It was a rowdy crowd that attended today's tax day tea party rally in Albuquerque at the Independence Grill. Beware these protesters were toting signs, flags, horns, and even hanging every pink pig they could find from trees.
UPDATED WITH AUDIO POSTS:We talked exclusively with NM National Guard General Greg Zanetti, who's lining up to run for governor in New Mexico next year, and with Rio Grande Foundation President Paul Gessing at the event.
Both men say fiscal responsibility will fix the country's problems faster than exorbitant government spending.
We also shot lots of pictures at the Tea Party Rally near Louisiana and Montgomery Blvd. Watch this slide show while you listen to comments from Zanetti and Gessing.
Zanetti Says Government needs to fund projects that create wealth.
Republican Greg Zanetti, who’s in the process of launching his 2010 gubernatorial, spent a few minutes talking to us. Zanetti says, “We have a spending problem that you can’t solve with more spending, a debt problem you don’t solve with more debt, and a borrowing problem you don’t solve with more borrowing.” Listen to our exclusive interview with Zanetti here.
“If we’re going to be a nation of free men and women then you have to have less government, less regulation, less taxes, less spending and less borrowing,” said Zanetti. “That’s the solution. It’s more freedom.”
We asked Zanetti what he’d do to in New Mexico if he’s elected governor. He told us he’d start right in the governor’s office and blamed Richardson for increasing the personal staff “exponentially.”
“We have reached to far into the lives of New Mexicans. We can cut back across the board,” Zanetti said.
“We have an entitlement philosophy that has permeated the entire state. We are rewarding those people who are not productive. That’s where the waste and abuse comes in. And of course, we’ve got a government that doesn’t trust the people and therefore the people don’t trust the government. That’s a bad cocktail,” said Zanetti.
Zanetti says the country needs to look for programs that which will lead to wealth production and wealth creation. He says he supports infrastructure projects, but says he’d cut venereal disease education and even public arts in tough times. He says the government needs to prioritize it’s spending.
Grassroots effort won't stop at the end of today's tea party.
Rio Grande Foundation President Paul Gessing tells us his group supports individual liberty and limited government. He says taxes and government spending is out of control.
Listen to his comments here.
Gessing says just because there has been an economic turn down it doesn’t mean the country should change to a socialist/leftist ideology. He says both parties have been responsible for the path “we are currently on.”
He believes the people turning out for this rally should have been on the street when the last administration was setting records for its own government spending beginning in 2004 and 2005.
Gessing told me that today’s grassroots effort won’t end the cries for smaller government. He says he working with the Tea Party Rally organizers to have another event on July 4th.
Gessing told us the Federal Government should take a cue from New Mexico’s leaders who tighten their belts when revenue projections fell.
He supports a balanced budget amendment and wants a “super majority,” or 2/3 vote requirement in both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House for any tax increase proposal.
