Word: teas
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Populism has been on everybody’s minds lately, probably because a populist group was responsible for many of Obama’s troubles in the wake of the Massachusetts senate race that catapulted Republican Scott Brown to Washington. The Tea Party movement, organized last spring around a shared disapproval of reckless spending in Washington, DC, was crucial for mobilizing support for Brown during the race. Over the past several months, the movement has grown so popular that, according to a recent New Yorker article, it would attract more support than the Republican Party if it were...
...same article also highlights some of the pitfalls of populism in its portrayal of the Tea Partiers as a cross between a social activist group and a Glenn Beck-worshipping cult. Not only is the Tea Party’s homophobic and racist rhetoric offensive (a Tea Party protest in Washington last September included signs saying “The Zoo Has an African Lion and the White House Has a Lyin’ African!”), but their tactics are self-defeating...
Like all populist movements, the Tea Partiers base their ideology around a divide between political elites and “ordinary” citizens victimized by Washington’s insider culture. But in order to spread their ideology, the populists must ensure that politicians sharing their views reach political office—in other words, ensure that these politicians participate in the very culture the populists claim to reject. Consequently, the ideology of the Tea Party directly limits its chances for success. The Tea Partiers either have to sacrifice their populist beliefs or their influence, the former leading...
...failure to articulate a set of ideals results in its demise. Sensing the populist anger that resulted in Scott Brown’s victory, Obama tried to tap into it, but his efforts necessarily failed; as an elected official, he was a participant in the Washington culture that the Tea Partiers despised, and the rest of Americans took his dramatic proclamations with the grain of salt most populism deserves. In other words, his plans and his populist rhetoric appealed to no one, least of all the Senate now blocking the proposed bank legislation...
...ability to solve these problems means asking people to make a sacrifice, which requires a spirit of compromise and bipartisanship. Only then will trust in government begin to rise, and only then will voters begin to respond. What I can't agree with is the notion, expressed by the Tea Partyers profiled in Von Drehle's terrific story, that government has no role in solving large national problems. And, by the way, to hear those voices, we deployed five reporters, a photographer and a videographer to Tea Party gatherings in five states...