Ok, it might be a good time to remember why we’re here...
We are here, because a strange small Idea took hold of the imagination of some British colonists, and that idea, grew…..
That’s basically it… WE are here because of that.
It was an idea novel in its time, but ancient in it concept… It was the belief that men, if given the chance, … could, and would, govern themselves responsibly….
It started very small. It challenged God, king, and common sense. Kings always controlled their countries……
It survived a war… a war to squelch that notion that man could govern himself… Even after winning the war, it struggled as problems, long anticipated by that philosophy’s detractors, threatened to tear that idea apart…
A conference was held where that idea was given form and substance, and became our Constitution..
Many men, and women, have died for that idea. As each of us celebrates our weekend of this Fourth of July, a quick prayer over dinner for those across the world, right now, representing the reality, that this idea is worth dying for…. would be appropriate.
There is a modern parallel to this story.
Those of us in government, tend to look out our windows at those protesting our ways outside, as nothing more than idiots…. We do, and we can’t help it… It is deeply rooted in our psychology; we work so hard and long for what is right…. that if you disagree, you MUST be wrong…. You basically have to replace me, to put your agenda into place…
We call those elections… Problematic as they are, they are a lot less intrusive into our daily activities than insurrections and wars would be… But nevertheless, an election pits one idea against the other, and the audience (in this case the voters) listens to both, and picks the winner…..
There are some similarities between Tea baggers and America’s first revolutionaries. One, they resent the taking of their money, and having it being used for someone else that is totally foreign to them…
Why should Joe the Plumber have his money support a family in Wilmington Delaware?
Those of us who think we are on the right track, need to answer that question… not bad mouth the Tea Parties and their members… That was the mistake made by Great Britain.
In fact, after they imposed the Stamp Act, and it sparked the Rebellion, they repealed every single imposed tax upon it save one… tea.
It is ironical, if not serendipitous, that these groups who oppose the current trends of the United States of America, take their name from the one, tiny tax left out of all the rest… It is almost as if they want to say, “we want to do away with all taxes.”
Who wouldn’t? Don’t even try to tell me there are some moments leading up to April 15th where you don’t sigh, and wish you could keep all that money for yourself?
But’s lets play along for a minute. How much would it cost you if you had NO taxes? There would be no health insurance. You would pay every price out of pocket. There would be no unemployment insurance. You’re retired? Enjoy living off what you’ve saved up….Getting to and from work? Figure what tolls would cost at 34 cents per mile. That is how our state’s toll cost averages out per Delaware mile… It would cost you $1500 if you drove 15.4 miles a day over a normal workweek. Did you pay more than $1500 to the State of Delaware? Well, if you didn’t, having no taxes just on that one item alone, would cost you more than what you pay in taxes…
It is not about how much taxes you are paying…. It is all about how much money you are keeping for yourself… from everyone… Where the government can do things cheaper, like single payer health care… it should… Where private business can do things cheaper, like sell booze, they should…
Compelling evidence shows that people have more extra money to spend, when Democrats are running the country. Clinton showed real job growth. Bush had no real job growth over his full 8 year term…..
If taxes were up, other costs were way down to compensate for it…
Hard to believe that during the Oil Oval Office reign, we were paying $4.60 per gallon of gas.. Now, we are paying $2.60.. If you drove 25,000 miles that year. average 20 miles/gallon, you paid during the Republican administration, $2,500 more each year….than you do today under a competent Democratic leadership… Were your tax savings $2,500? No? Then you lost out…
Taxes are not the issue… How much of your money you have to spend on yourself, IS the issue…
Which is why, the tea parties are not a throwback to our founding fathers, They had eight years to try out their theories. Their theories are messed up…
No, our Tea Baggers are more like the Royalists in the war of 1812…. Long proven wrong, thirty years too late, with a limited arsenal, they still forced America to undergo a war that accomplished nothing… except make a hero out of Andrew Jackson, whose election finally wiped the Federalist philosophy away forever… well, at least until the election of 2000…
America began with an idea that was crazy and grew to save our nation… Tea Baggers capitalize on this revolutionary fervor, and sell their ideas as saving the nation, but as we look at what they are saying, they are just plain crazy.
