Tea Party Anyone?

Victory in the French and Indian War had been  costly for the British. After the war's conclusion in 1763, King George the third and his government looked to taxing the American colonies as a way of raising the money for their war costs. They were also looking for ways to reestablish control over the colonies that had become more independent while the England was distracted by the war. A series of actions including the Stamp Act, the Townsend Acts, and the Boston Massacre angered the colonists, straining relations with the British. But it was the Englands attempt to tax tea that caused the colonists to act and laid the groundwork for the American Revolution.

The colonies refused to pay the taxes required by the Townsend Acts claiming they had no obligation to pay the taxes imposed by a Parliament in which they had no representation. In response, Parliament retracted the taxes with the exception of a duty on tea - a demonstration of Parliament's ability and right to tax the colonies. In May of 1773 Parliament came up with a plan. They gave the struggling East India Trading Company a monopoly on the importation of tea to the American Colonies. Additionally, Parliament reduced the duty tax the colonies would have to pay for the imported tea. The Americans would now get their tea at a cheaper price than ever before. However, if the colonies paid the duty tax on the imported tea they would be acknowledging Parliament's right to tax them. Tea was a staple of colonial life - it was assumed that the colonists would rather pay the tax than deny themselves the pleasure of a cup of tea. But they were wrong On December 16, 1773, two hundred men, some disguised as Indians, assembled on a near-by hill. Whopping war chants, the crowd marched two-by-two to the wharf, descended upon the three ships and dumped their offending cargos of tea into the harbor waters. "The Boston Tea Party, 1773,"  (2002).

Fast Forward 235 years later. Wall Street is Crashing, Banks are falling, The housing Market in shambles, and the Auto Industry is on the verge of failing. President Bush decides we must act now, Congress says These industries are too big to fail. So they come up with TARP. Toxic Assets Relief Plan. 700 billion dollars of Taxpayer money to help keep these companies afloat. The American people start to realize this is wrong. Then Presidential Candidate Obama, Campaigning on Hope and Change starts criticizing the President for TARP, and the Bailouts of the Auto Industry says action needs to be taken. While this is going on the Federal reserve uses its independent authority to spend 1.2 Trillion dollars on troubles assets.  Obama then wins Election, and then Dumps more of the Taxpayer Money into the system with a Stimulus that has cost over one trillion dollars. Many Americans have had enough. We know after all of this spending the government will need to recoup the money that they have spent. The government no longer looks to represent the people, but control them. On April 15, 2009 the new Tea Party movement was launched it was Tax Day, We wanted to let the government know that they need to start listening, or they can pack their bags. It has been around a year, and they are still not listening. They dismiss us as racist, right-wing extremists who hate seeing a black person as President, but we realize this didn't start with Obama, Spending has been going on for a while. Obama is just the current president who will not change the current climate in Washington. We cannot stay silent any longer. As Thomas Jefferson said, "All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent."