Truemors
is reporting from
Member
NP Rank:
NP Rank:
The Hijacking of the U.S. Government by the Republican TEA Party
Share:
by Karen Hatter | August 1, 2011 at 10:15 am
816 views | 15 Recommendations | 24 comments
Videos
Photos
Rep. Cantor Discusses House Member Security In Light Of Recent Th
uploaded by Getty Images
The United States of America was created with three check and balance components meant to allow governing of the country through the representative process. The United States is not a true democracy; it is a republic.
The country is governed through its citizens voting for representatives that in turn vote their constituents' interests within the U.S. Congress, which is comprised of two branches, the House of Representatives and the Senate. The third component is the office of the President of the United States.
In July 2010, a House committee approved Minnesota Republican Party Representative Michele Bachmann's request to form the TEA Party Caucus. She is currently seeking her party's nomination for the office of President of the United States in 2012.
In the spring 2009, during the faux outrage over attempts to reform health care and the insurance industry, the faux outrage having been orchestrated by conservatives and the Republican Party, at townhall meetings across the nation, the nation and the world were first introduced to the TEA Party, the Right Wing of the Republican Party.
Since then, those calling themselves the TEA Party have been cultivated and organized by conservative money from those like the billionaire Koch brothers, Dick Armey, the creator of FreedomWorks, the insurance industry and other conservative corporate interests.
The TEA Party freshmen, elected into Congress in the House of Representatives in the fall of November 2010, taking office in January 2011, and those TEA Party leaning freshmen, are said to be less than 90 freshmen. They have held the United States of America hostage and caused great concern in the world's financial markets, as they pushed their Right Wing minority view of how and what should be done by the U.S. government.
The House of Representatives, one third of the United States' governing process, currently has 435 members with two vacancies, 193 Democrats and 240 Republicans. The TEA Party Caucus and TEA Party leaning freshmen, all Republican Party members, are about 20% of the entire House of Representatives and less than 50% of the Republican Party, actually 33% of the Republican Party in the House.
Yet, the Republican Party has allowed the TEA Party to dictate how and what the Republican Party would negotiate during the Republican Party generated crisis involving raising the debt ceiling.
As long as the TEA Party has assumed control of the Republican Party, the American people will continue to be held hostage, as long as the Republican Party allows the TEA Party to control their party, as the Republican TEA Party uses tyranny to force the United States government to give in to their demands while proclaiming loudly how much the TEA Party despises tyranny.
Well, it seems the TEA Party only hates tyranny if it isn't wielded BY the TEA Party.
UPDATE:
By Tuesday afternoon, August 2, 2011, both houses of the U.S. Congress, the House of Representatives and the Senate, passed legislation that tied debt reduction, a Republican Party demand, to raising of the debt ceiling, an act which normally, until this year, had been a fairly routine matter. The debt ceiling stall lasted for nearly six months and was spearheaded by Republican TEA Party activists.
On Friday evening, August 5, 2011, giving a detailed explanation for why it chose to take this action, Standard and Poor's (S&P) issued a press release that announced it had downgraded the United States of America's sovereign credit from AAA, the rating the nation has held since 1917, to AA+.
While noting Congress' recent passage of the "fiscal consolidation plan" with the support of both Democrats and Republicans, " .... falls short of what, in our view, would be necessary to stabilize the government’s medium-term debt dynamics ...." , it further explains:
.... We have changed our assumption on this because the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues, a position we believe Congress reinforced by passing the act. ....
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: The U.S. Debt Crisis Showdown
Advertisement
NowPublic on Facebook
What is NowPublic?
NowPublic lets people work together to cover news events around the world.
Crowd Power
joellerose
Orlando, Florida, United States
Karen Hatter
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
levmyshkin
Roswell, New Mexico, United States
TheCameraObscura
Los Angeles, California, United States
CJaye
Virginia Beach, Virginia, United States
RMStringer
Lake Sam Rayburn, Texas, United States
qbubbles
Fairfax, Virginia, United StatesAndrew Aliferis
United States
Getty Images
Vancouver, Canada
David-Phillips
Las Vegas, Nevada, United States
Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (24)
at 10:34 on August 1st, 2011
The Tea Party has undermines the American System of government, by working an agenda to undermine the it. They are clandestine saboteurs and American voters had better awaken quickly to this circumstance.
at 10:52 on August 1st, 2011
You are right, Jim and the TEA Party's anarchistic tendencies, has had many stating publicly that if they have to destroy America to save it, they will.
