By Glen Meakem
Published in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review
September 20, 2009

A summer of discontent drew to a close last weekend as about a million Americans protested in Washington, D.C. Aerial photographs, police and foreign press reports confirm the number despite underreporting by left-leaning media.

The Washington marchers and others who have protested at tea parties across America have a simple message:

They object to an increasingly intrusive government, runaway spending and debt, higher taxes and government-run health care. They want our government to be limited — focused on preserving our liberty and not controlling our lives.

Although Washington and media elites have ignored or denied the tea party phenomenon since its spontaneous rise early this spring, the movement has grown as Americans of all stripes have become increasingly concerned that what is at stake in our political debates is much more than temporary economic, defense or social policies.

People are concerned that President Obama and the liberal Democratic Party majorities in the House and Senate will make fundamental changes that will damage America forever.

A majority of Americans do not want health care reform that will take more decision-making power away from them and their doctors and drive up the taxpayer-borne cost of health care by more than $1 trillion over the next decade. They observe the government-dominated health care systems in Canada, Great Britain and other countries and say “no thanks.” Market-based reforms that enable people to bear responsibility and make their own decisions would be much better.

A majority of Americans do not want an energy tax — whether called “cap and trade” or the “green jobs bill” — that will increase average household energy costs by $3,000 per year and eliminate 4 million jobs by some estimates.

That’s especially true when this enormous sacrifice is being called for based on politics and not hard scientific facts. To wit, President Obama’s EPA administrator, Lisa Jackson, says the bill will not improve our environment.

Rational conservation would be much better.

Additionally, a majority of Americans do not want increased unionization forced on them by the elimination of their right to a secret ballot in union-organizing elections. The fact our new president and his Democratic Party want this legislation — with a binding arbitration provision that essentially empowers the government to set wage rates — has betrayed the fact that they are the party of ideologically motivated authoritarian control in America.

Individual liberty would be much better.

A majority of Americans do not want government that grows faster than inflation and population growth, forcing higher and higher levels of taxation.

Fiscal restraint would be much better.

A majority of Americans believe in the free-market system. They understand that this — and not government spending and government programs — is the source of our wealth and success as a nation.

They do not approve of bailouts, subsidies, special deals and government ownership.

Fair competition and just being left alone would be much better.

A majority of Americans believe in the rule of law. They do not approve of people who are convicted of voter intimidation being released by political order.

They do not approve of professional CIA officers who had previously been investigated and cleared — whom the president said should not be investigated — suddenly being brought under the microscope of a politically motivated special prosecutor.

They do not approve when the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee (America’s chief tax law writer) appears to have evaded and underpaid his own taxes for years. They do not approve when the government abrogates contracts to give ownership of a bankrupt auto company to the auto union and the government instead of to bondholders.

Equal and consistent application of the law would be much better.

America is great because of its liberty. This year the middle of America has been roused to liberty’s defense. Millions will not go back to their private lives until our leadership in Washington is changed and liberty’s future is secured.

America never will be “perfect.” But these millions will keep America free and great.