The S-Word: Glenn Beck Refines the Reason Behind the Tea Parties

It's not so much taxes as what creates the necessity to tax. (And look, once again, Rhode Island earns a national mention for a dubious achievement.)

The mainstream media will report on the tea parties as if they're just a bunch of whack-job Republicans who only care about taxes on the rich (like New York's so-called "millionaire's tax" on individuals making $200,000 dollars and couples making $300,000); a third of the average New Yorker's cellphone bill goes to taxes; or smokers (like those in Rhode Island who are ticked off that their state's cigarette tax would rise to $3.46 a pack — the highest in the country); or the proposed 10 percent "tanning salon tax" in Utah; the proposed "streetlight user fee" that would add $51 a year to electric bills in Washington, D.C.; the 3 percent "bed tax" on anyone silly enough to spend the night in a hotel room in the state of Nevada, best known for Las Vegas, which has the largest hotels in the world.

If the Tea Parties were only about taxes, there would still be a great case for them. Americans pay more in taxes than on food, clothing and housing combined.

But, they're not. They're about the reason for our taxes, which is an out-of-control government that can't control its spending.

Add up all the bailouts so far and Congress, the Treasury Department and the Fed have spent, lent and guaranteed a total of $12.8 trillion, an amount that's practically equal to our country's entire GDP.

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Oh, I almost forgot about the pesky issue of $1.25 quadrillion in total debt, which represents the worst-case scenario for our Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security obligations.