If the TEA Party is left alone to work its plan, the United States will always find itself hostage to their demands unless they are marginalized at the voting booth, by yesterday.
at 11:08 on August 1st, 2011
Tar and feathering is too good for them. I want to see them on trial.
at 15:24 on August 1st, 2011
The Tea Party is democracy in action, you fascist.
at 16:26 on August 1st, 2011
Being representative of less than 20% of the voting population while holding the United States hostage to their demands is NOT " .... democracy in action".
at 18:40 on August 1st, 2011
Mad Hatter, How do you know what "percentage of the population" supports the Tea Party's attempts to uphold the Bill of Rights and US Constitution that have been systematically undermined and trashed by both parties for the last sixty years? You haven't a clue nor does anyone, lying pollsters notwithstanding. Statistics are pulled out of the air. The Tea Party represents the outrage of the little people against the do-nothing clowns in Congress and the totalitarians in the burgeoning Domestic Gestapo. My advice is to take a few airplane trips and get your brains and reproductive organs fried some more. Or maybe you can end up being a total body pin-up on some gate-groper's wall.
at 18:54 on August 1st, 2011
As I explained above, PRRA (not verified), America is a representative government. The TEA Party and TEA Party leaning members, as configured in the House of Representatives, represent 20% of the electorate that voted representatives into office in the House.
The evidence of the Republican TEA Party's hijack of the government has nothing to do with " .... lying pollsters." This calculation can be deduced by using basic arithmetic.
at 12:57 on August 1st, 2011
While it is blatantly obvious that a minority of the Republican Party has hijacked the democratic process, the President and the Democrats have proven that foolish thinking and that Republicans would negotiate in good faith was never in the equation. At every step in the process, conciliation and meeting unreasonable demands were seen as a sign of weakness and were exploited to the fullest. I supported this President in the election, and am hard pressed to see why I should support him going forward. The progressive/liberal base of the party has been marganilized throughout the process of governing since day one. I don't want to hear that the alternative is the reason for support. At this point I think it might be best to let the lunatics take control. I would much rather see the process implode the system immediatly that watch this painful death by a thousand cuts. Get it over with already. These sociopaths will not stop until the system is completly destroyed. Maybe then we'll wake up the rest of the citizenry that is taken in by this madness.
at 13:26 on August 1st, 2011
Nanute, it is difficult to envision any scenario where the Democratic Party or President Obama could have crafted a strategy to deal with this usurping of the American people's will by this extremely unbalanced faction within the government.
The Republican Party and their Right Wing, the TEA Party, have continually claimed that the TEA Party's thrust into office was a mandate from the American people but, given the ratio they represent, theirs should be a minority influence. There was no mandate where the MAJORITY of Americans voted for them.
It was the responsibility of the Republican Party to rein in its Right Wing before all of this reached critical mass, for the so called good of the country but, due to the GOP's misguided calculation that the anarchistic TEA Party IS their future, the Republican Party placates to them and I fear they may continue to do so.
The Republican Party has, for the past two years, declared over and over that the TEA Party or TEA Party leaning people are the base of their party.
The game of chicken, orchestrated by the Republican Party each time it caved to TEA Party demands, left the Democratic Party and the President no where to go. The TEA Party had already declared they were willing to let the debt ceiling pass, weren't worried about what may or not get paid by the U.S., just pick and choose and prioritize, ".... like you do at home at the kitchen table", one of the stupidest things I've ever heard.
Some even said they didn't care if the country had to be destroyed to allow them to rebuild it, according to THEIR beliefs, of what the founding fathers had meant the country to be.
What's the move in that situation? See if the crazies really will do as they say they will? I think the TEA Party has proven they may be as crazy as most people think them to be.
at 13:54 on August 1st, 2011
I'm sorry Karen. I think we're going to have to agree to disagree here; respectfully. You don't negotiate with hostage takers. Isn't that what Republican's always have argued? The 14th Amendment option was taken off the table, as was the idea of minting of coins in very large denominations. Granted, these are extreme and untested measures. Then again, when you have a weak hand, you better have a few wild cards up your sleeve. If the President would have stated very clearly that if forced, he would pay the debts with or without the Congress, and stated his case to the public, he would have at least been given credit for taking a hard line stand. He is now being percieved as weak, ineffective and easy to manipulate. He caved during the extension of the tax cuts, when he could have made the debt ceiling extenstion part of that debate. Didn't consider it, and the result is what we witnessed today. I'm starting to believe that he really is more conservative in his outlook than we were led to believe. Watch and see what happens in the coming months with regard to SSI and Medicare. If he moves in the direction of making cuts to these programs, my suspicion will be justified. Maybe I am just so totally pissed off right now, that I'm missing something. I sure hope so for the sake of the middle class and the future of the country.
at 14:57 on August 1st, 2011
No negotiations with hostage takers is the Republicans' mantra, Nanute but, I'm not sure if there hadn't been negotiations with this PARTICULAR group of kidnappers, they wouldn't have killed the hostage, for their principled beliefs.
