“No one believes that the TP [Tea Party] in the aggregate is even the least bit interested in "limited government," nor even understands what that might mean. They're only interested in "limiting" government to the extent of having only Republican presidents; they're only "against" government and they only call for it to be "limited" during Democratic administrations. They've been programmed to believe the "big government tax-and-spend liberal" meme that dates back to Nixon but hasn't been true, if it was ever true at all, since Nixon.
This is the same cohort that in 2004 enthusiastically elected an administration and a congressional majority that had together blown up a balanced budget, created the largest new bureaucracy in over half a century, and enacted the most sweeping curtailment of individual liberty since the Alien and Sedition Acts. In other words, everything they say they're against today, they voted for in 2004, and did so with vehement enthusiasm.
The Tea Party is nothing more or less than a GOP Fan Club. Everything else is made-up post hoc justification for voting Republican. That the GOP has never actually practiced "limited government" nor made any actual attempt to "limit" government while holding the White House is immaterial.”
- GrafZeppelin127 on the Tea Party.
