Don’t tread on me

Michael Barone devotes a superb column to explicating the true meaning of the Tea Party movement. In “Tea partiers embrace liberty, not big government,” Barone situates the Tea Party movement at one end of “an argument between the heirs of two fundamental schools of political thought, the Founders and the Progressives.” Barone describes it as an old argument that has “been raised again by the expand-government policies of the Obama administration and Democratic congressional leaders.” Barone optimistically observes that “[m]ost Americans… are rejecting the path of dependence and are intent on declaring their independence once again.” Here’s hoping.
FOOTNOTE: Anyone seeking to understand the ideological origins of the Progressive movement and its assault on the Constitution should spend some time with Hillsdale College Professor R.J. Pestritto’s invaluable Woodrow Wilson and the Roots of Modern Liberalism and American Progressivism: A Reader. I wrote about Professor Pestritto’s brilliant Wilson book a few years ago here (part 1) and here (part 2).
Professor Pestritto drily observes in the Wilson book: “[W]hile the history of the twentieth century subsequent to Wilson might be cause for reevaluation, Wilson contended that modern democracy would not degenerate into tyranny, even though ‘many theoretical politicians the world over confidently expect modern democracies to throw themselves at the feet of some Caesar.’” It’s an observation that is especially pertinent to the argument Barone explicates.