I'm a Right-Wing Extremist

It seems that I have made the Department of Homeland Security’s watch list. Department of Homeland Security Sec. Janet Napolitano has turned her attention away from acts of Islamic jihad on American soil (which she now refers to as "man-caused disasters"). Instead, her department is sounding the alarm over an unquantified "resurgence" in "right-wing extremism activity." On April 7, DHS sent a nine-page warning memo to law enforcement offices across the country titled "Right-wing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment." Yes, me being part of an active conservative group that opposes abortion, favors strict immigration enforcement, lobbies to protect Second Amendment rights, protests big government, advocates federalism or represents veterans who believe in any of the above qualifies me as being a “right-wing extremist.” The report of April 7, includes a sweeping definition of the threat: "Right-wing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration." You cannot ignore the context or the timing of this DHS report. It's no small coincidence that Napolitano's agency disseminated the assessment just a week before the nationwide April 15 Tax Day Tea Party protests. The grassroots events organized by fiscal conservatives, independents, Libertarians and, yes, even some Blue Dog Democrats were fueled by the "current economic and political climate" of bipartisan profligate spending and endless taxpayer-funded bailouts. The growing success of the loose-knit movement has invited scorn, ridicule and fear-mongering from Obama's supporters. Liberal bloggers have likened the Tea Party movement to neo-Nazis, militias and even Weather Underground terrorists. The Obama DHS report is an overarching indictment of conservatives. "Right-wing extremist chatter on the Internet continues to focus on the economy, the perceived loss of U.S. jobs in the manufacturing and construction sectors, and home foreclosures," the assessment warns. When asked, DHS spokeswoman Sara Kuban could not explain who was responsible for this "extremist chatter," she could not and would not name names. The only “extreme” I see here is the use of fear-based and buzz catching words in this report to disguise what the true issue at hand is. If you can redefine dissenting opinion as "hate," you can brand your political opponents as "extremists" and you can marginalize electoral threats. “Antigovernment”…“Pro-enforcement”…“Disgruntled"? Feeling taxed enough already and "recruiting" and "radicalizing" your friends and neighbors through "chatter on the Internet"? We are all right-wing extremists now. Welcome to the club.

I had no idea how important this week's nationwide anti-tax tea parties were until hearing liberals denounce them with such ferocity. Probably upset that they hadn’t come up with a clever idea like that to protest something they battered former President Bush over. Media coverage has been mixed on the subject, with right-leaning news agencies and bloggers praising them and supporting the idea (ahem) while their left-leaning counterparts accuse the protesters of being “crazy people” and childishly joke that these are “tea bagging” parties (referring to a dubious homosexual sexual practice). But, they both seem to be missing the point behind these tea parties and protests. The point of the tea parties is to note the fact that the Democrats' modus operandi is to lead voters to believe they are no more likely to raise taxes than Republicans, get elected and immediately raise taxes. Apparently, the people who actually pay taxes consider this a bad idea.

The problem with Democratic tax policy is that they almost always raise taxes on those who are most productive in society. All Democrats for the last 30 years have tried to stimulate the economy by giving "tax cuts" to people who don't pay taxes. Evidently, offering to expand welfare payments isn't a big vote-getter. Yes, I’m getting back on the topic of the Obama stimulus plan. I’m a Republican and for all of Bush’s shortcomings, I considered him a fine president compared to some alternatives. And even Bush had a stimulus plan where they mailed checks out to everyone. Of course, that didn’t stimulate anything, and we’ve sunk deeper into the hole we’re in now. Now we’re faced with President Obama’s stimulus package, which is the mother of all pork bills with earmarks for anyone and everyone who showed up for session that day. And all that government spending on the Democrats' constituents will be paid for by raising taxes on the productive. This forces and even coerces the productive to will work less, adopt tax shelters, barter instead of sell, turn to an underground economy…and the government will get less money. California tried this Obama style soak-the-productive-in-tax "stimulus" plan years ago and was hailed as the perfect exemplar of Democratic governance. In just a few years, Democrats had turned California into a state, or as it's now known, a "job-free zone", with a $41 billion deficit, a credit rating that was slashed to junk-bond status and a middle class now located in Arizona. Democrats governed California the way Democrats always govern. They bought the votes of government workers with taxpayer-funded jobs, salaries and benefits and then turned around and accused the productive class of "greed" for wanting not to have their taxes raised through the roof. Now, the only way out for California is to tax anything and everything, including Botox and steroids. California was, in fact, a laboratory of Democratic policies. The rabbit died, so now Obama is trying it on a national level.

The perfect bar bet with a liberal would be to wager that massive government deficits in the '80s were not caused by Reagan's tax cuts. If you casually mentioned that you thought Reagan's tax cuts brought in more revenue to the government…which they did…you could get odds in Hollywood and Manhattan.

(Information care-of Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter)