News & Events

May 10, 2012

Our special guest will be Dawn Wildman, California State Coordinator for Tea Party Groups, and President of the SoCal Tax Revolt Coalition. We meet at the Veterans Hall, corner of 17th and B Streets, Marysville. Meeting starts at 6:30PM.

You've Got Spine Award

Last month, Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson had the pleasure of speaking to the Yuba Sutter Tea Party Patriots in Northern California's Central Valley (near Sacramento) where he received the "You've Got Spine" award. The steel spine was handmade for Rev. Peterson by Craig Christensen, head of the Yuba Sutter Tea Party Patriots, as a recognition of Jesse Peterson's "steel spine of courage." This is only one of two awards made. Thank you to Craig and the Yuba Sutter Tea Party Patriots. This unique award is being proudly displayed at the BOND Action headquarters.

Grace-Marie Turner at CPAC: Obamacare — Why It’s Unconstitutional And What Conservatives Need to Do

After Republicans took over the House of Representatives, one of their first acts was to overwhelmingly pass a bill repealing ObamaCare. A poll taken afterward found that 22% of Americans thought the monstrous law had been repealed and 26% weren’t sure! That means only 52% of Americans understood that the repeal bill must also pass the Senate and be signed by the president.

Those are jobs that will have to wait until NEXT January!

In the meantime, what can we do?

We need to tell everyone that ObamaCare violates the Constitution down to its very DNA. Let’s start with the individual mandate and the federal government telling us that, beginning in 2014, we must spend our personal money on a private product – a health insurance policy that the CBO says will cost $20,000 a year for a family of four. Is a Chevy Volt mandate next?

And now we see Secretary Sebelius issuing a rule that violates our constitutionally-protected religious liberty. She says employer health plans must cover, at no charge to patients, contraceptives, abortifacients, and sterilization. President Obama called Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan of the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops to tell him the good news that Catholic schools, hospitals, and other institutions have a year to figure out how to comply — a year to figure out how to violate the Church’s fundamental teachings about the dignity of human life. He seemed totally surprised by the torrent of criticism from people who think that the Constitutional protection of religious liberty actually MEANS something.

And then there is the unconstitutional Independent Payment Advisory Board – 15 unelected technocrats who will be making decisions about spending hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicare money – a job explicitly delegated by the Constitution to ELECTED Members of Congress.

No one will be safe: The law gives Sec. Sebelius the power more than 1,500 times to order our lives, which she already is doing in many other ways. This law is a centipede, and there are endless shoes still to drop, crushing our liberty. And its massive spending on huge new entitlement subsidies will overwhelm any efforts to control our deficit and debt.

Before this controversy over religious liberty erupted, the White House had adopted a Strategy of Silence about ObamaCare. After the 2010 elections, the White House finally figured out that the American people despise this law. So the president had basically stopped talking about it – except for a few small things like putting 26 year old “children” on their parent’s insurance, and this “free” preventive care. They want people to wonder what the fuss was all about if ObamaCare was just a “few small things.” Meanwhile, this freight train is headed straight at us, gaining steam to collide with our economy and our freedom in 2014.

But President Obama knows that the only thing he has to do is get reelected, and the it will be almost impossible to repeal this law.

During the campaign, you can be sure he won’t tell you about its $500 billion in cuts to Medicare and the Medicare rationing board – the most radical and drastic changes ever made to Medicare. He won’t talk about its half a trillion dollars in taxes, the job-killing employer mandate, mandates to the states that trample the 10th amendment, and, of course, the freedom-killing individual mandate. It’s up to US to tell the American people the full truth.

So what’s next? The Supreme Court will hear an unprecedented 5½ hours of arguments over three days — March 26th through 28th, and it will issue its decision most likely in late June.

Whatever happens, we have our work cut out for us. If the Court declares just the individual mandate unconstitutional – a 50-50 proposition – then 90 percent of the law will still stand. Then our job is to tell the American people what’s left. For the sake of our liberty, we must take down the rest of it.

Former Attorney General Ed Meese — attorney general under President Reagan — said recently that the Supreme Court decision about ObamaCare is the most important decision in 100 years. It truly will determine whether we remain free citizens or whether we become subjects of an all-powerful government that has life and death control over us. I repeat: We will be subjects, no longer free citizens. If the Supreme Court upholds the law, then we must head for the ballot box in November to stop it. It’s our last defense.

