Changing Places
By Jeffrey Page
Two political observations.
–A friend of mine from New Jersey sent me a one-page document that I suspect has made its way through the Internet. It starts with the provocative assertion “Let’s put the seniors in jail and the criminals in nursing homes.”
It’s silly of course, but I think it illustrates the anger, frustration and political disillusion some Tea Partiers – not to mention just about every other American voter as well – are experiencing this year. It should serve as a warning to the left and right alike that if the tea people increase their numbers over the next few election cycles so that they actually have some clout in the House and Senate, the United States might never be the same. Can you see it? A constitutional convention to consider whether that pesky First Amendment is still needed. It only takes two-thirds of Congress or two-thirds of the state legislatures to call for such a convention.
If the homes of convicts and old people were switched, my Jersey friend says, jailed seniors would have access to showers, hobbies, and walks. But prisoners living in nursing homes with names like Happy Vistas would get one shower a week.
Old folks in jail would receive all the telephone calls they wish, but convicts serving their time in a nursing home would live in tiny rooms for which they’d have to pay something like $5,000 a month.
You get the point.
–Various people who claim to speak for the Tea Party movement say that they are not partisans, that they do not target individual politicians but the actions of individuals. They claim they are somehow above politics, but the fact is that they use the political system expertly and to their best advantage.
And they know where not to go. I’m still waiting for some Tea Partiers from the plains to demand that crop subsidies be eliminated as a means of reducing federal spending.
Their often proclaimed loathing of politicians is a sham. So is their conservatism. We have seen the attack on the moderate Republican Mike Castle in Delaware by the antimasturbatory Christine O’Donnell, but have not heard of their embrace of any conservative Democrats. The typical Tea Partiers are older white men. While their philosophical guides yammer on the radio about the need to cut back the Social Security program, I’ve yet to see a single sign at a Tea Party rally calling for such reductions.
Jeffrey can be reached at jeffrey@zestoforange.com
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