When Standard and Poor’s made the unprecedented decision last week to remove the government of the United States of America from its list of risk-free borrowers, it was immediately-and rightly-dubbed by many as a “Tea Party downgrade.”
Sen. John Kerry and former White House adviser David Axelrod, just to name two, insisted that the responsibility for the downgrade was the result of the fringe Republican group in Congress acting out of sheer brinksmanship with the American economy. By playing hardball with the very leaders of their own Republican Party, Axelrod said, the Tea Party “brought us to the brink of default,” adding that “this is essentially a Tea Party downgrade.”
But what’s really behind this? With the Tea Party members of Congress sitting at the helm of this horrid spectacle of economic terrorism, it again raises the specter of race as an unspoken yet powerful driving force. It is an aspect of this debt-ceiling calamity that few, if any, have spoken about. However, it’s nonetheless there, as plain as the dome of the Capitol building.
The Tea Party has always been shrouded in a subtle cloak of racial insensitivity. They don’t quite wear it on their sleeves, but they have mastered the wink-and-nod art of coded language. Their leaders and candidates regularly speak of the need to “take our country back,” offering a message that is as clear as it is uncompromising. For them, it’s troublesome that a Democrat is president of the United States-but it’s horrifying that he’s Black.
Let’s not sugarcoat it: There has always been something more than mildly repugnant to this fringe of the Republican right about the nation’s first African-American president. It’s embedded in the very DNA of the Tea Party. It shows up in their marches, their members’ placards, in their very lack of decorum toward President Barack Obama and in the “birther” campaign pursued by many Tea Party members.
Of course, there are truly pointed philosophical differences between them and the White House. The Tea Party is committed to cutting spending and committed to never, ever even pretending to consider the idea of raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans, no matter how many subsidies their companies get from the government. Likewise, in the debt-ceiling debate, the Tea Party played its role to the hilt, blocking a comprehensive deal between Republican leaders and the president that might have prevented the downgrade.
Nevertheless, there is far more to this than just differences of political and economic strategy. The Tea Party is determined that Obama be vilified, humiliated and, above all, defeated. Their passion is so strong, so rabid that they have determined that the country’s historically stellar credit rating be damned, so long as their core objective is achieved.
The Tea Party’s fight on the Hill didn’t quite hit the mark with American citizens, though. While Obama’s approval ratings have taken a hit, they are much higher than those for Congress, which, according to recent polls, are in the teens. This could represent an important opportunity for Obama.
What’s a president to do? First and foremost, show presidential leadership. The president will never have the support, let alone the good will, of this hysterical cadre of the right. Therefore, he might as well play to the common sense of the rest of America. On a fiscal front, for example, he might redouble his efforts to champion the notion of ending tax subsidies for oil and ethanol-a move that would reduce spending by $100 billion over the next decade.
However, more fundamentally, he would do well to fasten himself with renewed vigor to the cause of job creation, something he has already begun to do. It’s the heartaching spot that resonates with most Americans now. If he makes a clear case to the American people that he is the champion of providing jobs for his fellow citizens–along with forceful action-it would go a long way.
If he moves with the passion that propelled him to the White House to take up the banner of increased investment in infrastructure-refurbishing roads and bridges, for example-and “green buildings” as a way to create jobs, the president would make a case so strong, so convincing that even his wildest detractors-whatever their motivation-would find themselves in a political checkmate.
