The Tea Party Is A Favorite Scapegoat For Liberal Democrats

There was a saying I heard a lot when I was growing up. Whenever someone got into trouble, they would say “the devil made me do it”. I said it then and I’ll say it now. Mr. Lucifer received a lot of blame for things he had nothing to do with. It was just an easy way to shed the blame for the wrongdoing some people were involved in. Such is the case with the modern version of that phrase. Whenever you ask liberal Democrats who their worst nemesis is, you are almost certain to hear something that blames the Tea Party for all their woes.

The latest liberal Democrat to use the Tea Party as a scapegoat is Representative Henry Waxman of California. He recently announced his retirement from Congress, after serving in Washington for some forty years. John Hayward has a few observations about Mr. Waxman and his low opinion of the Tea Party.

Human Events - Forty years is far too long for anyone to serve in Congress, but apparently it’s just long enough for Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA).  This fixture of the Democratic establishment – who, as blogger David Freddoso observes, just last month pumped out a long essay explaining why it was important for him to run again – announced on Thursday that he would not run for re-election this fall.

So why the sudden change of heart?  Well, of course, there are those Tea Party rascals to consider, and the stubborn refusal of so many representatives to fall into lockstep with the Obama agenda.  From the New York Times:

Mr. Waxman, 74, joins the growing list of House members who are calling it quits, many in disappointment over the partisanship and ineffectiveness of a Congress that may end up as the least productive in history.

“It’s been frustrating because of the extremism of Tea Party Republicans,” Mr. Waxman said in an interview on Wednesday. “Nothing seems to be happening.”

As the waaaaaambulance pulls up to take Rep. Waxman away, the rest of us can reflect on the debt of gratitude we owe the Tea Party for improving Congress.  Bitterly partisan to the end, he couldn’t just say “I’m 74 and it’s a good time to retire.”  He had to take a few shots on his way out.  Let me know when those Tea Party guys muscle through a half-written trillion-dollar bill on a party-line vote after working the back rooms for a couple of weeks to arrange kickbacks and carve-outs, Mr. Waxman.  Then we can have a nice discussion about “extremism.”

I’ll be the first to tell you, I am not in complete and total agreement with the Tea Party. I believe the group has good and bad in it, just as the Republican Party has good and bad in it. That said, they have been successful at wrenching the discussions taking place in Washington back to many of their proper priorities. Fiscal issues have taken center stage in a major way, due in large part to the sentiments being displayed by a loose-knit group of people whose name is an acronym for Taxed Enough Already.

Taking into consideration any disagreements I might have with the Tea Party, I believe they are being blamed for a lot of things of which they are not guilty. Liberal Democrats love to use them as a scapegoat, to blame them for the gridlock that seems to be the norm in Congress. I call nonsense on that. The members of Congress who identify with the Tea Party are often accused of being unwilling to compromise. That is exactly the sentiment being expressed by Henry Waxman. What liberal Democrats decline to tell America is what their idea of compromise really is. They want conservatives and members of the Tea Party to roll over and play dead. The only compromise they are interested in is one in which they receive everything they want and at the same time, giving the “extremists” on the right nothing in return. Exactly how is that real compromise?

When the Tea Party decides to dig in their heels and say enough is enough, they are accused of extremism. It’s all their fault the debt ceiling is not raised. It’s the Tea Party that caused Congress to grind to a halt over the tax and spend policies of the liberal Democrats. Or so we are told. Again, I call that nonsense.

Henry Waxman may have gotten tired of trying to entice the Tea Party to accept the liberal Democrats’ idea of compromise. He made his feelings about the Tea Party very clear in his statement. My advice to him is this. He can not hide behind the scapegoat of the Tea Party forever. Sooner or later, the truth about what he calls compromise will be placed on full pubic display. I wonder what excuse he will use then?