Kosciusko County TEA Party WednesdayWednesday is when taxes are due, but it's also the day when people all across the country will be rallying against high taxes and how tax dollars are spent by elected officials.
In Kosciusko County, a Taxed Enough Already Party rally will be from 5 to 7 p.m. Wednesday at the county courthouse, downtown Warsaw.
"The purpose is to get the attention of representatives in Washington from the president on down," said co-organizer Jon Fussle. The other reasons are to get people active and involved.
"It's a bipartisan movement," said co-organizer Monica Boyer. "We don't care what party people are from. We want a unified voice to say enough is enough. We've been taxed enough."
In addition to being taxed too much already, Fussle said the government needs to stop spending money. The country is bankrupt. The gross national debt, he said, is more than $11 trillion. Including entitlement programs, the debt is more than $63 trillion. "That's 64 percent of our gross domestic product," Fussle said. However, Washington continues to spend and tax more, he said.
"I'm personally outraged Congress didn't read the spending bill before they passed it," said Boyer.
Fussle, Boyer and Jeremiah Heierman decided to organize a Kosciusko County TEA Party rally when they became inundated with e-mails about what the county was going to do Wednesday. Boyer had planned to attend a rally in Indianapolis, but so many people were frustrated locally, the group decided to have a local rally.
"We want them to have a voice in Kosciusko County," Boyer said. Since it was decided to have a TEA Party rally, she said they've been inundated with more e-mails thanking them for a chance to rally.
Boyer said they've invited a bunch of people from different backgrounds to speak, from all parties, to speak who feel the same way about taxation. Tentatively, District 21 State Rep. Jackie Walorski will be there among the speakers.
"We don't want it to be a Republican rally, or a Democrat rally. We want it to be a people's rally. It's not an Obama bash(ing)," said Boyer. She said attendees should not bring materials that bash the president.
What they do want, she said, is for people to feel like they can do something, that they do have a voice. It is a national movement.
"There's going to be a TEA party in about every county across the country," said Fussle.
At the Kosciusko County rally, Fussle said, he will try to speak on the numbers involved so people understand how big the debt is. If nothing is done now, he said, and if the United States continues on its current trend, the national debt will be 224 percent of the gross domestic product by 2040.
"The numbers get scary about how bad this is going to get," Fussle said.
"The bottom line is, our leaders are not listening to us, on both sides of the aisle," Boyer said. The masses are crying out, people are writing letters to their elected officials, but no one in government is listening, she said.
"We want people to bring their friends" to the TEA Party rally, she said. "We want to empower people. We want to meet other grassroots people and for them to connect."
"If people become aware of the problem with others, it's better than becoming aware of it alone," said Fussle.
For the rally, Heierman said the group will be making signs from noon to 2 p.m. today in meeting room A-B at the Warsaw Community Public Library. Bring your own poster board, and they will help with ideas for the posters.
In addition to the TEA Party rally Wednesday, Boyer said they've started a group called 9-12. The group will get together and learn their history, find out what the Founding Fathers actually wanted when they wrote the Constitution, Bill of Rights and other documents.
Heierman said they hope to educate individuals in order to empower them. Going back and reading the Bill of Rights and the Constitution will empower the people to move forward, he said.
Boyer said the 9-12 group is a continuing non-partisan project.
The Boston Tea Party in 1773 was a direct action protest by colonists in Boston, Mass., against the British government. On Dec. 16, 1773, after officials in Boston refused to return three shiploads of taxed tea to Britain, a group of colonists boarded the ships and destroyed the tea by throwing it into Boston Harbor.
The Tea Party was the culmination of a resistance movement throughout British America against the Tea Act, which had been passed by the British Parliament in 1773. Colonists objected to the Tea Act for a variety of reasons, especially because they believed that it violated their constitutional right to be taxed only by their own elected representatives.
The Boston Tea Party was a key event in the growth of the American Revolution.
For more information about Wednesday's rally, visit online at www.teapartyday.com or e-mail kosteaparty@gmail.com