This is the battle for liberty in our time, and we are the army. We must to defend the Constitution and our Freedom against this unconstitutional, freedom-robbing intruder. We have a book, and I’ll be signing copies in the exhibit hall at 3:30, called “Why ObamaCare Is Wrong for America.” This is your handbook for the battles ahead, the battle for liberty in our time. Onward!

With Keystone XL, Obama Mask Slips on Jobs, Energy

I have to admit that the blame falls squarely on the rest of us this time. Obama is not at fault here, even though his decision to scrap the Keystone pipeline- along with other energy and jobs mistakes- will probably cost him his job.

We’ve allowed Obama- and most other politicians- to continue to believe that we, collectively as a nation, are as stupid as they think we are. To Obama and his ilk, we’re all just hayseed bitter-clingers, clinging to our guns and religion or our union and our food stamps because we’re not as clever as Obama has been in parlaying our disaffection with ourselves into a career or a faith.

And while Obama’s lack of faith in ordinary Americans is wrong, he does have a point, even if it’s cynical, too blunt and a little rusty.

Only 48.3 percent of people disapprove of the job Obama has done, while 46 percent actually approve of Obama’s complete disregard for our country’s interests, according to an average of polls by Real Clear Politics. This, even as 65.3 percent of the country thinks we’re on the wrong track.

The discrepancy is explained, I believe, because there are still some people in the middle who haven’t quite made up their mind about Obama. They’d like to like him because he’s president; they’ll give him every opportunity because he’s liberal; and they don’t want to offend anyone- because he’s black.

Obama takes advantage of this benign ambivalence by speaking one way and then doing another- and some are taken-in by the act even though they do know better.

Of course Obama’s not the only politician who does one thing while saying another.

But politicians- even Obama- don’t get off quite so easily with that trick when it comes to jobs, taxes and the economy, as the president will find out on the Keystone pipeline.

Saying one thing on energy and doing another is going to present a problem for Obama and his friends at re-election.

Because energy is jobs, taxes and the economy, all in one. If you deny energy development that creates jobs, fuels the economy and doesn’t involve federally-guaranteed bankruptcies, people- even liberal people- might notice.

Since Obama first proposed another stimulus of half-a-trillion dollars back in August of 2011, he’s been campaigning like the only thing holding up job creation in the US is the act of writing a hot check with eleven zeroes after it.

He forgets to mention that we already spent a trillion dollars on stimulus measures- and more if you include bailouts and TARP and Fannie and Freddie- that created no jobs, no taxes, no growth and no energy. It truly was a do-nothing stimulus, as most conservatives pointed out it would be.

Americans still gave Obama some marks for good intentions on the stimulus, even if they subtracted marks for poor results.

He won’t get that kind of pass on his decision to kill the Keystone pipeline, which means he killed jobs, taxes and economic growth that would have cost the government nothing. The decision not to allow construction of the pipeline will cost American citizens a sum with eleven zeroes after it in lost wages, tax revenues, GDP growth and higher oil prices.

“Once again the President has sided with environmentalists instead of blue collar construction workers” said Terry O’Sullivan, head of the Laborers’ International Union of North America, whose workers expected to get the jobs Obama killed. Obama killed those jobs “even though environmental concerns were more than adequately addressed. Blue collar construction workers across the U.S. will not forget this.”

Nor will ordinary Americans.

Newspapers across the country are editorializing against it.

The Washington Post’s Robert Samuelson wrote: “Rejecting the Keystone pipeline is an act of insanity.” Obama’s hometown paper, the Chicago Tribune, says “Obama made a decision that will deny the U.S. a reliable source of oil. Note that Canada has never threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz. Obama made a decision that will cost the U.S. good jobs. He seems to think those jobs will still be there when he gets around to making a decision on the pipeline. But they may well be gone for good.”

If you’re Obama, who cares?

Jobs, taxes and the economy are small change of the Change Obama and the liberal left want to bring to the world.

But don’t think the voters won’t begin to notice.

