by Warren Longwell

Created on: September 17, 2010   Last Updated: September 18, 2010

I love watching the Tea Party for the same reason I always loved watching Wylie Coyote chase the Road Runner out beyond the edge of the rock precipice. It’s just a lot of fun to see that look of surprise that comes with the realization there’s nothing underneath but empty air. Sarah Palin had that look on her face when Katy Couric asked her what newspapers she read.

Tea Party candidates will undoubtedly win seats in congress come November, at which time they will come face to face with a number of unsolvable problems. The jobs necessary to bring down unemployment simply no longer exist in sufficient quantity. The national debt can’t come down when people absolutely refuse to pay higher taxes. The war in Afghanistan, like the war 40 years ago in Vietnam, is not something we can win. American public education, already near the worst in the developed world, is getting worse, not better. Deregulation, “getting the government off our backs” in TeaPartyspeak, is guaranteed to result in more episodes like the BP oil spill, and the home mortgage meltdown, and the salmonella-tainted egg recall, and the Wall Street derivatives scam, and the Johnson & Johnson pharmaceutical failures— because as hideous as government is, it’s not nearly as damaging as the unregulated and unprincipled corporate pursuit of profit above all else.

Unsolvable problems are a gift from heaven to a candidate running against the establishment, but a nightmare to an elected official when it comes his or her turn to make things better. The American electorate has basically become ungovernable— a good thing for those outside government looking to get in, and a frightening thing for those in power. One thing I would like to see is a breakdown of the unemployed in America along party line affiliation, because it seems like unemployed Republicans blame the Democrats, and unemployed Democrats blame the Republicans. This, of course, raises the question of what happens when both disgruntled and demoralized groups turn their sights on the Tea Party?

“That hopey, changey thing” is how Sarah Palin sarcastically refers to the optimism of Obama, vintage 2008. Frankly, I can’t see the giddy euphoria of the Tea Party, vintage 2010, becoming any more satisfying to America two years from now. During the next two years, watch for the Wylie Coyote look of helpless resignation and surprise on the face of newly-elected Tea Party honchos. If you like the humor of satire, cynicism and sarcasm, it just can’t get any better.

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