I am so proud of all attendees putting themselves out there and making their voices heard.
Updated April 17th 2009
By KARL ROVE
Republicans and the Tea Parties
The U.S. went 15 years without a federal tax increase.
Yesterday was Tax Day, and it was marked by large numbers of Americans turning out for an estimated 2,000 tea parties across the country. This movement is significant.
In 1978, California voters enacted Prop. 13 in reaction to steep property taxes. That marked the start of a tax-cutting movement that culminated in Ronald Reagan slashing high national income taxes in the 1980s. Now Americans are reacting to runaway government spending that they were not told about before last year's election, and which Americans are growing to resent.
Derided by elitists as phony, the tea-party movement is spontaneous, decentralized, frequently amateurish and sometimes shrill. If it has a father it is CNBC's Rick Santelli, who called for holding a tea party in Chicago on July 4. Yesterday's gatherings were made up of people who may never meet again (there's no central collection point for email addresses). But the concerns driving people to tea parties are real, growing and powerful. Politicians ignore them at their peril.
One concern is the rise of state and local taxes. New York and California passed multibillion-dollar tax increases this year. Other states are considering significant tax hikes or have enacted tax increases in recent years. The many tax and fee increases enacted or under consideration is angering voters.
Read the full story here...
Thousands of Anti-Tax 'Tea Party' Protesters Turn Out in U.S. Cities
Hundreds of anti-tax rallies kicked off Wednesday in several U.S. cities as demonstrators protested high taxes and massive government spending.
FOXNews.com
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Chants like "Give me liberty, not debt" and "Our kids can't afford you" were heard across several U.S. cities Wednesday as anti-tax "tea party" protesters took to the streets to voice their opposition to big government spending.
Thousands of protesters -- some dressed in colonial wigs with tea bags hanging from their eyeglasses -- showed up in states from California to Kentucky to Massachusetts, holding signs and reading speeches lambasting the Obama administration's tax-and-spend policies.
"I have two little kids and I know we are mortgaging their futures away," one protester at a rally in Austin, Texas told FOX News. "It makes me sick to my stomach."
Read the full story here
