I'm just going to copy and paste
what I wrote in an older thread on this.
Some thoughts on those planks:
Identify constitutionality of every new law: Require each bill to identify the specific provision of the Constitution that gives Congress the power to do what the bill does (82.03%).
I dare say most significant bills already do this. For example, the text of the beginning of (what, seeing what some Tea Partiers have to say, I assume to be) the most hated part of the most hated bill signed into law this Congressional term (i.e. the individual mandate bit of the health care bill) begins with an explicit and detailed Constitutional, legislative, and policy justification for its inclusion.
That won't stop them from arguing it's unconstitutional.
Reject emissions trading: Stop the "cap and trade" administrative approach used to control pollution by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emissions of pollutants. (72.20%).
Given that 66% of Tea Party sympathizers in the recent
NY Times poll of Tea Partiers either thought climate change doesn't exist or won't have any serious impact, it makes sense that they'd reject something like cap and trade.
But their characterization of it as an administrative approach is exactly backwards. I'll let the CBO explain the two approaches one could take to this problem:
The most fundamental choice facing policymakers is whether to adopt conventional regulatory approaches, such as standards for energy-using machinery and equipment, or to employ market-based approaches, such as taxes on emissions or cap-and-trade programs. Market-based approaches, most experts conclude, would generally limit emissions at a lower cost than command-and-control regulations would. Whereas conventional regulatory approaches would impose specific requirements that might not be the least costly means of reducing emissions, market-based approaches would provide more latitude for firms and households to determine the most cost-effective means of accomplishing that goal.
Cap-and-trade
is a market-based approach aimed at shaping incentives. Not passing it and allowing the EPA to regulate carbon would be the administrative approach.
Demand a balanced federal budget: Begin the Constitutional amendment process to require a balanced budget with a two-thirds majority needed for any tax modification. (69.69%)
One of the primary reasons this hasn't been done before is that it's a terrible idea. Contractionary fiscal policy during good economic times (e.g. the '90s) is fine but during a recession it won't work. Tax revenues fall and spending rising automatically during recessions--this is true even without any sort of stimulus spending. Take away the automatic stabilizers and you'll merely deepen the recession. There are times to seek a balanced budget and there are times when running a deficit is necessary.
As for the two-thirds bit--are there really people out there who want to take the California model for passing a budget national?
Simplify the tax system: Adopt a simple and fair single-rate tax system by scrapping the internal revenue code and replacing it with one that is no longer than 4,543 words -- the length of the original Constitution.(64.9%).
I think there's fairly wide agreement that it's time for a tax simplification.
Here's a decent article on the Wyden-Gregg effort to do exactly that. There's no need to take the progressivity out of the federal income tax, however. The argument that this is "fairer" just doesn't hold up when you consider the tax burdens imposed by things like payroll taxes which, being capped, fall more heavily on 5-figure earners than 6-figure-and-above earners. Part of that inequity is corrected by the fact that the marginal tax rates for dollars earned in those higher categories is higher.
Audit federal government agencies for constitutionality: Create a Blue Ribbon taskforce that engages in an audit of federal agencies and programs, assessing their Constitutionality, and identifying duplication, waste, ineffectiveness, and agencies and programs better left for the states or local authorities. (63.37%)
Sounds like another version of Clinton-Gore's National Performance Review (aside from the bit about assessing the constitutionality of the bureaucracy). Okay.
Limit annual growth in federal spending: Impose a statutory cap limiting the annual growth in total federal spending to the sum of the inflation rate plus the percentage of population growth. (56.57%).
Where is the growth in federal spending going to happen? Let's break government spending down into two categories: 1) Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and Net Interest, and 2) Everything else. Let's start with everything else:
Spending Other Than That for Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and Net Interest, 1962 to 2080 (Percentage of GDP)
Not really running away there. Most of the growth comes from system-wide rising health care costs:
But what does the NYT poll reveal about Tea Party attitudes toward the entitlement programs that drive spending increases?
Overall, do you think the benefits from government programs such as Social Security and Medicare are worth the costs of those programs for taxpayers, or are they not worth the costs?
Worth it/Not worth it/DK
62/33/6
That's somewhat perplexing.
Repeal the health care legislation passed on March 23, 2010: Defund, repeal and replace the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. (56.39%).
Replace with what?
If we look back at the NYT poll, we see this:
Do you approve or disapprove of requiring health insurance companies to cover anyone who applies for health insurance regardless of whether or not they have an existing medical condition or a prior illness?
