AN incomplete survey of newspaper accounts and organizer estimates pegged this week’s Tea Party protest population at a minimum of 250,000. If we use the crowd-counting math of left-wing activists, we can call it the Million Taxpayer March.
To George Soros-funded grievance professionals, 250,000 is an insignificant number. But unlike recent anti-war and pro-illegal-immigration rallies padded with union workers, college students and homeless people, the Tax Day Tea Party demonstrations featured small-business owners, working taxpayers and families.
A quarter-million people took time off in the middle of the workweek to raise their voices against reckless taxing and bipartisan spending.
Multimillionaire jetsetter Nancy Pelosi scoffed that the Tea Party movement was nothing more than “Astroturf” politics. Rep. Jan Schakowsky called the peaceable assemblies “despicable.” Others grumbled that activists only showed up where Fox News cameras were.
But tens of thousands more came out in rain, snow and cold — in Bozeman, Mont.; Eau Claire, Wis.; White Plains, NY; Bend, Ore.; Lansing, Mich.; Hilo, Hawaii; Nashville, Tenn., and everywhere in between — with no media personalities or celebrities in sight.
Even more significant: The protesters were as vocal in their criticism of Republicans as of Democrats.
In Salt Lake City, Utah, a crowd of 2,000 repeatedly booed GOP Sens. Orrin Hatch and Bob Bennett, who both supported the $700 billion TARP bailout, and protested GOP Gov. Jon Huntsman’s decision to accept $1.6 billion in porky stimulus funds.
In Sacramento, Tea Party organizer Mark Meckler singled out California GOP Chair Ron Nehring for waffling on proposed $16 billion tax hikes. The crowd of 5,000 greeted Nehring — who tried to hitch his wagon to the Tea Party movement — with a roar of boos and catcalls. Speaker after speaker lambasted GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for abandoning fiscal-conservative principles. The loudest chant of the day: “Throw them out.”
Other Tea Party participants pointed out that Newt Gingrich, who jumped aboard the bandwagon, flip-flopped on TARP in the space of a week last September and made common cause with Al Gore and Nancy Pelosi in ads calling for immediate action on “climate change.”
Before the grassroots Tea Party movement took them by surprise, Beltway GOP strategists argued fervently that the party’s traditional focus on taxes and spending had become outdated. The re-branders pitched their own expansive ideas to replace the anti-tax-and-spend agenda and inspire new voters. These included Gingrich’s “green conservatism,” David Frum’s proposal to raise carbon taxes and open-borders Republicans’ plans for alternative forms of amnesty.
Newsflash: Eco-zealotry and tuition discounts for illegals didn’t bring out thousands of first-time activists. Stay-at-home moms weren’t up all night making signs that read “Tax me more, please!”
What resonated on Tax Day were nonpartisan calls to roll back pork, hold the line on taxing and spending, end the endless government bailouts and stop the congressional steamrollers that have pushed through mountains of legislation without deliberation.
While the GOP public-relations peddlers search for the Holy Grail of Re-branding in tony salons and country club conferences, the agenda for 2010 is smacking them in the face. It’s the three T’s, stupid: Too Many Taxes, Trillions in Debt and Transparency.
The GOP path to reclaiming power lies with candidates who can make a credible case that they will support and defend fiscal responsibility. That means acting on fiscal-conservative principles now, not paying lip service later.
The reckonable forces of the Tea Party movement didn’t let opportunists escape accountability on Tax Day. The GOP shouldn’t assume they’ll get a pass on Election Day, either.
As one of the most popular Tea Party signs read: “You can’t fix stupid, but you can vote it out.”