Do You Like the Gov't Taking Your Money?

ANDREA TANTAROS: Tea Parties Will Bring America’s Outrage to a Full Boil
By Andrea Tantaros
Republican Political Commentator

As tax day approaches there is a crescendo growing across America in the form of organized protests, also known as tea parties, and the noise is on a path to becoming deafening. Thousands of rallies are planned across the country; one in every single congressional district and larger gatherings slated for cities like New York, Sacramento and Atlanta which hope to boast an upwards of 20,000 participants.

The message is simple: repeal the pork, cut taxes and cut spending. But there is much more at stake than the money. The impact these actions will have on our culture is key.

Those who discount the frustration and fury across America should so do at their own peril, particularly incumbents who voted for the Obama budget. This time anger is being transformed into action. Each person who participates in a Tax Day Tea Party is being asked to organize a group of friends, family and neighbors. These groups will be asked to develop a consensus around two candidates, a fiscally responsible Democrat and Republican that they can unite behind to support in 2010 to unseat their big spending representative.

Though many on the far left continue to ignore or downplay the rage claiming that these gatherings are only for conservatives, all evidence is to the contrary. A recent FOX News poll found that 47 percent of respondents were willing to participate in a Tax Day Tea Party, along with 29 percent of Democrats and 29 percent of independents. By April 15th, organizers hope to have a database filled with a quarter of a million names representing a broad spectrum of political affiliations.

The message is simple: repeal the pork, cut taxes and cut spending. But there is much more at stake than the money. The impact these actions will have on our culture is key. Massive government control is a clear threat to our liberties and our values of American exceptionalism. The argument from Tax Day to Election Day 2010 should be focused on helping voters connect the dots, not only about why we can’t afford to spend money we don’t have or why we can’t trust Washington, but also about how spending and borrowing will cause irreversible damage to our union and put us on a slippery slope toward a European model of stagnate economies, welfare states and mediocrity. Plainly put: the spending and borrowing threatens our greatness.

The fundamental difference between tea totalers and those who are drinking the leftist Kool-Aid is how they view decision-making. The Kool-Aid clan believes that government is better equipped to make choices than a country’s citizens, that they are entitled to our earnings, and that what we get back is simply a giveaway. They feel they know best how to spend it, not us, and simply don’t trust us if left to our own devices.

Every time the government assumes control of our rights and choices whether it is on health care or education, finances, family or faith, it sucks the life out of each one, eventually causing the decay of individual empowerment. As power is increasingly transferred to the government, it will seek to dilute and destroy our most precious values — from the sanctity of marriage to the right to bear arms, free speech and other fundamentals of our constitution.

The Obama Doctrine seeks to do just that: strip power from people, put government — and ultimately the tenants of radicalism — in control. This has a direct impact on our communities and our culture. And once the our culture has decayed, there is nothing left to fight for, which is why we must not cease or waiver in this, and all other, efforts to protect our freedoms.

The culmination of a resistance movement is more than brewing; the tea parties will bring the outrage to a full boil. Though the tea might steep on Wednesday, the battle to protect our nation from socialism’s effect on our culture and our American exceptionalism has just begun. Grab your Earl Grey, it must be stopped.

Traitors want to Give Away America

President Obama is gearing up for yet another legislative battle, this time over the contentious issue of immigration, according to a New York Times report that says one of the goals will be to a create a path for illegal immigrants to become legal.

The push for immigration reform would echo one of Obama's campaign pledges, though its success is uncertain in a tough economic climate.

Administration officials told the Times that Obama plans to speak publicly about the issue in May and will press lawmakers from both parties to begin discussing legislation by the fall.

But the White House downplayed the report, with a spokesman telling FOX News the president consistently said the debate over immigration reform would start this year. The spokesman said nobody is claiming the problem will be fixed this year.

The spokesman pointed out a lengthy response Obama gave at a town hall meeting in California in March, when Obama called for strengthening the border and creating a pathway to citizenship for some illegal immigrants. He did not give a timeframe, however, for when this debate would occur.

"This is not going to be a free ride. It's not going to be some instant amnesty," Obama said at the time. "What's going to happen is you are going to pay a significant fine. You are going to learn English. You are going to go to the back of the line so that you don't get ahead of somebody who was in Mexico City applying legally. But after you've done these things, over a certain period of time you can earn your citizenship."

Several Senate Democratic aides insisted that getting any immigration bill through Congress this year would be almost impossible -- but a senior spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told FOX News Reid wants a bill on the Senate floor in September.

Democrats are in a difficult position, however. Hispanic-Americans were key to numerous Democratic victories in the last two congressional elections, as well as Obama's presidential campaign. Also, Reid, up for re-election in 2010, is from a state with a prominent Latino population, many in the massive service industry based in Las Vegas.

But the labor movement, a major backer of Democrats, is not at all in favor of comprehensive immigration reform, particularly in tough economic times.

Another complicating factor is that the lead immigration reform negotiator Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass, has been slowed by his battle with brain cancer. One Democratic source said it is possible Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., will become the next point man, as he took over the reins of Kennedy's immigration subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee.

"We must solve the immigration issue and we can, even in these difficult economic times. I believe there is a real chance of passing comprehensive reform this year, and the Senate panel on immigration will begin a series of meetings and hearings later this month with an eye towards meeting that goal," Schumer said in a statement.

Schumer plans to meet with Hispanic groups when Congress returns from recess the week of April 20.

The goal of the immigration program will be "policy reform that controls immigration and makes it an orderly system," Cecilia Munoz, director of the White House's intergovernmental affairs, told the Times. "He intends to start the debate this year."

However, the new push for immigration reform would come in the wake of the failure two years ago of the Secure Borders, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Reform Act. That bill received criticism from both sides of the immigration debate, despite being portrayed as a compromise between legalization of illegal immigrants and increased border enforcement.

During Obama's campaign, he pledged to "bring people out of the shadows" through a system that would allow the 12 million undocumented immigrants to pay a fine, learn English and go to the back of the line in the citizenship process.

"Opponents, mainly Republicans, say they will seek to mobilize popular outrage against any effort to legalize unauthorized immigrant workers while so many Americans are out of jobs," the Times said.