<http://newsmax.com/InsideCover/R--Emmett-Tyrrell-tea/2010/04/26/id/356932
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Tyrrell believes conservatism in America was “damaged heavily” during the presidency of George W. Bush.
“That’s why I say ‘after the hangover.’ They spent money like drunken sailors — and I mean no offense to drunken sailors,” he says.
“But the liberals participated, and the liberals have gone even further.
“In the meantime a wonderful new crop of conservatives — the tea party people, for instance — have come aboard and given vibrancy to conservatism and returned us to our liberty-loving roots.
“There is nothing particularly new about the tea party . . . The Federalist Papers and the Founding Fathers set the tone for American political discourse, for our belief in liberty in this country and our belief in limited government. The tea party is just a renaissance of those ideas.”
Asked why Palin is such a lightning rod for liberals, Tyrrell responds: “Liberals are phony sophisticates. And in their phoniness they really hate the middle class. They really hate middle-class values. She embodies middle-class values, and she does it with charm and it drives them mad.
“They can’t rattle her. I think that’s because she’s good-natured.”
Tyrrell calls talk that the tea party people are dangerous and violent “nonsense,” and adds: “For a large group of people, it’s a pretty good- natured group. I call it in the book a civic upheaval of good-natured people defending American values.” Tyrrell expresses concern about the increase in federal spending under President Barack Obama.
“I am fearful that he has already run up such an extravagant bill in terms of future payments that will be borne by our children,” he tells Newsmax.
“Certainly it’s going to take a long slog to get out of it. But [conservatives] have the leadership and we really have the principles. Our principles are so sound, particularly in economics, that the socialist Indians, the communist Chinese picked up our ideas for economic growth a decade or more ago, and look at how vibrant their economies are. They learned from us and we can learn from them now. It’s our views that are spreading, not Obama’s.”