Approve/Disapprove/DK
59/32/9
The question doesn't ask which level of government should impose this requirement, although given this was one of the major tenets of the bill just signed law, it's not particularly far-fetched to read in the question the distinct possibility the feds would be doing the regulating. Regardless, then you get responses like these:
As long as the federal government provides financial help to those who cannot afford health insurance, do you think the federal government should or should not require all Americans to have health insurance?
Should/Should not/DK
12/85/3
At which point, like most Americans, it becomes difficult to see how the mechanics of their world views are supposed to work.
I see in this thread's incarnation they add a line about "a system that actually makes health care and insurance more affordable by enabling a competitive, open, and transparent free-market health care and health insurance system that isn’t restricted by state boundaries"--i.e. standard boiler plate coupled with the across-state-lines insurance proposal.
First, I look to point out the irony of (I thought) avid Tenth Amendment-ers pushing for across-state-lines insurance sales, since legislatively that amounts to a federal override of 50 state laws, with the feds forcing states to allow insurance policies in their states that currently they choose not to.
Second, this is an idea that has the potential to be disastrous if done incorrectly (i.e. the way it's done in the Shadegg bill that was incorporated into the Republican substitute this year). If it's done with a modicum of sanity that doesn't just allow the industry to write consumer protection-shedding laws at the state level that then apply nationally, okay. The reform law passed this year (which they want to repeal, of course) take steps toward this in two ways:
Sec. 1333. Provisions relating to offering of plans in more than one State. By July 1, 2013, requires the Secretary, in consultation with NAIC, to issue regulations for interstate health care choice compacts, which can be entered into beginning in 2016. Under such compacts, qualified health plans could be offered in all participating States, but insurers would still be subject to the consumer protection laws of the purchaser’s State. Insurers would be required to be licensed in all participating States (or comply as if they were licensed), and to clearly notify consumers that a policy may not be subject to all the laws and regulations of the purchaser’s State. Requires States to enact a law to enter into compacts and Secretarial approval, but only if the Secretary determines that the compact will provide coverage that is at least as comprehensive and affordable, to at least a comparable number of residents, as this title would provide; and that it will not increase the Federal deficit or weaken enforcement of State consumer protection laws.
Sec. 1334. Multi-State Plans. As added by Section 10104, requires the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to contract with health insurers to offer at least two multi-state qualified health plans (at least one non-profit) through Exchanges in each State. Requires OPM to negotiate contracts in a manner similar to the manner in which it negotiates contracts for Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP), and allows OPM to prohibit multi-state plans that do not meet standards for medical loss ratios, profit margins, and premiums. Requires multi-state plans to cover essential health benefits and meet all of the requirements of a qualified health plan; States may require multi-state plans to offer additional benefits, but must pay for the additional cost. Multi-state plans must comply with 3:1 age rating, except States may require more protective age rating. Multi-state plans must comply with the minimum standards and requirements of FEHBP, unless they conflict with the PPACA. Guarantees that FEHBP will maintain a separate risk pool and remain a separate program.
Pass an 'All-of-the-Above' Energy Policy: Authorize the exploration of additional energy reserves to reduce American dependence on foreign energy sources and reduce regulatory barriers to all other forms of energy creation. (55.5%).
Sounds like a pro-drilling, pro-nuclear stance. The President seems to be in their corner on this one.
Reduce Earmarks: Place a moratorium on all earmarks until the budget is balanced, and then require a 2/3 majority to pass any earmark. (55.47%).
I can't tell if this is supposed to be symbolic or if people really think earmarks play a significant part in creating the deficit.
Reduce Taxes: Permanently repeal all recent tax increases, and extend permanently the George W. Bush temporary reductions in income tax, capital gains tax and estate taxes, currently scheduled to end in 2011. (53.38%)
Surprising this is the lowest of the ten priorities. But it leads back to the question that always has to come up. If you don't like those higher (but still historically low by the standards of most of the 20th century) tax rates
and you don't like deficits, then what spending are you specifically going to cut? The only specific spending cut in this entire list is earmarks, or about 1% of the budget (and not a driver of spending increases). A generic "stop spending" plank is questionable without actual suggestions as to how one goes about doing this. Which makes the wisdom of extending deficit-financed tax cuts indefinitely questionable as well.
But we need to scrap it and do something that works, not go back to the same old same old except with a written invitation to race to the bottom. 
