Quote from trefoil:
Rubes, the buncha you (AK excepted, natch).
I mean, c'mon, all of you decided, a year before anyone was going to cast a vote, that Obama was in deep doodoo and the Congress was going to go 100% Republican.
On the basis of...
I never could figure that out.
The FL governor is deeply unpopular, as is the governor of OH and WI. All of them Tea Party favorites.
Hmm, could it be that maybe, just maybe, the Tea Party is, to the extent it ever was real, a very very debatable proposition, already turning to dust and ashes?
Ron Paul, who is to the Tea Party what Satchel Paige was to the old Negro Leagues, has yet to win a Republican primary.
The REAL issue is, has been, and always will be, for the vaunted base of the Republican Party, abortion. Second to that, gay marriage. Batting third, race.
Ron Paul, innocent that he was, thought they meant it when they said they wanted strict interpretations of the Constitution. He gave them what they said they wanted, and they booed him.
It will always be about social issues for the base, because that base is nothing but the old Dixiecrats. They're as interested in the Constitution as Hugh Hefner is in the intelligence of the next Playmate he gets to bop.
The Tea Party politicians are in trouble for one main reason. They violated the number one rule of managing expectations. Under promise and over deliver.
They were elected on the premise that they were going to get into office and tear things up with drastic changes. That is an impossibility in our current system. You must have a super majority to push an agenda like that, and in states where that sort of majority exists, the red meat issues have already been handled according to Tea Party principals. Look at the most Red states in the nation like Utah. The Tea Party holds no influence there, because there aren't really any drastic changes that they would make.
States like Wisconsin go back and forth between parties, so the Tea Party can mobilize and get someone nominated. Once in power, that person realizes that 90% of what they promised isn't possible without additional support. So those who oppose the Tea Party mantra are angry about the changes that were made, and those who support the Tea Party are angry that not enough changes were made. Then you end up with a Scott Walker and Nikki Haley with very low approval ratings and being hated by the vast majority of voters.