public interest law firm, is representing taxpayers in Madison Local School District and Shelby City School District, where district officials:
• Engaged union leaders through Murray and the OSFC;
• Received substantial contributions from unions in passing their levies;
• Passed a levy for a new school building in August; and
• Will soon formally decide whether to implement union-friendly provisions in building their schools.
“It certainly appears as though union influence over the Strickland administration caused the firing of the prior OSFC director, and the hiring of Murray, with either the instructions or the implicit understanding that Murray would run rough-shod over taxpayers and school districts to benefit union allies,” said 1851 Center Executive Director Maurice Thompson. “School districts are making construction decisions within this troublesome framework. This suit aims to clean up the process before additional tax dollars are wasted.”
According to the complaint, OSFC Executive Director Murray is at the center of the corrupt activity. Specifically, Murray has attempted to pressure school districts, when building school buildings, into using PLAs, unduly rewarding those who do and retaliating against those who do not. PLAs require contractors to employ union workers or require their non-union employees to pay dues to local unions for the duration of a construction project.
Additional allegations of bribery and intimidation by the union are corroborated in the complaint by former OSFC executive director Michael Shoemaker. The complaint alleges LIUNA was displeased with Shoemaker’s unwillingness to strong-arm school districts into using PLAs.
According to Shoemaker, organized labor interests threatened Gov. Strickland that they would withhold nearly $400,000 in political contributions to the governor’s re-election campaign if Shoemaker remained OSFC executive director. Gov. Strickland then removed Shoemaker and appointed the union-friendly Murray upon the recommendation an Ohio union leader.
In 2006, LIUNA contributed over $326,000 to Gov. Strickland’s election campaign – making it his single largest political contributor. In 2010, LIUNA reportedly contributed over $500,000 to the Democratic Governors Association, which in turn spent over $1.75 million supporting Gov. Strickland’s re-election campaign.
In addition to Madison and Shelby schools, the complaint cites instances of corrupt activity by the parties in the Clay, New Boston, and Washington-Nile Local School Districts in Scioto County, and the Fremont City School District in Sandusky County.
The complaint also seeks to declare as unconstitutional an OSFC regulation promoting PLAs and prevailing wage, insofar as it attempts to override Ohio statutes that forbidding them.
Also charged in the complaint are Strickland Chief of Staff John Haseley, LIUNA official Ralph Cole, and the Madison and Shelby City Local School Districts.
A Speech on the Tea Party Movement
by Jack Painter, Founder, Indian Hill Tea Party
A lot has been said and written about the Tea Party, and some of it is very critical.
Yet, pollsters Scott Rasmussen and Doug Schoen recently wrote in the Washington Examiner that over half of the electorate now say they favor the Tea Party movement, around 35 percent say they support the movement, and 20 to 25 percent self-identify as members of the movement.
They concluded:
“The Tea Party has become one of the most powerful and extraordinary movements in American political history.” “It is as popular as both the Democratic and Republican parties.”
It seems clear that the Tea Party is a significant political development with potentially broad ramifications.
So how did a corporate lawyer like me, who has no political ambitions, get involved in this movement?
I’d like to share two key events that affected my willingness to get involved.
The first occurred in the spring of 2009. There was a Tea Party rally scheduled on Fountain Square at noon on April 15, 2009.
I’d heard about the Tea Party, and I decided to go.
I was at the Chemed building at a client’s office that day, and I decided to walk over to Fountain Square and check it out.
What I saw amazed me. There must have been 6,000-7,000 people there. The crowd was so big it covered Fountain Square, and people were standing shoulder to shoulder down Vine Street.
I was struck by the type of people there and the great signs. It was a diverse crowd – young and old, men and women from all walks of life. It was very peaceful and well behaved, and many people brought signs extolling the virtues of liberty. I thought to myself – these people are well educated, and they have a deep appreciation of the founding principles of our country.
I watched several speeches and then headed back to the office.