As I have pointed out all along, the Keystone issue isn’t about the safety of a pipeline. Obama and enviro-whacko friends know that if they allow Canadian tar sands oil to be developed via the Keystone pipeline, that the US will also start to develop their own tar-sands and shale oil. The US contains well over 600 years of known reserves and that would allow the US to be a net exporter of oil. If that happens, the green economy ruse that the left has sponsored, already reeling from bankruptcies and cronyism, would collapse. It would show that there is no shortage of oil and “green” energy can not compete with fossil fuels.

The only thing left then for those bitter climate clingers would be the shoddy science of Global Something-or-Another.

Oil from tar sands, reports the BBC on the Keystone decision, “is so plentiful that full-scale development would seriously delay the transition to low-carbon alternative fuels,” which is the holy grail of the left.

Full scale development of tar sands can only be stopped by taxing oil out of existence, like was tried with cap and trade. Cape and trade was never about trying to cool the earth. It was about giving "green" technologies a competitive advantage over fossil fuels that free markets won't conceed.

The Atlantic echoes the theme:

The Keystone XL is merely on hold, and oil from all sorts of other "dirty" situations continues to flow into our gas tanks…. We need to stop fighting oil development project by project -- and instead focus on passing a Low Carbon Fuel Standard (which could make the Keystone XL economically unviable).

And the New York Times goes further, stating: “Far more important to the nation’s energy and environmental future is the development of renewable and alternative energy sources. This is the winning case that Mr. Obama should make to voters in rejecting the Republicans’ craven indulgence of Big Oil.”

But voters won’t vote for that argument, as Obama well knows. So he says one thing, and does another.

Americans want jobs, and cheap, reliable sources of energy. And Obama said he wanted those things for America too.

But the contrast between Obama’s reckless spending of a trillion dollars that created no jobs and his prevention of private capital investment that can create many jobs has let the mask slip. Obama doesn’t care about jobs if jobs don’t mesh with his ideology. He wants the America that he wants, not the one you and I create every day.

And that frames perfectly what the 2012 presidential election is all about- even if Obama won’t admit it.

Washington Can't Ignore the Tea Party

Dear Friend,

As you know, the Senate has failed to pass a budget resolution for three years running. Now they won't even let the American people do the job for them.

This afternoon, 200 FreedomWorks members and representatives from tea party groups across the country met in the Russell Senate Office building to formally present our plan to balance the federal budget and cut $9.7 trillion in spending over the next 10 years. Unfortunately, it seems like the only thing Washington wants to hear is excuses.

The Democrats who run the Senate Rules Committee were so afraid of the tea party plan to balance the federal budget that they ordered committee staff to remove the microphones we had set up for the event while Capitol Police blocked the doors of our hearing room, which had been reserved by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) specifically for this event more than two weeks ago. At the same time, a "suspicious package" was reported in the room next door and all visitors and staff were barred from the area.

Click the image below to watch footage of what happened next.

Although Senator Lee courageously stood up for us, he ultimately determined that the hearing should proceed without further interruption or harassment. For that reason we moved to another location off the Capitol grounds where our commission of 12 volunteer tea party activists presented their recommendations to a fired-up crowd.

Senator Lee was also joined there by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), Reps. Joe Walsh (R-IL), Steve King (R-IA), Mike Pence (R-IN), Mick Mulvaney (R-SC) and Paul Broun (R-GA). Rep. Broun received a standing ovation when he offered to help draft and sponsor legislation that could eventually allow our recommended cuts to become law.

Unfortunately, the unexpected location change disrupted live coverage of our hearing on CSPAN, but please click to watch the video, which provides highlights from this afternoon's events.

For more information about the Tea Party Debt Commission, or to access the full report presented today, visit http://www.freedomworks.org/the-tea-party-budget.

Sincerely,

Matt Kibbe
President and CEO, FreedomWorks

OWS vs. The Tea Party

As a Tea Party Patriot, I have been asked by the media to explain the differences between the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) protesters and modern-day Tea Partiers.

