“Honk if I’m paying your mortgage” (bumper sticker)

The tea party movement of 2009 protested against reckless government spending. The Tennessee Republican Party issued a bumper sticker in February 2009: “Honk if you’re paying my mortgage.” Several pundits claimed that the bumper sticker should have read “Honk if I’m paying your mortgage”—where the car owner is the taxpayer/sucker and the honking cars are the freeloaders. Why would a car owner advertise being on government assistance? Either way, the message is that some people are taxpayers/suckers while others are freeloaders.
 
The bumper sticker saying has expanded to other government spending programs, with stickers such as: “Honk if I’m paying your healthcare.”
   
 
Zazzle.com
Honk If I’m Paying Your Mortgage
Bumper Sticker
         
VN Boards
deviled_egg
Date Posted: 3/15/07 4:04pm Subject: RE: OT: How do wireless headphones work?
honk if i’m paying your mortage
 
Michelle Malkin
“HONK if you’re paying my mortgage”
By Michelle Malkin •  February 26, 2009 12:05 PM
The Tennessee Republican Party takes on the federal mortgage entitlement mentality.
 
I’m buying one of these bumper stickers today (though I’m a renter, I like their message).
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From commenter twofoot: “Shouldn’t it be, “Honk if I’m paying your mortgage”?
 
And from commenter tre: “I’m paying their mortgage. But they’re not paying my rent. Something ain’t right here!”

Exactly.
 
Instapundit
February 26, 2009
HONK! If you’re paying my mortgage.
UPDATE: Reader Charles Allen writes:
 
Any conservatives that place these well-intentioned TNGOP bumper-stickers on their cars might end up catching a lot of unexpected heat (and hand gestures) from people thinking that *they* are the sub-prime deadbeats.
 
Shouldn’t the proper message of outrage be “Honk if I’m paying *your* mortgage”??
 
Several readers have written to this effect, but I think the bumper stickers are better as written. This way, everyone who sees them feels like a sucker — the other way, it makes the bumper sticker owner the sucker. Which is more politically effective?
Posted by Glenn Reynolds at 12:08 pm
   
Texas Insider
12:24 pm CST - February 26, 2010
The TEA Party Effort One Year Along
By Adrian Murray
One year ago, on February 27, 2009, a few 1,000 people gathered outside the Cowtown Grill in Fort Worth.  Some carried signs reading “Taxed Enough Already”.  No one there knew each other, but all were there for a common purpose, even if we could not easily articulate it at the time.  We knew it was something much deeper than taxes & spending. 
 
Other signs read, “Honk if I’m paying your mortgage.”  Some decried the “Porkulous” bill, federal spending, states’ rights.
 
WLWT Cincinnati
Thousands Rally Downtown Against Government Spending
POSTED: 11:04 pm EDT March 15, 2009
CINCINNATI—Thousands of Tri-State residents gathered Sunday on Fountain Square in downtown Cincinnati to voice their opposition to government spending bills recently signed by President Barack Obama
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The group called itself the Cincinnati Tea Party, modeled after the Boston Tea Party of 1773.
 
Many of the demonstrators carried signs with slogans that said, “Honk if I’m paying your mortgage” or “Stop spending my allowance.”
     
Nice Deb
Obama’s Broken Promises and America’s Growing Anger
March, 30, 2010 — nicedeb
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COMMENTS
gsr Says:
March, 30, 2010 at 4:41 pm
“Honk, if I’m paying your healthcare!”
     
Annuit Coeptis
Page added: 12:21 UTC, Thursday, 1st April 2010
Congressman Hank Johnson: A good excuse for drug testing
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COMMENTS
NEPAConservative says:
April 2, 2010 at 5:33 pm
Good thing he’s got one of the best health plans out there. Honk if I’m paying your health care PING!