As I walked in front of the Westin Hotel, I noticed a well-known former Congressman standing on the sidewalk watching the crowd from a distance. This man was elected to Congress in the early 80’s and had been part of the Reagan revolution.
I stopped and stood there for several minutes and watched him for clues as to what he was thinking.
I had the strong impression that he didn’t know what to make of the rally. He seemed hesitant to cross the street and join in and was content just to watch from a distance.
It was if he was calculating whether it would be bad for him to be seen in that crowd.
I remember thinking how odd that was. Here was a group of people who were advocating exactly what he believed, and he was afraid to be associated with them.
It gave me the strong impression that our leaders didn’t have the courage to step forward. They were paralyzed with fear and doubt. It was up to the people to take the lead and hope the leaders would follow.
The second event was a speech by the historian David McCullough that I attended in mid-September 2009. This was about two months after I founded the Indian Hill Tea Party.
McCullough talked about our founding fathers and George Washington in particular.
At the end of his speech he told a story about Washington that inspired me.
As you may recall, the battle of Trenton occurred Christmas night, December 26, 1776. Washington and his troops crossed the Delaware by boat in the dead of winter and defeated the British at Trenton, New Jersey. This proved to be a turning point in the Revolutionary War.
A few days later, on December 31, Washington called a large part of his troops out into formation to speak to them.
The way the system worked, all enlistments for the entire army were up on January 1, 1777. Every soldier was free to go home.
Keep in mind that these were volunteers from every walk of life – farmers, shop keepers, blacksmiths.
Washington appeared before his men on horse and urged them to reenlist. He said that if they would sign up for six more months, he’d give them a bonus of $10, which was almost a month’s pay at the time.
As McCullough put it, “These were men who were desperate for pay of any kind. Their families were starving.”
The drums rolled, and Washington asked people who were willing to stay on to step forward.
No one stepped forward.
Washington turned on his horse and started to ride away. Suddenly, he stopped, turned around and returned.
He then said the following three sentences to his men. We know this because someone wrote down his exact words.
“My brave fellows, you have done all I asked you to do, and more than could be reasonably expected, but your country is at stake, your wives, your houses, and all that you hold dear. You have worn yourselves out with fatigues and hardships, but we know not how to spare you. If you will consent to stay one month longer, you will render that service to the cause of liberty, and to your country, which you can probably never do under any other circumstance.”
According to David McCullough, it was as if Washington was saying:
“You are fortunate. You have a chance to serve your country in a way that nobody else is going to be able to, and everybody else is going to be jealous of you, and you will count this the most important decision and most valuable service of your lives.”
After Washington spoke, the drums rolled again, and men began stepping forward.
This story stuck with me, and it affected my willingness to step forward myself in the months to come.
Let me turn now to the Tea Party.
I’d like to start with a brief explanation of who we are and how we are organized.
We’re a spontaneous, grassroots movement that grew out of alarm about the direction of our country.
Our members come from all walks of life and include Republicans, Independents, and Democrats.
We are not a political party. We’re really a coalition of local community groups.
The Indian Hill Tea Party has over 375 members who live in Indian Hill and nearby communities.
We are affiliated with the Cincinnati Tea Party, which consists of 25 local Tea Party groups located in Southwest Ohio and has a mailing list of about 9,000 people.
The Cincinnati Tea Party is in turn part of the Ohio Liberty Council, which is a coalition of about 70 liberty-minded groups around the state, including Tea Party groups.
Both the Cincinnati Tea Party and the Ohio Liberty Council are highly decentralized. Their role is primarily to help the local groups share information and avoid duplication of effort.
At the national level, there are 4 or 5 groups that call themselves Tea Party groups, but they seem to exist more on paper than anything else. We really don’t have any national leadership and don’t see a need for that.
So what do we stand for and what are we trying to accomplish?
The starting point in answering that is the central idea behind our movement
• It’s the core principle on which our country was founded – the idea that all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights.