Cut taxes and cost me way more money? I don’t think so……
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June 30, 2010 at 11:57 am
Liberalgeek
Nice piece. One criticism, though. The $1 per citizen per mile of road, is that construction of the road? Because once you pay that $1, it is built, unless you are also working in the number of miles driven by Delawareans. So the calculation is (cost of roads) / (miles of road) / (total number of miles driven per year) / (number of drivers) / (365 days in a year).
Convoluted, but it will give you the cost per driver per day, I think…
June 30, 2010 at 4:22 pm
awain69
(I put this comment on “Inside Joke” which was NOT the article I wanted to comment on, so am reposting my comment to THIS article
I really like the views on your site, even from the opposing team. Just finished up reading the Colin Powell article.
I have found, to my chagrin, that you can present all the logical arguments you want with evidence to anyone these days who is Republican, and they will deny, deny, deny until the sun falls down and the rivers dry up. To them, it’s morally wrong to be any other religion than a Christian, only white people can run the country, and heck, if YOUR white guy screws up, then blame the black guy the first day he’s in office. It is too much like the Jim Crow south which should teach us that racism was never dead, just sublimated until the Republican Party gave those tensions a “legitimized” voice.
I do not think all Republicans are wrong or bad, just a lot of good people who don’t do their research, or if they do, they research FOXNews and 10 ten minute soundbytes or listen to AM radio, and think they have the truth. The truth is, we will NEVER know everything that goes on in government because so many things happen to create a situation we can never know everything behind the scenes. When the American people got lackadaisical about voting, when civics courses were largely taken out of the high school, the people effectively have treated the government as a separate entity from the people–no matter what party one is affiliated with, this is never a good idea.
Because the truth is not black and white as so many Republicans believe, there is no sense in reasoning with them, although I think it’s better to keep trying to figure out how these people think than to give up on them entirely. The Republicans used to be the party of Big Business, and still is, except Big Business and the Party figured out that if you got the religious people behind you you could win elections. Republicans do not care about the common man, no matter how much they profess to. Now, this party used to be a whole lot more honest with itself and others, and let’s not forget the things Republicans today whine about the most, their own party actually did. For instance:
Theodore Roosevelt created the national parks. He invoked the Antiquities Act hundreds of times to save the American wilderness. He created the Grand Canyon National Park, Yosemite National Park, and hundreds of other smaller reserves–the same reserves that the “new” Republicans want to “drill baby drill” on. And to top it all off, the “new” Republicans of today call Democrats treehugging liberals for wanting to keep Big Oil out of our national parks. It was a Republican who created the national parks system, and seriously, not one Republican today could hold a candle to Theodore Roosevelt. If he were alive today, he would be branded “liberal scum” by Rush Limbaugh, and of course we all know that whatever Rush says, no matter how inappropriate, is locked in the minds of his followers forever.
Richard Nixon was responsible for the largest federal appropriation to the school lunch program in American history. School lunch used to be a privatized concern, but Republicans AND Democrats got together in the 30′s and decided because of the Depression the government oughta run the program for every American child to get at least one decent meal a day when most of the country was out of work.
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Republican, was responsible for the interstate freeway system. when he signed the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956, appropriating 25 BILLION dollars to build the interstate freeway system faster. The same “new” Republicans who whine about big government and don’t want to pay taxes forget their own history or are ignorant about it. If Republicans were really concerned about Social Security or any of those things, they would have gotten rid of them in the last 80 or so years since that was created. To the “new” Republicans, paying taxes is not “American” because they are the ones who want to keep their money because Republicans again, are for Big Business, not the common man. They took people’s outrage over taxes and melded into the party platform because they knew nobody likes paying taxes. Reasonable people who remember Eisenhower understand that paying taxes is a necessary evil in this day and age, and pays for things that all of us use every day.
