Op-Ed: A Cheer and a Half for the Tea Party.

Were it not for the Tea Party, the debt-ceiling controversy might never have taken place. Kudos on that count alone.

The rest of the op-ed, "A Cheer and a Half for the Tea Party," is here.

Op-ed: Republican Phonies

It’s time for some honesty from the Republicans. Either give up the empire and the conceit of “American exceptionalism” or give up the rhetoric of fiscal responsibility. Stop playing the American people for fools.

Read the full op-ed here.

Op-Ed: Hypocrisy’s Coming Election-Day Triumph

By nearly all accounts, Republicans are poised for a big win, even by historical midterm standards, in the November 2 congressional elections. Many candidates backed by the Tea Party should have a big day.

But what will these victories mean for people who are alarmed by the growth of the welfare-warfare state? Not much, I’m sorry to say.

Read the rest of my op-ed here.

TGIF: The Anti-anti-authoritarians

It’s easy to point out flaws in the Tea Party. What is getting old quickly is the political elite’s criticism, which exhibits an intolerance and bad faith that it often attributes to the tea partiers. You don’t have to read too much of this criticism to see that the powers that be and their fawning admirers in the media and intelligentsia dislike one thing in particular: the movement’s apparent anti-authoritarianism.

Read the rest of TGIF: "The Anti-anti-authoritarians" here.

For the Record

I don't want the government back. I just don't want anyone else to have it.

Tea Party Disconnect?

Someone had done his homework, but it wasn't Dick Armey. Dana Milbank of the Washington Post reports:

A member of the [National Press Club] audience passed a question to the moderator, who read it to [Freedom Works chief Dick] Armey: How can the Federalist Papers be an inspiration for the tea party, when their principal author, Alexander Hamilton, "was widely regarded then and now as an advocate of a strong central government"?

Historian Armey was flummoxed by this new information. "Widely regarded by whom?" he challenged, suspiciously. "Today's modern ill-informed political science professors? ... I just doubt that was the case in fact about Hamilton."

Alas, for Armey, it was the case. Hamilton favored a national bank, presidents and senators who served for life and state governors appointed by the president.