The Age of Reason

Thursday, April 16, 2009, 12:00 PM

Just a few comments about the Joplin Tea Party:

First, John Putnam, who was introduced as an "organizer" of the event, shared with the crowd approximately 50,000 principles (actually, I think it was 10) he believed the Founding Fathers would want us to follow to maintain our freedom. One of those principles happened to have something to do with Obama's birth certificate. A prescient bunch, those founders.

In any case, the crowd cheered loudly when Putnam bravely broached the birth certificate "issue." He explained again that, "as a Fee Agent for the Carthage License Office," (just how did he get the job and how long will he keep it ?) he was well positioned to understand that if the rabble had to show a birth certificate to get a driver's license, it wasn't too much to ask a presidential candidate to show one to prove he wasn't beamed here from Tralfamadore. Well, he didn't use the Vonnegut reference, probably because Kurt is not on his approved reading list, but his point was the same. That, he said, is why he asked Sen. McCaskill about it because as a member of Congress she might have some authority to get to the bottom of it.

Notwithstanding the nuttiness of Putnam's mentioning this nonsense as some kind of oblique threat to our liberty, it is more than disingenuous to assert that he only asked Sen. McCaskill the question so she could somehow try to resolve the issue. He knew what her position would be. She was one of Obama's first and most ardent supporters in the Congress. I suspect the real point of bringing it up the night she was here, and at the Tea Party, was to arouse suspicion in those who were only vaguely familiar with it, and to stoke the hostility among those who knew it inordinately well, all of which serves to keep the phony issue alive to undermine the president's policies, if not the president himself.

In an attempt to sound "fair and balanced," Putnam tried to qualify his remarks about the birth certificate with this:

I don't say that to disparage Barack Obama. He might be a fine man, I'm not sure.

Now, that bit of dancing around the puddle he made simply isn't enough to excuse his public infatuation with Obama's alleged illegitimacy as president. After the 2000 election, when extremists on the left were upset with the Bush victory via the Supreme Court, I recall conservatives hammering those extremists for their lack of respect for the "courts" and the "process." If Putnam really isn't trying to disparage Barack Obama, he should do what conservatives told liberals to do in 2000: Get over it and move on. You lost.

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The second curious thing about the Tea Party was the use of children as props for reinforcing political points. Some of these children were holding signs saying things like, "USA not USSR." Given the ages of many of these children, it is highly unlikely they knew much if anything about the Soviet Union, not to mention the implication that what is going on in our country somehow resembles that former totalitarian giant.

Sadly, these children were deemed useful props because one of the themes of the rally was that we are passing on a tremendous debt to our children and grandchildren. Well, we may be, if the debt is never repaid; that is, we may be, if future Republicans--who want to spend, spend, spend and simultaneously cut the taxes of the wealthy-- get another opportunity to squander the surplus handed to them by future Democrats.

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Which leads me to another "theme" of the party. A populist rally that essentially and aggressively promotes lower taxes for our wealthiest citizens is a very strange populist rally. Having previously doubted the liberal critique of the whole Tea Party idea as simply rich conservatives manipulating gullible citizens, I now have to wonder. There were many loyal bubbabots in the audience who actually cheered when someone from the podium protested the high tax rate on the wealthy. Now, that is a fine piece of elitist workmanship that would have William Jennings Bryan rolling in his Fundamentalist grave.

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Finally, many of the speeches were liberally peppered with quotes from Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine. Now, I suspect many, if not all, of those who spoke are committed Christians. And to quote Jefferson and Paine like they were Jesus and Paul is a little disconcerting.

I have in my library a copy of the Jefferson Bible, a handy little volume because it doesn't take up much shelf space, since the Founding Father cut out the parts of the New Testament that didn't suit his fancy. I also have a copy of The Age of Reason, Thomas Paine's commentary on the Bible, which contains many reasons for not believing the Good Book, useful for those after-church picnic discussions or Wednesday-night Bible studies.

So, I was a little offended that the pious defenders of our contemporary liberty have resorted to quoting deists and atheists (I thought I heard a Ben Franklin reference during the proceedings).

Anyway, given the revolutionary implications of the Tea Party, I thought I would pass on a friendly Biblical reminder to those whose thoughts might be turning, Texas-like, toward an insurrection:

"For rebellion as is the sin of witchcraft." 1 Samuel, 15:23