|
|
Mike Lee on Principles & Values |
GOMEZ: This election is about putting people before politics. Congressman Markey has had 37 years down there to get things done in terms of immigration reform, comprehensive tax reform, entitlement reform. Give me 17 months and I will keep my word and I don't need 37 years like Congressman Markey has had.
Q: 17 months is the time left in John Kerry's term, but you would be just one of 100 members of the Senate. How are you going to break the gridlock in Washington singlehandedly?
GOMEZ: If a Navy SEAL can talk a Peace Corps volunteer into marrying him, I think I can work with anybody. I look forward to working with President Obama, I look forward to working with all the senators in DC I have been bipartisan my whole life. That's the problem we have in DC right now. We have such a high level of cynicism, fiscal mismanagement and hyper partisanship. And the issues are so big that we need to reach across the aisle, respect the other side and get things done.
The solution, I proposed, is for the American people to demand that whenever any member of Congress votes to fund a federal program or create a new one, that person should explain where Congress gets its constitutional authority to run that program.
As our nascent, limited-government movement gathered supporters and volunteers, we decided to form an organization to serve as the vehicle for the message of constitutionally limited government. We named the organization the "Article I Society," recognizing the part of the Constitution that outlines the basic powers that properly belong to the federal government. By November 2009, the Article I Society had signed up hundreds of volunteers from nearly every part of the state.
Bennett was widely considered to be a "good guy" who was mostly reliable on Republican issues. Most notably for the delegates from Utah, he had voted for the Wall Street bailout. As Bennett spoke to the gathering, the chant of "TARP, TARP, TARP" echoed across Convention Hall. Bennett was ultimately replaced by the Tea Party underdog candidate Mike Lee, a staunch supporter of limited government and the very first signer of the Contract from America.
One pundit fumed, "It is a damn outrage." Another wailed, "It's almost a nonviolent coup." Get used to it, guys.
The Tea Party movement is a populist conservative social movement in the United States that emerged in 2009 through a series of locally and nationally coordinated protests. The protests were partially in response to several Federal laws: the stimulus package; te healthcare bill; and the TARP bailouts. The name "Tea Party" refers to the Boston Tea Party of 1773, the source of the phrase, "No Taxation Without Representation."