I Cannot Wait for the Blockbuster Hit of the Holiday (I mean Christmas) Season
Filed Under Big Ideas, Domestic Politics, Entertainment, In the News, Patriotism, Politics, Porchy, USA
Say what you want about the Tea Party movement, and I’ve said my share, but make no mistake about it, they are very, self-righteous. I firmly support anybody’s right to assemble and shout their grievances. I insist that dissent is a patriotic activity. I even say that the Tea Partiers, as wrong as they are, as hypocritical as they often are, as racist as they often appear to be, are still acting within a centuries-old democratic tradition. The mere exercise of assemblage reinforces the fundamental right to protest and engage one another–and the powers that be–in an open and public debate.
The difference between the implication of this video and what I have to say on the 1t Amendment is that I would say–and did say–the same thing of the anti-war protesters of 6+ years ago. I personally helped organize and attended the April 2006 pro-immigration marches. Turns out, I’m not a hypocrite in this regard. But it seems me that by taking the mantle of “patriotism” the Tea Partiers are insisting that a pro-immigrant march would be somehow “unpatriotic.” That a march for healthcare reform would be “unpatriotic.”
Hell, maybe it is. For all their talk of patriotism I don’t see anybody making a strong argument for why what “patriotism” means and whether it’s good.
Aha! I can hear certain readers saying, for all his talk of being a patriot before, Porchy just revealed that he’s a not-so-secret Hate America Firster.
Not true. I just happen to realize that “patriotism” is a very fuzzy concept. Not any more fuzzy that any other social concept that involves in-group/out-group dynamics, self- and social identification, and multiple axes of measurement. If “patriotism” is defined as “supports the Tea Party movement” then I must not be a patriot. But that’s circular. But if we expanded the definition to include some of the terms and ideas tossed around in the trailer, yeah, I clearly I am. I transcribed the trailer to make my point clear.
Voiceover: It began as a ripple, an online whisper, a grassroots awakening to a new threat on freedom.
Man: “I’ve had a yearning inside of me for quite some time. In order to go on living with myself, I had to take an action.”
William: “This is not a beginning, it’s a continuation.”
Man2: “The president serves us; the congress, they serve us.”
VO: Lady liberty faces her newest challenge and across this great nation a new generation of patriots stands ready for her defense.
Nate: “When you have a government control over everything, you have tyrannic behavior.”
Woman: “We want fiscal responsibility.”
Costumed Actor: “We’ll give them some stimulus.”
Jenny Beth: “Do you think Congress can hear us now?”
VO: They were ignored; they were mocked; but, in the end they would not be silenced.
Dr. Fred: “If you don’t get involved in the process, your voice is never heard.”
VO: A greater cause united them…
Jack: “…I don’t care what party you’re in…”
VO: …a greater outcome awaits them
Nate: “We’re hear to be great, not mediocre.”
VO: This Thanksgiving the story of 2009 becomes the living history,the second American Revolution. Tea Party: The Documentary Film. Liberty’s march has a new generation of patriots.
“I’ve had a yearning inside of me for quite some time. In order to go on living with myself, I had to take an action.” After Bush’s re-election I became involved in county politics in a dominantly Republican part of the state. I was an active member of the Democratic Party. So, like the first person quoted in the trailer, a long-held interest in politics manifested itself as a call to action to fight for ideals I believed in that I felt were under an overwhelming onslaught, slowly twisting my government into unrecognizable morass of lies, autocratic behavior, un-, even anti-, democratic laws, etc. etc. I rose up to fight against forces that gave us the largest increase in government bureaucracy since the creation of the CIA, the Patriot Act, the Unitary Executive Theory, legalized torture, extraordinary rendition, two illegal wars, and problematic foreign relations which forced America to use up additional resources to secure diplomatic ends. Let’s just say that I did and do feel pretty patriotic for those things. So, rising to the challenge of shouting the truth to authority? Check! I’m a patriot.