The first answer I give is: the Occupy Wall Street protesters have been around for about 50 days, compared to about 1,000 days for the Tea Party Patriots—and so far 2,500 “Occupy” protesters have been arrested (compared to zero Tea Party arrests), there have been 4 rapes at Occupy Wall Street protests (and no rapes at Tea Parties) and the OWS folks have caused about $2.4 million in property damage, whereas the Tea Party Patriots have actually been a source of revenue for the cities in which we protest because we pay permit fees for our protests and we leave the city spaces cleaner than when we arrived.

Oh, and no Tea Partier has been arrested for sniffing the feet of another man’s girlfriend, as happened recently at an “Occupy” protest, and Tea Partiers don’t steal things from each other, like in Zuccotti Park where an OWS organizer admitted that “stealing is our biggest problem.” Stealing and rape. And defecating on a police car. And defecating everywhere else.

The other difference can be found in the different ways that media and power elites treat OWS rapists, criminals and thieves, compared to the way the media and power elites have treated non-raping, non-criminal, and non-thieving patriotic Americans in the modern-day Tea Party movement.

The media, the White House, the administration and many members of Congress have joined together to parrot the phrases and champion the causes of the violent, criminal, anti-American Occupy Wall Street protesters, whereas the same media, White House, administration and members of Congress refer to Tea Partiers as an “angry mob” of “terrorists” who should “go to hell.”

Aside from the different ways that these two protest movements are treated by those on the outside, it is what’s on the inside that counts. I’m referring to the different core beliefs of these two vastly different groups.

The Tea Party Patriots have three core principles: fiscal responsibility, free markets, and Constitutionally limited government. By contrast, the Occupy Wall Street protesters are demanding less fiscal responsibility (they want more government spending), an end to free markets, and the overwhelming majority of OWS demands—from guaranteed wages to free tuition to universal health care and more government control over markets—all call for a radical expansion of the size and scope and power of government to control us, and to take care of us, from cradle to college to grave.

Occupy Wall Street is calling for a declaration of dependence on government; a call for more government control over our lives. It is the direct opposite of the Declaration of independence that sparked this nation into existence, and it is the direct opposite of the core principles of the modern-day Tea Party movement.

As James Madison wrote in 1817, “The people of the U.S. owe their independence & their liberty, to the wisdom of descrying in the minute tax of 3 pence on tea, the magnitude of the evil comprized in the precedent. Let them exert the same wisdom, in watching agst every evil lurking under plausible disguises, and growing up from small beginnings.”

Today, instead of exerting wisdom and eternal vigilance over threats to our independence, the heirs to Madison who now occupy the White House, and the media whose freedom was secured by our Founding Fathers, have joined together to champion the cause of those who loudly and proudly declare their dependence on government.

That is the main difference between the Tea Party movement and “Occupy” protesters. We, like America’s Founders, declare our independence from government. The Occupy Wall Street protesters declare their dependence on government.

Michael Prell
Tea Party Patriots

Occupy Wall Street is no tea party By: Mark Meckler October 18, 2011 09:23 PM EDT

The media chorus is singing a new song this week in its anti-tea party echo chamber. It goes something like this: The law-breaking anarchists who want to tear America down are somehow just like law-abiding tea partiers - who are working tirelessly to build America back up.

What has now become an oft-repeated political euphemism. In 1988, during a vice presidential debate, Democratic candidate Sen. Lloyd Bentsen said to his Republican opponent, Sen. Dan Quayle, "Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy, I knew Jack Kennedy; Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy."

So despite the risk of sounding cliché here, I say to the small band of misfits and anarchists now occupying Wall Street: I was one of tens of thousands of patriotic Americans who were there at the beginning of the tea party movement. I stood shoulder to shoulder with tea partiers all across this country. And you, who are occupying Wall Street and trying to tear America down, are no tea partiers.

The tea party movement started spontaneously from the rant of CNBC's Rick Santelli on Feb. 19, 2009. His words resonated with millions across the country, and his spontaneous call for a "tea party" spurred tens of thousands to action.

Within a week, in close to 50 locations across the country, almost 40,000 people turned out to protest the U.S. government's fiscal irresponsibility. By Tax Day in April 2009, the movement had grown to millions - and there were more than 850 peaceful, lawful protests across the nation attended by more than a million people.

The movement was organic, fast moving and had a cogent message: It's time for fiscal responsibility in government.

