A friend of mine in Minnesota exhorted me to do a better job reporting on the Appleton Tea Party. As parital recompense for the luke warm job I did yesterday, here is a small exchange I had with an e-mail friend of mine, Jim L. Jim is from Candada and has a bit of a different take on events in these United States.
I started off in the e-mail discussion with:
Speaking of the Appleton Tea Party:
story: http://tinyurl.com/ctl5g2
pictures: http://tinyurl.com/cp7x54
I wrote a bit about it here:
NeenahPolitics.com
Great fun, but ephemeral, I'm afraid, unless it's more organized. Demonstrations are fine, but actions speak louder, etc.
Steve
Jim wrote:
To really make an impact there would have to be a hundred thousand or so there. If the rally could have organized a million then the event would be on every station and channel and politicians of all stripes would be there to claim support... a few hundred is viewed as little more than a bunch of malcontents.
Sorry to pop anyone's bubble but perception is reality and numbers are all they count.
Jim
My reply:
Jim,
Considering that if you took the populations of all the cities and towns from Green Bay to Fond du Lac, WI, together you'd only have about 300,000 people, I wonder about your "million"...
What did the "Million Man March" on Washington achieve? It's silly to say that only 100,000 or a million people at a time would have an impact. One person can have an impact when the goal is specific enough.
As I said in my message, it was "ephemeral". It was a demonstration, that's all. It was easy to get to. Nobody asked for any money. It was a sunny, pleasant day with very polite people. The parking lot was spotless afterwards.
There were also similar demonstrations in every state. Does it only mean anything if they all get together in one spot?
The impact, if any, will come at the ballot box. Unfortunately, to my mind, there is a certain dismay amongst the electorate that voting doesn't accomplish much. At this rally it was easy to see how dyed-in-the-wool Republicans can easily switch to being small government advocates if the occasion warrants.
Political action can really only achieve limited, targeted, specific goals. The big ones are easiest to get a big response to, but it's the little ones that get implemented.
Regards,
Steve Erbach
Another friend, Donna C., from North Carolina replied to Jim L., too:
I think they're saying 250,000 across the Country. These were supposedly organized by local citizenry. Multiple small groups of ordinary folks in multiple locations vs. one large group in a single location. Hence the terms "local" and "grass roots" effort.
Donna
Jim waxed philosophical in his reply to Donna C.:
It is definitely an organized campaign but it does appear more like a 'I hate Obama' rather 'tell us the truth'.
The truth is that the country is in deep deep debt... It is spending far more than it has or may ever be able to fully pay. The proper way to handle in good times would be to raise taxes.
No one wants to hear that but the voodoo economics that says tax cuts will stimulate the economy into growth is nothing more than a fantasy. I would like that fantasy land to be true also but it is not. It is now the time to face reality and it is going to be very hard. We can not longer borrow to prosperity.
There are only two disasters that break that rule, all out war and a major depression. Obama is now in a very high stakes game of balance, spend, retreat and all the time trying to hold everything together. If he pulls this off and gets the economy on stable ground and starts paying down the massive debt he will have pulled off the hat-trick of the century and maybe even the millennium.
Whether it is possible, I really cannot say but he has a team of the very best financial minds, in America and maybe in the world. This is going to be a very brutal war, many factories will be razed, cities devastated, with huge numbers of causalities and still a massive debt to pay. You had better pray that Obama does well.
I think it is good that many people are venting their anger and frustration but events that have already been set in motion are much bigger than many or all the protesters really understand.
What is coming is a major tidal wave. Whether it is a good or bad thing is out of anyone's hands and it will now depend on your attitude as there is simply nothing anyone can do but hold on tight and just weather it out.
Jim
This elicited another response from Donna C.:
Replies ***inline
It is definitely an organized campaign but it does appear more like a 'I hate Obama' rather 'tell us the truth'.
***Then you're watching/reading people other than those involved...
The truth is that the country is in deep deep debt... It is spending far more than it has or may ever be able to fully pay. The proper way to handle in good times would be to raise taxes.
***As opposed to cutting spending?
No one wants to hear that but the voodoo economics that says tax cuts will stimulate the economy into growth is nothing more than a fantasy. I would like that fantasy land to be true also but it is not. It is now the time to face reality and it is going to be very hard. We can not longer borrow to prosperity.
***Sorry, but every time taxes are cut, revenue increases. You can call it anything you want, but no one denies the fact that revenue goes up every time taxes (particularly business taxes) go down.
Donna
...and a response to Jim L. from me:
Jim,
I'd like to take a crack at this, too.
Judging by the event I attended, this wasn't an "I hate Obama" demonstration. It was certainly an outpouring of frustration, albeit a polite one. What kinds of frustration?
1) Huge spending bills being passed without being read.
2) Huge spending bills, period.
3) Huge borrowing levels beyond anything attempted before.
4) Huge promises about "change" that amount to "Just sit back and let us handle it. We're the experts. We know better than you how to spend your money, since you can't do it responsibly."
5) One of the big ones IS about Obama: that here's a guy who didn't even complete a full term as a Senator but who now is signing into law trillions of dollars in debt and spending money like a whole battleship full of sailors. We elected him because he was a different sort of leader than Bush. But what did we get? We have really no idea other than what we've seen so far which is gobs and gobs and gobs and gobs of indiscriminate spending.
6) The stupefying idea that to get out of a recession taxes have to be raised and spending has to increase.
To say that all we can do is "hold on tight" isn't something that most people are willing to do. Trust in our leaders has eroded and the only weapons we have are protests and the ballot box. The people that went to those rallies around the country vote regularly. One way I know that is by the two informal polls that were taken during the demonstration I attended.
The first was "How many of you here are veterans or currently serving in the armed forces". I'd say that a good 15-20% of the hands went up. The second was "How many of you own a business or have ever run a business?" There were twice as many hands that went up.
I'm not saying that things are going to change overnight, though, based on what has happened since Obama took office, overnight changes are certainly possible.
As to the "very best financial minds", nah! They're the same type of minds that we've had all along. They're just taking advantage of a crisis, as Rahm Emanuel pointed out and, more recently, Secretary of State Clinton.
Regards,
Steve Erbach
"Never waste a good crisis." That could well be the thing that the Obama administration is remembered for.