Thoughts on the Tea Party Movement

Today, in America, political passion is on the right.

There is a frequently quoted statement I have heard attributed to various people: Churchill, Alain; that goes something like this: "If you are young and not politically on the left, it's a sign that you lack passion. If you are old and not on the right, it's a sign that you lack common sense." The same notion was expressed in my family in the 60s when we spoke of bleeding heart liberals. The implication was that the social agenda pushed by the left was driven by lofty ideals, but was not realistic. The notion of the right was that it was cautions and careful not to upset the status quo. It sought to ally itself with the economic elites.

Throughout the 19th century and until recently, the left was animated by a passionate party of writers and political activists: socialists, communists, liberationists, labor leaders, intellectuals, who were driven by what they perceived as social injustice. They were a liability to the mainstream democratic party, putting forward candidates too far to the left to be elected, requiring that the national debate be focused on their issues. But they brought out the vote on election night and they moved the political center in their direction.

Today, this passion has moved to the right and is being expressed by the Tea Party movement.

The ideals of the Tea Party are straight from the heart: patriotism, commitment to the constitution, free enterprise, economic freedom.

Their lofty ideals are, unfortunately, seriously disconnected from the central issues of our time.

Their assertion that the recent healthcare bill constitutes a step toward socialized medicine is ludicrous. A poor bill, certainly, but not a socialistic one in any way. A socialist bill would have nationalized the insurance industry. This bill subsidizes the insurance industry and requires citizens to do business with it. It's based on an alliance between the government and corporations. The same alliance which has been one of the pillars of the Republican party since the 1880s. Anybody with a socialistic fiber in their political make-up can only be furious at this bill. It's a sign of the times that the left-wing disappointment with this bill is not even being heard.

The Tea Party people are angry at the deficit and government spending, but, here again, their analysis fails to understand the problem. The government has run the deficit up by bailing out the pillars of advanced capitalism: the Wall Street investment banks. This is not the result of a mysterious left-wing agenda. Any person with affection for socialism knows that these super banks should have been nationalized and broken up into something small enough to fail. But once again, the left wing perspective and the passion that drove it is absent from the conversation.

Where is the common sense of the old right? It now belongs to the Democratic party of Clinton and Obama. They have been cautious and careful not to upset the status quo. They have allied themselves with the economic elites. Like Clinton, Obama gives only lip service to the social causes that once drove the left.