TulipGirl

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April 15th. Taxes. Tea Party Day. We participated in our neighborhood Tea Party. The boys went with our neighbors, until Hubby and I could show up later. I would say there were easily 300 people when I arrived, and was told the crowd was larger earlier in the event. While I was there, I saw many people come and leave — so I would easily estimate 5-600 people participated throughout the event.

Besides our neighbors, we saw friends from church, the lawn guy who works in our neighborhood, our dentist and a lot of small business owners. Later on we met up with some of the YCSers. I think I even saw Steve as he took his almost-great photos of the event (would have been great pics, had I found ones of my boys!)

In addition, we saw people of all ages, people with disabilities, people of various socio-economic backgrounds, people of different racial and cultural backgrounds. Even some people who had a few too many beers. The “right wing extremist” stereotypes were blown away by this Tea Party.

As the Tea Party went on, the scheduled speakers finished and the organizers opened up the microphone to anyone from the neighborhood. It was interesting to hear the common refrains of liberty and responsibility. J12 leaned over to me and said, “I think I have something to say. . .”

And so, he went up to the podium and had his first experience with extemporaneous political speaking with a microphone. He announced the Young Conservatives of Sarasota and talked about how his generation, and every child today is already laden with tens of thousands of dollars in government debt. I was pretty impressed. (Our kids’ futures being mortgaged — talk about taxation without representation!)

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“We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our selection between economy and liberty or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debts as that we must be taxed in our meat in our drink, in our necessities and comforts, in our labors and in our amusements, for our callings and our creeds…our people.. must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give earnings of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses; and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live.. We have not time to think, no means of calling the mis-managers to account, but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow suffers. . . .

This is the tendency of all human governments. A departure from principle becomes a precedent for a second; that second for a third; and so on, till the bulk of society is reduced to mere automatons of misery, to have no sensibilities left but for sinning and suffering… And the fore horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in it’s train wretchedness and oppression.”

Thomas Jefferson