Tea party rallies have always felt like "parties" - and safe and clean ones at that. Unlike protesters in New York, I can find no reports of tea partiers being arrested, individually or en masse, at the thousands of tea parties across the country with millions of attendees that have taken place for years now.

We are not lawbreakers, we don't hate the police, we don't even litter. A quick glance at the TV reveals the sharp contrast to the Wall Street occupiers.

In recent days, I've been repeatedly asked by reporters, "Does the comparison now being made in the media between the tea party and the Wall Street protesters bother you?"

My answer is an unequivocal: "Hell yes, it bothers me."

It bothers me because it groups millions of patriotic tea partiers, who want to build America back up, together with a bunch of criminals who want to tear America down.

For two years now, tea partiers have stood firmly on principle and helped shape the political debate. They believe in time-honored American values, principles and systems - including the freedom to innovate and employ people to implement and distribute your ideas to the public.

Consider the career of the late Steve Jobs. The freedom from government allowed him to try new things, see what worked and discard what didn't. Tea partiers agree, not believing corporations like Apple are inherently evil or that bankers should be beheaded. They do not believe this country should be divided by class but united in a return to the principles that undergird success.

In fact - we want more of what made America great. More constitutional restraint on government, so the people have more freedom to achieve the good things the country offers.

In contrast, those occupying Wall Street want less of what made America great - and more of what is damaging America. They want a bigger, more powerful government to come in and take care of them, redistributing the wealth of those who innovate and create something, so they don't have to work like the rest of us who pay their bills.

When tea partiers first took to the streets, we were ignored and then mocked by the media and those threatened by our principles. Then we were attacked with labels like "AstroTurf," "racists," "fringe," "radical," "terrorists," "jihadis," "hostage takers" and "Nazis."

In just the past few weeks, we have been told by Democratic elected officials to "go to Hell," called "the real enemy" and accused of wanting to see fellow citizens "hanging from trees."

Meanwhile, some of the media continues to cheer for a group of law-breaking miscreants who occupied a park in New York, blocked the Brooklyn Bridge, were arrested by the hundreds and treated law enforcement with disrespect and disdain - all while trying to tear down the foundations of the greatest nation on earth.

We expect that kind of idiocy from the media. But when you compare these people with tea partiers, now you've got a problem with We the People.

Mark Meckler is a co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots, the nation's largest tea party organization, with more than 3,500 affiliated local groups.

Palin: Obama, with his non-jobs plan, ‘plays us all for fools’

The president’s speech last night was so painfully predictable as to almost deserve no post-speech analysis (we covered it all before he gave it!) — but because it’s a Friday afternoon and The One’s announcement of the American Jobs Act last night was supposedly the most important political event of the week (with the GOP debate a close second), TV pundits and other commentators continue to talk about it. Mercifully, Sarah Palin this afternoon dismissed it with characteristic plainspokenness:

I thought the president was very bold in his request for another blank check,” Palin said on Fox News, where she is a paid contributor. “I don’t consider it a plan at all.”

The former vice presidential nominee said she cared neither for the substance or the style of the president’s speech, and felt that he was trying to pressure the Congress into passing the jobs package.

“They want to shove something down our throats even though it’s inconsistent with economic principles that can work in facing the problems we have with our economy,” Palin said. …

Palin disputed the characterization of the bill as bipartisan, saying Republicans believed that they could not afford the measures, considering the current deficit.

“The president was disingenuous when he insisted over and over again that everything in this package had been endorsed by all,” Palin said.

Palin also issued an on-point reminder to the GOP candidates to connect the dots between the debt and deficit and the jobs crisis the country faces — an idea that cannot be too often emphasized. But, as ever, she was elusive when asked whether she plans to run for president.

Interview with Tea Party Co-Founder Mark Meckler 'We Have Compromised Our Way Into Disaster'

Mark Meckler, 49, the co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots in the United States, talks to SPIEGEL about the US debt ceiling, the radical right's uncompromising fight against the national debt and the "complete economic disaster" he claims President Barack Obama has created.

SPIEGEL: The world is looking at Washington and sees gridlock and chaos. How much have the negotiations over the United States' debt ceiling hurt America's standing in the world?

