Maybe there's a point to be made here?
87,000 new IRS employees may have shifted the game a little bit, but we'll see.
This was the featured meme on The Patriot Post yesterday.
And while I think it’s a timely meme, perhaps we should take a step back and remember what has transpired over the last 13 1/2 years since TEA Party 2.0 began as a well-attended but eventually futile protest against Barack Obama’s stimulus program in a few dozen cities on a February afternoon. I won’t portray myself as the be-all and end-all expert on the latter-day TEA Party, but I think I might be in the top few percent. Besides, I doubt there are any ships in Boston Harbor laden with tea these days.
To a political activist surveying the scene, it’s essentially an embarrassment of riches when you consider causes to rebel against, as we received a trifecta in this case: the 87,000 IRS agents came along with tax increases on corporations that somehow aren’t expected to affect consumer costs. The laughingly-named Inflation Reduction Act (actually a revamping of the failed Build Back Better package Joe Biden hoped to ram through previously) also included a redoubling of the government’s foolish belief that revised policy (read: handouts to favored special interests in the “green” energy field) can stop the climate from changing as well as an extension of Obamacare subsidies, which the TEA Party cut its teeth fighting on in the early teens. It doesn’t matter that “only” about 49,000 IRS agents will do actual enforcement, they’ll still be armed and it’s still more government excess brought to you by the Democrat party.
The question, then, should be: how did we get back to where we were back in 2009? I’ve had my share of criticism for the latter-day TEA Party movement; in particular regarding how it devolved from a grassroots effort to a top-down operation run nationally by a handful of groups who promised big results with the funds the rubes sent in only to maintain the status quo and fill the pockets of their consultants. But like the initial version, which only had the support of about one-third of the colonists in its infancy - another third preferred the security of the British Crown and the other third just went with the flow - the 2009 version of the TEA Party never gathered more than a low-30s approval rating. For that lack of public support we can point our fingers at the partisan media all we want, and it deserves a significant share of the blame for the failures of the TEA Party. But that’s not the issue.
Failure may be a strong word, but how else can you define it? Try as we might have, we didn’t bring about lasting political change at a national scale. In 2022 we have a Democrat trifecta nationally, just like we did in early 2010. Granted, the 2010 election of Massachusetts Republican Scott Brown to the Senate seat long held by Ted Kennedy made a significant difference because it eliminated the cloture-resisting 60-40 advantage Senate Democrats had (hence, Brown dubbing himself “Mr. 41” on the campaign trail) but we’ve not had a similar opportunity this year to break the Senate majority, and even if misfortune struck the Democrats, it’s doubtful Mitch McConnell would have asserted himself as Majority Leader even if the strokes suffered by Chris Van Hollen of Maryland or Ben Ray Lujan of New Mexico turned out to be fatal or the fall taken by Vermont’s Patrick Leahy been more significant, like the tumble down a flight of stairs that killed a longtime representative in my old Ohio House district. On the other hand, the Democrats wasted no time when jumpin’ Senator Jim Jeffords switched to independent in 2001, did they?
The political grift might be where the money is, but I’ve become convinced that’s not where the lasting change is made. We have to get ourselves on a glide path that works toward rightsizing the federal government no matter who is in charge of Congress. It’s worked in the opposite direction for over a century but that train’s running out of track, veering toward the cliff of tyranny.
As an example of this concept, for decades we had politicians pay lip service to the pro-life movement knowing that Roe v. Wade was their backstop, a convenient whipping boy and excuse as to why they couldn’t do anything about abortion, since the Supreme Court had spoken as the final authority. Yes, the pro-life question was eventually resolved in a political manner, but it took a lot of grassroots work and changing of hearts and minds to put the people in place to properly resolve it, and it began at the state level in a state that had local politicians willing to stick their necks out to make needed change. Mississippi had to pass the 15-week law first before Dobbs could become what it was.
As a spoiler for the book I referenced above, my contention was that TEA Party 3.0 needed to lay off financial and federal issues and focus on local causes, especially education and school board elections. However, this particular cause may deserve a little bit of attention as the IRS gained a reputation for overstepping its boundaries as far as the TEA Party is concerned, and could be weaponized against those who speak out against federal government overreach. I’m not sure they would let me use the Timothy Geithner defense (although it would be true) if they decided to make me an example for saying something.
It could be, though, that the expansion of the IRS may be the spark that really sets off TEA Party 3.0. Given their level of popularity is down there with pedophiles, used car salesmen, and members of Congress, the IRS is a group that’s easy to despise and their needless expansion could be the bridge to changing hearts and minds on other issues. You might ask: should a government that would sic one of 87,000 IRS agents on you be trusted to make your car-buying, energy-consuming, or healthcare choices for you? Join our side and take action: talk to your representative at a townhall meeting (or demand they hold one) but better yet talk to your friends and neighbors about getting involved. There may be a lot of new agents but they can’t audit all of us.
We can work on the elevator pitch as we go, but the moment to act is upon us.