“This is not a beginning, it’s a continuation.” Was my battle, like Williams, not a beginning but a continuation of the battle that started with our nation’s forefathers (and mothers)? As many of our forefathers were immigrants themselves or the sons (and daughters) of immigrants absolutely. Not to mention the scores of immigrants that came after. Not to mention that the specific ideals I was fighting for have their basis in the Constitution. So if basing my arguments in cherry-picked quotes from certain historical documents with a patriotic pedigree is a standard by which to judge my patriotism, check again! Continuing the battle and still a patriot.
“When you have government control over everything you have tyrannic power.” Yup, that seems simple enough, and tautological to boot! To give Nate the benefit of the doubt, he doesn’t mean control over everything he means bank bailouts, the GM purchase, and/or healthcare reform. Now, granted these combined three things are barely a measurable fraction of the $3 trillion dollar War on Terror which doesn’t include the price tag for maintaining a Department of Homeland Security, but heck! He picks his battles and I pick mine. But as a general statement of purpose, Nate and I seem to be in agreement: government control over everything is a bad thing. I don’t know how Nate feels about DHS and the Iraq War, maybe he’s against them too. I will say this, though: I sure which there was a fiscally responsible Tea Party movement in 2002. KnowwhaddImean?
“We [The Tea Partiers] want fiscal responsibility.” Me too! See above. So that’s double check, still a patriot. I will quickly add though that the bank bailout has earned taxpayers $10 billion in profits, DHS and Iraq cannot say as much. I might also add that healthcare reform has been estimated to decrease the deficit by several billion dollars. Some people (not me) can argue with the CBO report, their assumptions, and the formulae they opted to use but as far as I know and as far as I can know the CBO is the best measurement of the likely outcomes and its estimated savings.
“If you don’t get involved in the process, your voice is never heard.” See the first guy, I totally agree. Civic engagement is a necessary component of actual patriotism.
“I don’t care what party you’re in.” Two things. First: I don’t either. I think party loyalty is horror and a shame. It is true that I tend to vote Democratic but that’s because Democrats tend to side with me either 1) on the issues I find most important at the time or 2) on the majority of issues. If some other party crawled out of the woodwork and did either of those two things better, I’d vote accordingly. The second thing is outside the theme of this particular post but deserves a mention. There is this myth that the Tea Party movement is bipartisan. It isn’t. It favors their propaganda that the population perceive it as such, but it isn’t. I’m sure there are some disgruntled Dems in there but a handful of Democrats doesn’t make this a bipartisan movement any more than Cao’s healthcare vote made that House bill a bipartisan one.
So, from beginning to end, it sounds like me and the Tea Partiers want the same thing and that, as a result, we’re both patriots. And in truth, if I ignore the important semantic discussion of what a patriot is and if being one is a good thing, then that’s what I’d say. But it’s the fighting for what you believe in using (lowercase) democratic values that makes the patriot here, not what they are fighting for specifically. At the point they start advocating for violent overthrow of a duly elected democratic government, they stop being (lowercase) democratic and they stop being patriots (upper or lowercase). And, to be as blunt as possible, having guys march in tricorner hats and ringing the alarm bell for a “second American Revolution” does just that.
Appealing to the imagery of the actual American Revolution the Tea Partiers forget that the government that was overthrown there was an imperialist, monarchic one where the citizens were actually not represented. In contrast, the one the Tea Partiers advocate overthrowing is a democratically elected, representative government. They can say, “My government is ignoring my wishes,” and that’s not untrue. But during the previous presidency, the government was ignoring my wishes and I didn’t march for its violent overthrow. It’s the way representative government works. It’s hard. It’s hard to watch your government systematically and seemingly consciously ignore doing the things that you think would make it good. But dems da breaks. I encourage the Tea Partiers to party. My support stops when they advocate a coup or an assassination of the president.
Comments
2 Responses to “I Cannot Wait for the Blockbuster Hit of the Holiday (I mean Christmas) Season”
man. fuck patriotism.
maybe I should have “patriot” in quotes.