I remember sitting in the front row of the Kansas City Tea Party a couple years ago listening to the keynote speaker. The premise of his speech was simple.

No compromise.

No deals with liberals, no concessions to progressives, no compromise with leftists.

Sound radical? Extreme?

Sounds rational to me.

Here’s why: they never keep their part of the bargain. A deal with a progressive usually consists of two parts: what conservatives will do now and what they will do later.

For example, in 1986 President Reagan granted amnesty and the left promised an end to illegal immigration. How did that work out?

Now, Mitt Romney stands before another “deal,” this time offered by the Obama camp:

“Governor Romney apparently fears that the more he offers, the more our campaign will demand that he provide,” wrote Obama campaign manager Jim Messina in a letter today Romney counterpart Matt Rhoades.

“So,” Messina added, “I am prepared to provide assurances on just that point: if the Governor will release five years of returns, I commit in turn that we will not criticize him for not releasing more — neither in ads nor in other public communications or commentary for the rest of the campaign.”

Sounds like a deal, right?

Until all the Obama surrogates start making demands for more, while the campaign sits back and says, “That’s not us. That’s them. We’re not asking for any more.”

We cannot allow the left to set the terms of the debate. We cannot compromise.

Don’t release the tax forms. Don’t allow them to dictate the terms.

They have no intention of following through.