That’s what’s so funny. Their own party instituted the same “socialist” agenda the “new” Republicans find so “unAmerican” today. To me, who used to be a Republican until Bush Jr. got in, what has happened to this party is a national shame. It is no wonder Republicanism appeals to the South who is still angry about getting their asses kicked in the Civil War and about getting their asses kicked over Civil Rights. The same people who live in the South today are no doubt indoctrinated about the idea of sovereignty of the state at the same time they wish to separate from the Union. Is secession American? If they don’t like this country that my dad went to Vietnam for, if they don’t want to respect the President and criticize the President without all the racial epithets (criticism can be respectful), then as far as I’m concerned, I’d love to see them secede and try to make it without the funding they get from the federal government and the blue states which keeps their states functioning (http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2004/09/red_states_feed.html) The same “new” Republicans who whine about welfare are still cashing their checks every month, getting federal commodities and expecting the government to save them from oil spills and hurricanes.
And they don’t want big government? Bullshit. They just want to be holier than thou because they belong to “God’s Party.” What the hell ever. Now, having said this, I am with Voltaire when he says “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” I may not like this new Republican party, but they have a right to exist and a right to say anything they like as we have freedom of speech in this country. However, we need to keep pushing back on the things that are said that are just plain racist, mean spirited and just plain wrong.
I don’t even discuss politics anymore on Facebook or social networking sites, even with my friends, because every Republican I have ever come across can only argue if they are calling the President names, or calling me names, or arguing in circles. If I present evidence that clearly shows they have been misled by whoever they are listening to on FOXNews and AM radio, they simply repeat the Big Lies they’ve been told over and over. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life, and frankly, when you can’t reason with the opposing side, show evidence, and have a conversation in this country anymore about politics, then I think we should begin to fear for our freedoms.
My dad didn’t go to Vietnam on two tours just so he could be told years later that he is a filthy communist Democrat. Which is what he has been called by Republicans he knows. there comes a time when reasonable people have to draw a line between facts and personal attacks. By the way, my dad kicked their asses, who said that to him, and I’ll kick anybody’s ass who calls me a red commie for being a Democrat. Particularly when a lot of the so called “socialist” stuff these new Republicans go on about their own party came up with.
Most Republicans I have talked with don’t know the difference between a socialist and a communist anyway, but use the terms interchangeably. If you are benefitting from the freeway system, the post office, the public schools, Social Security and paying taxes for national parks, then that means everybody in the nation is a “socialist,” and those on the right who are paying those taxes need to shut the hell up.
June 30, 2010 at 4:40 pm
awain69
PS–I pick on the South because nearly all of the current Republican representatives in Congress are from the South, Rush Limbaugh is from the South, and of course, the governor of Texas wanted to secede from the Union, Tom DeLay tried to create a permanent Republican majority in Texas and the federal government and he is, of course, from Texas, AND I have some Southern acquaintances who still go on about the federal government trampling all over “states rights” during the Civil War. Yet they still expect the federal government to give them everything they want–they just want to be the ones in power.
July 1, 2010 at 10:51 am
mike w.
Awain – And now it’s those on the left (like Kavips) who are crying about how States have the “right” to violate the Constitution.
July 1, 2010 at 11:01 am
Liberalgeek
And Mike, it is people like you that keep posting comments on threads that have been dead for 3 months. Seriously, let it go.
July 1, 2010 at 9:48 pm
kavips
awain 69
you are somewhat correct in your assumption.. The descriptions you give are very familiar to us… However, they are not conclusive. There are some republicans out there who deeply care about this nation, so much that they voted Democratic this past election because they knew their candidate would not be able to bring America up from its knees…
They comment here, instead of on their own blogs, for the very reasons you mention..