But, have no fear, Nanute! There still may be time to pass on the hostage takers' next double down move, which may come later this evening. So far, all of the TEA Party congressmen I've heard are saying they are against this latest deal.
The Democratic Progressive Caucus, which is considered the Left Wing of the Democratic Party, which numbers at 74, seems to be the largest force against the plan on the Democratic side of the equation. Although, it is unclear whether they will vote no as a block.
So, for the sake of this discussion, let's assume they vote as a block against the latest deal and Minority Leader Pelosi is able to whip the rest of the Democrats into yes votes, that's 119 Democratic votes. That means that the Republicans must deliver a minimum of 97 of the 216 that will be required for the solution to pass.
So, we have to wait and see if Speaker Boehner can deliver 97 votes from among the 240 they have in the House, well, let's say, from among 150 Republican members, if it is assumed that the nearly 90 members of the TEA Party Right Wing will vote against it.
at 18:49 on August 1st, 2011
"Hostage-takers." What hyperbolic blarney. You want hostages? I'll tell about hostages -- our Secret Government takes domestic hostages as victims of the US Surveillance State's official Gangstalking and Torture Nationwide Network. Now THOSE are hostages. If the Tea Party members knew about the extent of this secret prison/weapon system, they'd be even more enraged at what has been done to the republic under the pseudo-excuse of defending it.
at 15:25 on August 1st, 2011
Dems and Repubs are IRRELEVANT. The Military Industrial Oligarchy of Oilmen, Bankers, Spooks and Generals run the country. The party circus is just that -- a circus on a par with Dancing with the Stars. It keeps the plebes occupied and looking in another direction while the Thugocracy steals the tax money and uses the army to keep control of their theft.
at 13:30 on August 1st, 2011
Great article Karen !
This was the perfect storm..President Obama's election combined with huge debt left by a (republican) housing, financial, and a banking crisis. Unpaid large scale military actions. An (immuture) political extreme movement (Tea Party) combined with religious right wing elements. Plus two plus years now of missteps by the Obama Administration and democrat policy, all coming to a crescendo in this debt ceiling budget battle being politically fought on Capital Hill today !
at 13:43 on August 1st, 2011
Thanks, 1.
As I wrote above, what is most disturbing about this current hostage situation is that the TEA Party is NOT representative of the majority of the American voters so, blame MUST be lain firmly at the feet of the Republican Party for playing 'Kick the football, Charlie Brown!' , at the expense of the American people. Their goal is to win at any cost.
I honestly don't buy the story being pushed by most of the media that the GOP was somehow forced into the positions they have taken.
The TEA Party, as the Right Wing of the Republican Party, has corrupted the Republican Party and the GOP's actions have proven they are as extremist as the extreme wing OF their party.
The Republican Party's actions are moves of desperation as they find themselves isolated within American society, and as a party, on the wrong side of mostly all social issues so, this is to whom they are now beholden, to its most extreme faction which has proven to be ungovernable BY the leadership OF the Republican Party.
at 13:47 on August 1st, 2011
Lets hope then that however this turns out now, the Republican party and Tea Party members are given a strong rebuttal by the general population in the next national elections.
at 13:51 on August 1st, 2011
1, it's gonna take more than hoping, the electorate has to organize to get it done at the ballot box.
at 15:27 on August 1st, 2011
Look, Pippi, Deluded cybernazis conversing with each other. A circular firing squad.
at 17:42 on August 1st, 2011
By saying "hijacked" you mean that people actually VOTED for these Tea Party members, and they are actually faithfully REPRESENTING their constituents. The horror!
at 18:28 on August 1st, 2011
No, scottie_vox, by hijacked I mean that in a representative government, with the TEA Party representing 20% of the voters that voted in the election, they held the will of the MAJORITY of those voters that did NOT vote for the TEA Party, who are NOT represented by the TEA Party, hostage to the TEA Party minority's demands.
at 18:48 on August 1st, 2011
I heard it was 90 percent representation, not 20 percent. I get my statistics the same place you get yours -- out of thin air.
at 19:03 on August 1st, 2011
It seems it has been difficult for some like yourself, CA (not verified), to follow the calculations but, if the TEA Party freshmen, as identified, are approximately 90, I believe the actual number is 87 but, I rounded up and the House of Representatives has 435 members, the percentage of voters represented BY the TEA Party in the House is 20%.
at 21:08 on August 1st, 2011
at 03:39 on August 2nd, 2011
tnij.org/dickinjustinbieber