Meckler: Saying that these debates have hurt our image is absurd. What you currently see in Washington is one of the most responsible debates ever about the size and scope of government. The world should look at what is going on in the United States as a model for what should happen in all countries.

SPIEGEL: We look at it and see a Congress held hostage by a small group of radical Tea Party members unwilling to agree to any budget compromise and risking a US default.

Meckler: What do you mean by "a small group?" Forty-one percent of voters in the last US election said they agreed with Tea Party values. And the primary values of the Tea Party are about fiscal responsibility.

SPIEGEL: But you are willing to accept a US default if your demands for massive budget cuts and no tax increases are not met. That seems rather irresponsible or even unpatriotic. Most leading economists forecast financial "Armageddon" in that case.

Meckler: Default is a false threat. We take in over $220 billion in revenues every month and our debt service is only roughly $20 billion. The only way we will default is if the President of the United States makes the irresponsible choice not to pay our debts. We Tea Party Patriots put principles first, and we have to understand what America is about. Our country was founded on an idea: liberty. But it requires fiscal responsibility for people to be free. We are becoming slaves to our own government. Every US family now owes $400,000 to $500,000 in national debt. We Tea Party Patriots fight for the future of the nation, and there can be nothing more patriotic than that.

SPIEGEL: Democracy is not just about winning fights. It can only function if all parties are open to compromise.

Meckler: The compromises that we have witnessed on debt have taken our country to the brink of financial collapse. Currently, the American government is spending 44 cents of each dollar on interest payments. We have compromised our way into disaster. None of the budget plans proposed have real cuts in them -- only promises to cut. The reality is that legally one Congress cannot bind the future Congress to cut, so these promises are actually a lie. We need real and immediate cuts.

SPIEGEL: The budget plan proposed by Republican speaker John Boehner contained massive spending cuts. Why were you so unwilling to embrace it?

Meckler: Look closely at the plan: It proposes $22 billion in cuts in the upcoming fiscal year. That is ridiculously little. It is the equivalent in the United States of shutting off the lights on Friday night and reopening at your normal rate of spending on Monday.

SPIEGEL: The plan also rules out any tax increases to close the deficit, though. Even the plan of the Democrats does not mention new taxes. So your movement already won the debate over taxes.

Meckler: This debate is not about taxes. This is a question of spending. There is no amount of taxes that we could raise that would stop our deficit spending caused by politicians who have lied so often.

SPIEGEL: Your movement often refers to Ronald Reagan, the Republican icon. But he raised taxes 11 times and the debt ceiling 18 times.

Meckler: At no time did he control both houses of Congress, so often he had no choice. But Reagan got attacked viciously by conservatives over this, just as we would attack any Republican president in the future if he did something similar.

SPIEGEL: The US economy is still growing very slowly. If you cut government spending drastically now, you will risk having a double-dip recession.

Meckler: That is simply wrong. Government spending is never efficient.

SPIEGEL: But in the short run, the cuts will lead to even higher US unemployment.

Meckler: Possibly on a minimal level. But we have worried about the short term for so long that we have damaged the long-term prospects of our nation. Look at what is going on in Europe: Spain is a complete disaster. It has more vacant homes than we have here, with only 40 million people. Italy is a complete disaster. Europe is going down the same path as the US, only many countries are far ahead and don't take corrective action.

SPIEGEL: Speaker Boehner failed several times to rally Republicans around his plans. Does he need to go?

Meckler: We have polled our membership and 74 percent of our members in our 3,500 chapters said it is time to look at new leadership.

SPIEGEL: And should he be replaced by a Tea Party representative?

Meckler: The ultimate goal is to have somebody in the House who is fiscally responsible. We have changed the debate in the United States, which is a pretty radical thing to do in such a short period of time. The question back then was: "How much more will we spend next year, not how much can we cut?" But you will see much more profound change in 2012.

SPIEGEL: Who could be the Tea Party candidate in the next presidential election?

Meckler: The movement has no clear preference. Our members are taking a cool and careful look at all the candidates on the Republican side. I am actually glad people are not more excited and blown away. The last time we saw that on the campaign trail, the country got Barack Obama in the White House -- and that led to complete economic disaster.

Interview conducted by Marc Hujer and Gregor Peter Schmitz