By now there has been much discussion about the crowd reaction at the two most recent Republican presidential candidate debates. In the GOP debate at the Reagan Presidential Library, the crowd enthusiastically applauded the fact that Rick Perry has overseen 234 executions during his tenure as governor of Texas. To the crowd's delight, Governor Perry proudly defended his record of capital punishment. At the Tea Party sponsored debate held last Monday in Tampa, Florida, the crowd cheered at the prospect of letting an uninsured man die rather than having the "government" pay for his palliative care.
This insensitive display of sadistic anger at an important GOP political forum is deeply disturbing. Have these folks lost their sense of compassion? What drives such anger? How have such radically disruptive views found their way into the mainstream of the political party of Eisenhower, Nixon and Reagan? Many contemporary Tea Party Republicans would scorn their dangerous liberal policies.
The Tea Party-Republican line is against big government. They say that government, which for them means the federal government, has never created jobs. They say that government can never do anything well. They want to undercut the services the government provides. And yet, even as they deride the federal government and its programs, many Tea Party supporters are happy to receive monthly stipends from the Social Security Administration, a very successful and well-funded federal government program. Even as they castigate President Obama's Affordable Care Act, many of them like the coverage they get through Medicare, the kind of single-payer federal government health care program that many Tea Party supporters duplicitously call "socialized medicine."
Are the sadistic reactions and the muddled thinking examples of collective lunacy? What is going on under the GOP Tea Party revivalist tent?
Here's my anthropological take.
In Tea Party America, you are on your own. In Tea Party America, you have to take personal responsibility, which means you pay most of your increasingly expensive medical costs, you put out your own fires, you inspect your own meat and you rebuild your own house after a natural disaster. If for some reason you have lost your job and medical insurance, like 49.9 million of our fellow citizens, that's too bad. You'll just have to forgo going to the doctor or put off essential medical screenings. If for some reason, a fire engulfs your house, don't expect firemen to come to save your home. In Tea Party America, their funds have been cut and their equipment is not in good working order. If you get sick from eating spoiled food, that's too bad. In Tea Party America, you should shop at a store that has the funds to hire someone to inspect the food it sells. If a flood, tornado or hurricane destroys your house, don't expect a government bailout because the funds for disaster relief have disappeared in Tea Party America.
In Tea Party America the rich are strong. They work hard, earn good salaries and live relatively healthy lives. In Tea Party America the poor are weak. They are lazy, unemployed and uninsured. In Tea Party America, the poor can no longer expect government "handouts" -- unemployment insurance, Medicaid, food stamps and welfare. These are denied. In Tea Party America, the poor get what they deserve: to live hungry in squalid conditions and die a premature death.
These kinds of beliefs, which underscore much of the Tea Party worldview, come straight out of 19th century Social Darwinism, in which the strong -- or the fit, to use terminology of Social Darwinism -- adapt successfully to adverse conditions. Following this logic, the weak don't have the wherewithal to adapt. In time their weakness makes them more and more socially marginal. As conditions change and people are increasingly left to their own devices, the weak become invisibly inconsequential. They fade away or die prematurely. They are no longer a drag on society. Let that terminally ill uninsured man die. Why should I pay for his care?
The explanatory rationale for 19th century Social Darwinism, of course, was so-called "scientific" racism -- the belief that whites were genetically superior to browns, yellows and blacks. Scholars of that era used this unsubstantiated idea to explain the technological and social superiority of 19th and early 20th century Europe. At the turn of the 20th century, scientific racism resonated strongly and clearly in a racially segregated America that was confronting unparalleled immigration from Asia and Southern and Eastern Europe. The prevailing theory of the time was that the mix of immigrants into American society would threaten the genetic purity of nation.
In Tea Party America, the racist and anti-science ideological principles of Social Darwinism are being reaffirmed. Consider the widespread and disdainful display of Tea Party-Republican disrespect for President Obama. In Tea Party America, a black man as president is intolerably "unfit." Consider Rick Perry's derisive dismissal of science and scientists. In Tea Party America, fundamentalism eclipses science, ignorance subverts knowledge, and intolerance replaces open-mindedness as we revert back to a cruel and unforgiving time in our history. In Tea Party America, the poor, the sick, and the disabled are all unfit.
Considering the disturbing crowd reaction during the latest GOP presidential candidate debates, Tea Party America is a scary scenario -- almost as scary as the prospect of a President Rick Perry.
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http://wn.com/agricultural_subsidies
While you are entitled to your opinion, I think you read to much into the origional question that was posed to the canidates. Please correct me if I'm wrong but Mr. Blitzers question was very specific. It was about 1 man, around 30yrs old, good health, good job, a good wage, and CHOSE not to have insurance. The wording that Mr. Blitzer used gave me the impression that this man had the means to purchase insurance but chose not to buy insurance. IN this persons case he should be ultimatley responible for the medical bills not the government. I think its a gross exaderation to extrapolate from the origional question to now include all poor people an unemployed.
As far as personal responsibility is concerned it does not mean inspect your own meat or put out your own fires, but it does mean that if you chose to live by a river that floods annually, is prone to hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes, or frequent mudslides you should be responsible for buy insurance that is priced for the risks for that area or have the entire cost of rebuilding if you chose not to have insurance. You should take alook at the area you want to live in and make an educated decision on wether or not the risks of losing your home is to much to afford. It seems people have gotten to complacint when it comes to research or they might feel it cant happen to them.
Aside from your phonetically challenging comments, you failed to answer the question yourself.
Here's a question - what if the person in question could NOT afford health care? What if this person were a smoker, or a drinker, or had a genetic predisposition to life threatening problems? Should the government pay to save this life, or is this person on his own?
(non serious catholics can just go on pretending)
www.catholicnewsagency.com/column.php?n=1647
They are for an america where the power of government is used for one thing the corporations who can sue the government and the people for failing to allow them to do anything they want.
Had Obama not been elected, it's doubtful the TP would exist. The ultra-Right monied interests would have taken a different tact to attain their goal of dismantling the New Deal and the middle class.
However, the 'unique' nature of Obama himself and his election gave the ultra-Right an additional avenue to tap the hidden biases and fears that have been dormant as an organized movement for some decades. These extremists helped create, fund, and poke the TP to do their bidding, using those fears and biases, to accomplish the agenda of those extremists. What would cause a person to actively pursue policies that are against their own interests? Fear derived from bias is a powerful motivator. Fear and bias block reasonable and critical thinking - no time for that with the 'emergency'.
Feed these masses their lines and mottos, provide them alternative histories that belie the facts, play to their fears and biases, and send them into battle to fight against their own interests. It's the biggest scam in the political history of the United States of America.
http://news.medill.northwestern.edu/chicago/news.aspx?id=156203
And contrary to your assumptions, smaller government, sound money, lower taxes, and less debt would be in the best interests of anyone not dependent on government and ultimately by weaning them from the statist teat, those too.
Helping your neighbor is human nature.
Believe it or not, poor people help each other too - without expectations.
Don't break your arm patting yourself on your back.
Deep thinker.
Very insightful comment. Thank you.
The saddest aspect is that under either the tea party or compromisers like Obama, America is doomed to further disparity of income.