Overweight Federal Deficits call for Tea Party Personal Responsibility

Published by clickbroker.blogspot.com.

Watching former VP candidate Sara Palin’s address to the Tea Party Nation Convention Saturday night it was clear to me that the attendees were just as confused as I am. Aside from a few meager applauses most of the audience appeared to sleeping.

Dynamic Palin is not. For a reported $100K plus speech I expected a much better performance from the new Fox News (NWS) star. Palin had a little trouble with her facts on the underwear bomber and no ideas on how to lower federal spending or reform health insurance. Surely Palin could have paid for a better team of writers. Fox News President Rodger Ailes is not managing his latest asset very well.

I am sure the original Tea Party Patriots regret not having trademarked their name before it was hijacked by Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks Foundation for the Tea Party Express bus tour and the profit making Tea Party Nation Convention. In the grand finale of the convention Palin was supposed to define for the world the sense of purpose of the Tea Party movement.

Palin failed miserably. Tea Party Express is corporate funded and has only the interest of big business. Tea Party Nation is just trying to make a buck. And Palin told the world that movement should have no top down leadership and just be assimilated into the Republican Party. The only guiding principles are God, country and opposition to big government.

The opposition to big government, big taxes and big deficits only works when the opposition has the luxury of not having to govern. The truth is that the majority of government spending is for Social Security and Medicare entitlement programs. Everyone knows that under the “unified budget” the associated trust funds are just a wet dream. All FICA and Medicare taxes are comingled with the general fund as a practical matter.

So without addressing either Social Security or Medicare, all the Tea Party talk is meaningless. At this point the movement only serves the grassroots arch enemies on Wall Street by stopping any meaningful regulatory reform. Talk about tyranny.

But the hope for the movement lies in applying the personal responsibility they advocate for others to themselves. C-SPAN broadcasted the convention beyond Palin’s speech covered on cable news. It gave me a view into how serious the attendees took their personal responsibilities to conserve precious healthcare dollars. Virtually everyone in the audiences and most of the panel speakers were overweight or otherwise decrepit looking. It goes without saying that movement appears to consist primarily of senior citizens.

Now let’s look at the brand builders supporting the movement: Fox New President and former Reagan and Bush, Sr. political strategist Rodger Ailes, talk show host Rush Limbaugh, weekly Wall Street Journal columnist and former Bush Jr. political strategist Karl Rove, and former House Majority Leader Dick Armey. Not a Charles Atlas amongst these political heavyweights. As Karl Rove is fond of saying, politicians must protect their base and these gentlemen are ready for many seasons of hibernation.

So now it is time for the grassroots to free themselves from the shackles of the corporate takeover of their movement; including the burden of shielding Bank of America (BAC), Citigroup (C) and JP Morgan (JPM) from evil consumer protection. The moment has arrived to embraced John F. Kennedy’s “Ask Not” speech. Indeed, what sacrifices can the Tea Baggers themselves make for their country?

Given that most Tea Baggers are too old to join the military, they cannot heed Palin’s call for patriotism. But they can use as few government services as possible and convince their friends to drop Medicare Advantage which costs the government far more than standard Medicare. They can become vegetarians and start exercising. They can question the need to take statins when they haven’t had any cardiac events.

Every American on the dole, including all seniors, has a responsibility to save the government money. They should weigh every elective hip and knee replacement against the good of country. JFK would. I go so far as to say every ice cream cone and doughnut should be weighed on the cost of diabetes to Medicare.

Palin had the opportunity to define personal responsibility, but instead chose to pander to her audience. Saying the movement should have no leadership is a copout. The grassroots needs to understand that Ailes, Armey, Limbaugh, Palin and Rove are all in the business of brand building and profiteering. None of these people care about the good of the country, but apparently the grassroots doesn’t either.

True patriots would give up their Social Security and Medicare, but I don’t expect that. Just a little more green tea and a few less doughnuts!

Disclosure: Author is long BAC and C.

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