• In other words, we are all equally human and therefore equally free.
• Each of us has the right to be left alone in our pursuit of happiness as long as we honor the equal right of others to be left alone.
In my view all the talk about deficits, earmarks, and the like is somewhat misplaced.
• Our deficits are unsustainable, and if something is unsustainable, that means it won’t be sustained.
• The only question is how many people will get hurt between now and when we address those problems.
In the meantime, many of our leaders are willing to abandon the idea of equal freedom to achieve goals they think are more important.
• This has led to unprecedented efforts to use government to redistribute wealth, which sacrifices equal freedom to achieve equal results.
• It has also led to recent efforts to limit the basic rights of certain disfavored people or groups, including:
o the free speech rights of corporations
o the freedom of association rights of religious-based groups
o and the private property and freedom of contract rights of individuals and businesses.
As a result, we’re losing our right to be left alone, to be free from coercion and free to choose – the right of each of you to decide what is best for you and your family instead of having big, all-knowing government decide for you.
When I discuss this with people, I often ask them the following questions:
• Do you want a choice in whether to give others some of what you earn?
• Do you want the freedom to choose your own doctor? Your medical care? Whether to purchase health insurance?
• What about the freedom to choose what to charge your customers and what benefits to offer your employees?
• And do you want the freedom to choose what political speech you read and hear instead of having that speech filtered by the government?
Our founding fathers realized you have to establish boundaries on government to safeguard liberty.
• Without boundaries, government tends to grow more powerful over time.
• Eventually, it encroaches on liberty and makes some people servants of others.
• As Thomas Jefferson said, “A government big enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take everything you have.”
Our movement is a reaction to the fact that in many ways our federal government has escaped its boundaries.
• This has happened over many decades.
• It has accelerated in recent years.
Our response is to promote three principles that we believe are key to reestablishing boundaries for our government:
• Limited government
• Fiscal responsibility
• Free enterprise
Let me read a couple points from our statement of principles to give you an idea what these principles mean. If you want to learn more about these principles, I recommend you visit our Web site at www.indianhillteaparty.org.
Here are a few of the points under the heading “Limited Government”:
• Role – The proper role of government is to protect equal rights, not to provide equal things through the redistribution of wealth.
• Powers – The federal government has only the limited powers enumerated in the Constitution, and the checks and balances in the Constitution (such as separation of powers and federalism) are essential for limiting governmental power and preserving liberty.
• Rule of law – The law must apply equally to all (including our elected representatives), and judges are not entitled to favor certain people or groups over others based on compassion.
The key question is how to best promote these principles.
The Executive Committee of the Indian Hill Tea Party has considered that question and has reached some conclusions. I should say at the outset, that I’m speaking for the Indian Hill Tea Party, not the Cincinnati Tea Party.
We’ve identified three options, and each involves influencing our elected leaders:
• First, we can be part of a third party movement.
• Second, we can work within one or both of the two major political parties.
• Third, we can stay out of party politics and limit our involvement to protest, lobbying and education.
We don’t think being part of a third party movement will work. It will just split the vote and elect progressives and liberals.
We like the idea of protest, lobbying and education, but we think that doesn’t really take full advantage of the energy of our movement.
That leaves the option of working within the two major parties.
We’ve developed a written strategy on how to engage with the two major political parties. While the principles behind the strategy are neutral and non-partisan, their application requires us to take sides.
I don’t have time to get into the details here, but let me touch on the key points.
In the short-term
• We have to take the gavel away from the progressives and liberals who currently have it.
• We have to stop them before they destroy our country.
• This means we need to defeat all Democrats this November, even those we may like.
Let me illustrate this idea with an example. If Ronald Reagan were alive today and were running for Congress as a Democrat (not as a Republican, which he was, but as a Democrat), I would vote for his Republican opponent.
I say this even though I’m a Reaganite. The reason is that as a Democrat, Reagan would have to vote for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker, and our goal is to take the gavel away from her.
