The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism: on Social Security
Dick Armey:
FreedomWorks focus: reduce government & privatize Soc. Sec.
Just a day after the Santelli rant, the national advocacy organization FreedomWorks dispatched staffers and posted website tips on organizing and locating Tea Party rallies. Soon the organization's President Matt Kibbe and its Chairman Dick Armey teamed
up to write a book they dubbed a "manifesto" for the Tea Party movement. Clearly FreedomWorks was delighted when Tea Party protests started, and did all they could to help conservatives connect with them. But FreedomWorks was hardly some brand-new
insurgent entity. Indeed, the group had been promoting the "Tea Party" idea for years.The DC-headquartered organization by the name FreedomWorks commenced in 2004 as a professionally staffed advocacy organization devoted to training citizens and
politicians at both the state and national levels on behalf of an agenda that includes reducing taxes and removing regulations on business, privatizing Social Security and reducing social-welfare programs, and furthering tort reform and school vouchers.
Source: The Remaking of Republican Conservatism, p.104
Jan 2, 2012
Tea Party:
Older citizens have earned Social Security
We felt skeptical that Tea Partiers opposed major US entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare, given the obvious demographic facts of Tea Party life. Tea Party people know that Social Security, Medicare, and veteran's programs are government-
managed, expensive, and funded with taxes. It is just that they distinguish these programs, which they feel recipients have "earned", from other social benefits, which they feel unnecessarily run up expenses. Or might run up public costs in the future--
placing a burden on hardworking taxpayers to make payments to freeloaders who have not earned public support.Much of the Tea Party brouhaha about the "federal budget deficit" is a preemptive strike against funding for unworthy programs and recipients,
not a call for cutting off spending on programs like Medicare and Social Security that currently benefits people like them. There is a strong sense among Tea Party people that they have earned these social protections through lifetimes of hard work.
Source: The Remaking of Republican Conservatism, p. 59-60
Jan 2, 2012
Tea Party:
Increase the payroll tax to sustain Social Security
Not a single grassroots Tea Party supporter we encountered argued for privatization of Social Security or Medicare. Even a Virginia man who calls Social Security a "Ponzi scheme," noted that the Bush plan for the privatization of Social Security, which
he supported at the time, would have been disastrous for seniors in this economy. There is almost nothing done by the government that the private sector cannot do better; but when pressed on Social Security, he stops short and gropes for a halfway point;
he might privatize the administration, he tentatively suggests, but not the funds themselves.When Tea Partiers expressed concerns to us about Social Security and Medicare, they focused on how to keep the programs solvent, even if additional taxes
might be needed. Indeed, broad surveys show that Tea Party supporters prefer new revenues to sustain Social Security over the long haul. For avowed Tea Party supporters, 2/3 of them support increasing the payroll tax to sustain Social Security.
Source: The Remaking of Republican Conservatism, p. 61-62
Jan 2, 2012
Tea Party:
Think Tanks support privatization; grassroots does not
Rank-and-file Tea Partiers have considerable affection for Social Security and Medicare, even as they pay lip service about slashing federal spending. Grassroots Tea Partiers have a different take than the policy-makers at right-wing ideological think
tanks, for whom Social Security and Medicare are anathema. National groups such as FreedomWorks have long been committed to privatizing these huge, popular US social insurance programs, taking funds out of them so that taxes on business can be reduced.
Right-wing ideologues also hope to boost for-profit businesses that manage savings for retirement. So what happens when FreedomWorks and other ultra-free-market advocacy groups push these privatizing plans in the name of grassroots Tea Partiers, most of
whom are either on Social Security and Medicare already, or expect to be soon? Will local Tea Partiers become skeptical of advocates claiming to speak for them--at least on matters where Tea Party people have concrete experience and views of their own?
Source: The Remaking of Republican Conservatism, p.116-117
Jan 2, 2012
Page last updated: Feb 21, 2019