“• 52% of Tea Party supporters believe the amount they pay in taxes is fair.
• The majority of the Tea Party believes that Social Security and Medicare are worth the cost to taxpayers.
• The majority support the amount of money spent by the federal government on defense.” (CBS News)
That’s some scary jank. What options do libertarians have?
I think Dr. Paul’s primary opponents are going to win by saying they’re going to do what he would do, and then not do it. It’s like Sean Hannity saying he agrees with Dr. Paul 100% on matters other than “national security”, but all he sincerely cares about is “national security”. He’s fine with the welfare state as long as the warfare state is bundled with it and he’d rather have the welfare-warfare state than a minimal state.
I see no hope for the world. I can’t personally believe so many people like living like this.
The Tea Party was built on sand; it’s not surprising that it’s falling apart. They have only vague desires to return to founding principles, faith, honor, and limited government. Most of them have no idea where they want to go, they just know that Obama is bad, more spending it bad, and that things were better in the past.
The sad part is they think that this election is really changing things. Republicans get congress and a few of them are even Tea party people (Rand, O’Donnell, etc), the country is still on track for depression, inflation, or both. We’re still bombing the crap out of the Middle East, so Muslims are still going to keep attacking us.
Look at this recent FreedomFest Panel. Most of the panelists are run of the mill Tea Party people; they think that this current election is going to change everything. Tom Woods is the only voice of sanity, pointing out that things won’t change and these are the same Republicans that have screwed us over for a decade.
Everything about this election that the Tea Party people have so much misplaced hope in was summed up on a conservative talk show that I heard on my drive to school, Laura Ingrahm to be exact. She was interviewing a Tea Party approved Congressional candidate from Wisconson and he went on and on about how the government is too big, too much money is being spent, yada yada yada… Laura asked him specifics about what he would like to see done with Social Security, Medicare, etc… He beat around the bush and never gave a valid answer opting to only say “well as much trouble as Social Security is in we have to keep our promise…” Surprisingly Laura held is feet to the fire and he still would not give a direct answer. The only specific he gave was that he would work to repeal Obamacare. Good luck with that! Of course defense spending was never even brought up so that’s another one there