Glenn Reynolds: What I Saw at the Tea Party Convention

The godfather of the blogosphere, Glenn Reynolds (aka Instapundit), has penned an interesting piece on what he observed at Tea Party convention in Nashville for the Wall Street Journal. The article has been buzzing all throughout the blogosphere. Here are some highlights:

"There were promises of transparency and of a new kind of collaborative politics where establishment figures listened to ordinary Americans. We were going to see net spending cuts, tax cuts for nearly all Americans, an end to earmarks, legislation posted online for the public to review before it is signed into law, and a line-by-line review of the federal budget to remove wasteful programs.

These weren't the tea-party platforms I heard discussed in Nashville last weekend. They were the campaign promises of Barack Obama in 2008.

Mr. Obama made those promises because the ideas they represented were popular with average Americans. So popular, it turns out, that average Americans are organizing themselves in pursuit of the kind of good government Mr. Obama promised, but has not delivered. And that, in a nutshell, was the feel of the National Tea Party Convention. The political elites have failed, and citizens are stepping in to pick up the slack." 

That's just a taste of the rather insightful and candid article. The werewolf has only written briefly about the Tea Party movement as he is still trying to get his paws around what it really means. The roots can be traced back to the nascent days of the Obama administration during Rick Santelli's famous live rant from the Chicago Mercantile Exchange almost a year ago. The ideas driving the Tea Party have played a huge role in the recent GOP victories in Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Virginia. However, it seems the criteria for being a Tea Partier have little to do with traditional conservative causes around social issues or foreign policy and there is no official litmus test for membership. The tired template of rabid right-wing populist extremism that certain media outlets are pimping is poor analysis at best or bigoted bias at worse. Skepticism of an ever-expansive government apparatus seems to be the primary driver. Reynolds offers a great road map to a better understanding of the Tea Party phenomena, but the the werewolf is still unsure how to measure to scope and scale of the Tea Party movement as a new dimension on the American political landscape. It'll be a treat to watch and analyze. 

Substance versus Style

Michael Barone, the political virtuoso and author of The Almanac of American Politics, has a interesting article contrasting substance versus style as it pertains to current state of American politics. It begs some interesting questions in light of recent revelations pursuant to Obama's governance style. His rhetorical talent and ability to leverage his lack of a record and experience clearly helped him clear the hurdles to victory in 2008. However, the great gamble on Obama was betting that his style would eventually translate into substance. Given the opaque and shady heath care reform process, the blatant buy-off by the unions, the punitive tax proposals, the abandonment of the gays, and the increasing government encroachment in the private sector, Obama's actions scream to the lack of substance being derive from his style. At his best, he's another empty suit parroting yesterday's failed liberalism, and the longer his style is adrift and doesn't jive with the substance it allegedly pimps, the quicker his brand will erode.

This brings us to a second point, the tea party movement. Barone hits the nail on his head with regard to the fact that the so called intelligentsia has long ceased to generate new ideas. It's as if they grew content with John Maynard Keynes and yesterday's failed notions of high liberalism, like LBJ's "great society." Throwing a new coat of paint on a rusty old jalopy, doesn't change the fact that the car in question is still archaic and out-dated. The werewolf doesn't like it when someone pisses on his leg and tells him that it is raining outside. This is the vibe he gets from the ideas that drive modern liberalism, and it scares him because of the monopoly they hold on political power at the moment. (This observation doesn't bestow automatic regard or credit to the Republicans, they to, have grown lazy and complacent) This is also what is fascinating about the tea parties. They are clearly a third rail that has formed in the modern political scene. They may have common cause with the Republicans in some elections, but they are hardly reflective of mainstream GOP thinking or establishment ideals. In fact, the werewolf's friends in the RNC are very concerned about the tea parties. However, the idea that average Americans, provincial to their very core, are the new leaders when it comes to forward-thinking and idea generation is worthy. The werewolf doesn't identify with the tea-parties that much, but he does identify with an anti-incumbency, anti-status quo, movement that prioritizes substance over style. That is what make the tea parties such an interesting phenomenon.