Our long-term goal is to reform both parties.
In other words, we need to defeat the political class.
This starts with the Republicans. We have to become the soul of the Republican Party.
I like the way Sue Hardenbergh, the co-leader of the Anderson Tea Party, describes our goal for the Republicans: Extreme Makeover, Republican Party Edition. Maybe someday they’ll make it into a reality T.V. show!!
This effort to defeat the political class will also target the Democrats. It will likely take longer with them, but we have Independents and Democrats in our movement who are up to the task.
Anyway, that gives you an overview of what we stand for and what we’re trying to accomplish.
Right now, the Cincinnati Tea Party is focused on November, and we call our effort “Project Vote”.
The core of this effort is neighborhood organizing.
In the May primaries, we ran Tea Party people for Republican Precinct Executive positions in Hamilton, Butler, Clermont, and Warren Counties.
A precinct executive is responsible for a precinct and sits on the Republican Party Central Committee for the County.
We had a fair amount of success. For example, in Hamilton County, there are 660 precincts, and about 375 of them have a precinct executive. Tea Party people or people favorable to the movement hold about 150 of those positions.
We also had good results in Butler, Clermont and Warren Counties. We now have Tea Party people in leadership positions in the Republican Party in those Counties, including the Chairman of Republican Party in Butler County and the Vice Chairman of the Party in Warren and Clermont County.
In Indian Hill, we elected all six precinct executives, and these people have formed precinct teams under them of 10 – 20 people.
This is the building block of our grassroots effort.
In the run up to the November election we are focused on four things, and have a number of projects underway to accomplish each.
• Registering Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents
• Promoting Republican candidates
• Contacting like-minded voters at the precinct level by phone and by going door-to-door to urge them to vote.
• Planning Election Day activities to get out the vote.
Some of this is in coordination with the Republican Party, such as manning phone banks, but most of it is independent.
For example, the Ohio Liberty Council now has its own phone banks targeting four key Congressional races in Ohio.
Let me conclude with some words that inspire us in the Tea Party movement.
Forty-six years ago, Ronald Reagan spoke about the battle for freedom when he said:
“You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We can preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we can sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done.”
Those of us in the Tea Party movement take these words to heart.
We are a critical moment in our nation’s history, and we believe our liberties and founding principles are at risk.
The solution won’t come from the political parties or from Washington. It will only come from ordinary citizens like you and me who get involved and make a difference.
We are trying to answer the call. We are trying to justify our brief moment here. We are trying to do all that can be done.
Prepare To Be Betrayed
This is an article by Lew Rockwell published September 22nd and available in original text at: http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/prepare-for-betrayal155.html
He writes quite eloquently on what anyone intimately involved in the “tea party movement” knows – we are yet to see fundamental change and the “tea party movement” is yet to prove its committment to stated principles.
It all sounds great, but we do not know if people are ready for the really heavy lifting necessary to genuinely shift the paradigm back to preserving principles of liberty above all else.
Prepare To Be Betrayed
by Lew Rockwell
It’s another revolutionary season in American politics, with voters preparing to do everything they can within the structure of the law to throw out the bad guys and the bad system they represent. The focus is on this amorphous thing called the Tea Party, which embodies a huge range of political impulses from libertarian to authoritarian, united under the common belief that everything is going wrong in Washington, with a common goal of upending the status quo.
Candidates that the Republican Party doesn’t like are making big inroads into the party structure and, quite possibly, the election itself. That is fun to watch. The wind at their backs is the spectacular – but wholly predictable – failure of the Obama administration’s economic witchcraft. Trillions and trillions created and spent and yet the suffering endures.
The health-care bill is also a source of American public anger. People are not deceived into believing that whatever reforms we are getting are going to fix the problems of the current system; they will make them worse. As it is, the freedom remaining in the system is the only reason that the system serves us at all. Take that away, and you take away a lifeline.