Now I enjoy having them for this reason… I am not able to cover every aspect of every topic myself… Their perspective, often sharpens what little wisdom happens here, into something that is better than I could produce myself…
So I reiterate, for the hope that Republicans will hear it, that the Republicans who love this nation, need to walk away from that party. I know the Democrats and don’t think my Republican friends would fit in, and having only one party, would certainly make things boring, and dangerous…
There is nothing wrong with republicans in general… They need a mutiny. There is something very wrong at the top of that party… Very wrong.
So, whether I agree with your complete (and very good) assessment of Republicans, depends………. upon which Republicans we are talking about… The Limbaugh Republicans? or for want of a better word… wait… no, I’ll change it….. the Bush Republicans…. Bush 1, that is… Those thoughtful Republicans need to take back their party from the goosesteppers…
July 1, 2010 at 9:57 pm
kavips
Well not to disagree with the distinguished Liberalgeek……
But anyone is welcome to comment on my posts at anytime… 3 months, 6 months, 24 months, or come November….48 months….
On this blog, posts are not set in time; they are meant to record, document, and preserve time…. my posts are meant to last eternally, for as long as electricity fills the web….
lol.
July 1, 2010 at 10:39 pm
kavips
1) Average mile driven per year… 15,000
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Average_miles_a_car_is_driven_per_year
2) Number of drivers per state…. 585,138
http://www.statemaster.com/graph/trn_lic_dri_tot_num-transportation-licensed-drivers-total-number
3) Estimated bill for Resources in 2010…. $ 585,867.000
http://deldot.gov/information/pubs_forms/bond_bill/2006/pdf/fy_2006_bb_presentation_042504.pdf
Calculations….. pending…
________________________________________________
Answer: .0667 dollars per mile… or rounded up to 7 cents spent for every mile driven…
factors not included… how many of those 15,000 miles were driven out of state… For the $1 to be accurate, the average Delawarean would need to drive 1000 miles in the state of Delaware per year… Considering that there are 260 working days a year, if one’s commute was around, 3.8 miles a day, or 1.9 each way; a person doing this, would spend $1 per mile of Deldot’s money.
On the other hand… …. The Delaware Turnpike charges $4.00 for 11.2 miles of road, making it the most expensive toll road in America…. That averages out to 35.6 cents a mile….. or roughly 3 miles to a dollar.
I will change my post now to match this new data… Thanks for getting me started on this…
I’d never heard of the Pike Creek Freeway before….. So THAT’s WHY Exit 1 is 896, and the next exit is…. Exit 3 at 273….. :O
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delaware_Turnpike
July 1, 2010 at 10:51 pm
kavips
If every Delaware road were to charge a toll at the same rate of the Delaware Turnpike, ( .34 cents per mile) then a driver who was at the average (15,000 miles per year) , could be expected to pay $5100 a year in tolls, if all his driving was in Delaware….
Proof again that taxes save us money…..
July 4, 2010 at 2:05 am
kavips
Mike w.
YOU should do two things. 1) define hypocrisy and bigotry. 2) show the exact passages where it’s so.
Who knows? If your definition is narrow enough, it may be right. But, with your reputation, it can be counted on that no one will believe it, until you show a tiny piece of proof.
Till then you don’t need to be wasting my reader’s time.
July 8, 2010 at 10:42 am
mike w.
Have you gone a little loony Kavips? I don’t see any discussion of those terms here? You are responding to comments that don’t exist.
July 8, 2010 at 4:59 pm
kavips
Nothing wrong with going a little looney. It helps keep things sane around here.
July 18, 2010 at 12:55 pm
Mike W.
Btw kavips, your post is all the “proof” I need.
I’m ashamed you live in my state, and if you’d been dumb enough to direct the post in question at me I would make sure you were brought up on charges.
July 27, 2010 at 11:59 am
kavips
Mike W is a fool and not worth wasting time rebutting… Nothing he says makes sense, and he cannot back any charges he makes with facts…
I leave him on here so his stupidity will be on exhibit for eternity, or as long as there is electricity, … which ever comes first…