They still don't get it 052609 - The Augusta Chronicle

They still don't get it 052609 - The Augusta Chronicle

Much of the left-leaning "mainstream" media thought the nationwide series of Boston Tea Party-inspired protests earlier this year was a joke. Literally.

CNN's Anderson Cooper recently apologized during a speech for joking about the tea-party protesters in a subtle but profane on-air comment.

Cooper claimed in his apology that "I don't think it's my job to disparage, or encourage" protests. Of course, the former is precisely what he did. And his network hardly covered the run-up to the tea parties on April 15, in which hundreds of thousands of Americans came out to rally against government overspending.

How can news organizations ignore that movement without revealing an agenda opposed to it?

Well, we suspect the "mainstream" media still don't get it.

This isn't a Fox News event, as Cooper and others want to make out. This isn't a fringe movement (although if it was a left-wing fringe movement, the media would be all over it). This is about real Americans who are deeply concerned about the legacy of debt Washington is leaving to our children and grandchildren, and the high taxes that have already been pushed at us to compensate for all the spending.

And not just in Washington.

California politicians, unable to control themselves and their spending, asked voters May 19 for a series of tax hikes to subsidize the bloated and wasteful ways of that state's government.

Voters responded with a resounding series of "No!" votes.

Taken together, the votes add up to one thing: a tax revolt.

If the "mainstream" media pay attention to that fact at all, they may record that the tax revolt movement began May 19 in California. But only because they chose to ignore or marginalize all the other Americans who took to the streets earlier this year as part of the tea party movement.

The movement began months ago. But the stunning -- and wonderful -- California vote gives wind and further credibility to the tax-reform movement already under way.

This is huge news that may be lost on the major media: Supporters of the California tax hikes outspent opponents by a monumental margin of 10 to 1 -- and still were routed at the ballot box.

Neither the media nor the politicians get it.

Well, some do.

"I think the message was clear from the people: Go all out and make those cuts and live within your means," Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said.

That's what should have happened in the first place.

The election "may mark the end of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger as a compromising moderate willing to talk tough, but ultimately postpone the state's hardest budget decisions," writes Capitol Weekly .

A New York Times writer was content to blame "direct democracy" for the problem, and called voters' decision to limit elected officials' pay in times of financial crisis "a sort of chin-out electoral scowl."

Right. It was a childish tantrum.

Good grief.

When will they figure out Americans have had enough?