The revolt, then, is in high gear. It’s not the first time, and it won’t be the last. The governed have long been very unhappy about the government, and they periodically wake up and seek to change it. It’s been some 16 years since the last go-round of such revolutionary sentiment. It is arguably stronger today than it was back in 1994.
The good aspects of this have nothing to do with political outcomes, despite what people believe. The political environment focuses the mind on important issues like freedom, economics, culture, power and its uses, and the role of the state. As they debate with their neighbors, follow election coverage, listen to the candidates, and watch the process, people learn and study and, most importantly, think and rethink.
If you begin with a skeptical attitude toward the government, watching and thinking can lead to a radicalization and ultimate embrace of a consistent opposition to government involvement. This is why election season always ends up creating a huge flood of new libertarians who buy books, feel the inspiration to get active (perhaps for the first time), and dedicate themselves to reducing the power of the state in whatever way they can.
If American politics can be said to contribute anything to American culture, it is this educational aspect that stands out. The elections focus the mind and lead people to a new consciousness. Ideally, that consciousness would dawn without politicians and elections and all the apparatus of the season. And yet people are busy in normal times, dealing with regular life; it is the very urgency of the election that gives rise to the concern in the first place.
You might as well know right now, however, that the Tea Party, no matter how successful it is at the polls in November, will certainly betray the party of liberty. There are several reasons for this, but the fundamental one is intellectual. The Tea Party does not have a coherent view of liberty. Its activists tend to be good on specific economic issues like taxes, spending, stimulus, and health care. They worry about government intervention in these areas and can talk a good game.
But just as with old-time conservatives, there are many issues on which the Tea Party tends toward inconsistency. The military and the issue of war is a major one. Many have bought into the line that the greatest threat this country faces domestically is the influx of adherents of Islam; in international politics, they tend to favor belligerence toward any regime that is not a captive of U.S. political control.
On immigration, the Tea Party ethos favors national IDs and draconian impositions on businesses rather than market solutions like cutting welfare. On social and cultural issues, they can be as confused as the Christian right, believing that it is the job of government to right all wrongs and punish sin.
This doesn’t describe them all. A poll taken last spring divides the activists into two camps: Palin and Paul. Both groups are mad as heck at the mainstream Republican party, but only the Paul camp has broadened that anger to the government generally.
Such are the philosophical problems. Just as telling are the structural problems in politics that lead all political candidates toward the center as a matter of maximizing votes. It’s always the same. They count on their base to show up and vote for them, however reluctantly. It’s the voters in the middle who get their attention. This is why all candidates tend to water down their positions after the primaries, that, and to get funding from the corporatists allied with both parties.
The larger problem occurs once they take office. Here is where the serious problems begin. They are leaned on by their new colleagues, the party elites, related financial interests, the press, and the entire system of which they are now part. Are they going to make themselves enemies of that system, or are they going to work within the system in order to achieve reform, and not just for one term but more terms down the line? Doing a good job means being part of the structure; doing a bad job means being an enemy of the very system that they now serve.
Which choice do they make? The same choice that everyone else in office makes (Ron Paul being the lone exception in all of human history). It is for this reason that newly seated “revolutionary” politicians will betray those who put them in power. It happens like clockwork, same as day turns to night.
Some good can still come out of the results, if only because former ideologues can serve as some resistance to really bad policy. The new Congress that was seated after the 1994 election certainly curbed the ambitions of the Clinton administration for a time. But avoiding greater evil is not the same as doing good. We can state with confidence, all else being equal, that even the best electoral outcome will not lead to actual cuts in the power of government over our lives.
That doesn’t mean that all is for naught. What will change the prospects for freedom in this country is a growing and society-wide awareness of the issue of freedom and the role of the state in wrecking that freedom, and the civilization to which it gives rise.
Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., former editorial assistant to Ludwig von Mises and congressional chief of staff to Ron Paul, is founder and chairman of the Mises Institute, executor for the estate of Murray N. Rothbard, and editor of LewRockwell.com. See his books.