How Important are Grassroot Movements like the Tea Party Express?

Comment

Comment by karen boose on May 29, 2010 at 5:20pm

I agree it is a great insight. I am hoping with all my heart that we all can change the goverment as it is today, to what it was really meant to be.

Comment by WTPUSA on March 24, 2010 at 12:11am

Great insights Rick. Thanks!

Comment by Rick Jackson, MD on March 23, 2010 at 6:47pm

Some today are asking the question , "Are grassroots movements really worth much--can they really have much of an effect ?"

If my memory and understanding of history are correct, our original fight for liberty was very much a grassroots movement. In the days of our revolution against tyrannical government, as today, many were afraid to speak up against the powerful few in a distant capital that controlled so much of their lives, and consistently trampled on their liberty. Many felt the need to appease those who held both power and the reins of their liberty. A vested interest in the status quo is a strong incentive to remain silent -- even in the face of tyranny. Those who risked everything to bring about a "new birth of freedom" in the world, who fought our revolution for freedom and independence, were not, in the beginning, highly organized--were not part of an established party mechanism and were not an organized interest group-- they were just countrymen who cared enough to say "enough is enough--we will be pushed no further! "
Once again, the charge for freedom and limited government is being led by regular Americans -- grassroots Americans, people who are bound by principles rather than power politics, and are willing to be counted as part of another ragtag revolution -- symbolized in our time by the the American Tea Party movement. May God bless this generation of rebels for liberty!

Rick Jackson, MD (AKA Ricky Lee Jackson, website FreedomFamilyandFaith.com)
Battle Ground, WA