It's open internecine warfare now, folks.

The Tea Party Fringeballs have brought this upon themselves....very poor stategic thinking (or lack, thereof).

WASHINGTON — Former Ohio congressman Steven LaTourette is wading into the GOP's civil war, hoping to provide reinforcements to mainstream Republican candidates battling Tea Party contenders in primaries across the country.

His weapon of choice: a new super PAC and an $8 million fundraising goal.

LaTourette said he's tired of watching super-conservative advocacy groups pick off moderate Republicans in favor of ideologues who either can't win a general election, or, if they do, have little desire to make Washington work.

"Some well-funded groups on the far right . . . took the energy of the Tea Party and raised a lot of money from wealthy individuals," he said. Instead of using it to "grow the Republican majority," he lamented, they've spent it defeating GOP pragmatists.

"We've sort of been sitting on our hands and letting them wipe out a number of our guys," he said. "It's time to stand up for ourselves."

The former congressman represented Ohio's 14th congressional district for nine terms, earning a reputation as a moderate consensus-builder before retiring last year. Now a Washington lobbyist, LaTourette has not been shy about criticizing the Tea Party wing of his party, particularly House Republican insurgents, as "bomb throwers" and "obstructionists."

But this new effort will put LaTourette front-and-center in an escalating battle between establishment Republicans and hard-core conservatives. The struggle was on full display during the government shutdown — driven by conservatives' push to defund the federal health care reform law, over the objections of more establishment-minded Republicans.

The GOP split was also highlighted in this week's elections, most notably in a GOP congressional primary in Alabama. Business groups spent generously to help the establishment candidate, Bradley Byrne, beat back a firebrand conservative, Dean Young. Among other things, Young had said the government shutdown was not "the end of the world" and vowed to vote against giving John Boehner, R-Ohio, another term as House Speaker.

"That ended up being a very close race between a well-funded establishment candidate against an underfunded anti-establishment candidate, and the guy with less money nearly won," said Nathan Gonzales, deputy editor of the Rothenberg Political Report, which provides non-partisan analysis of House and Senate races.

The race highlighted how some of the tactics of the Tea Party, including the government shutdown, have "awakened a normally more passive establishment side of the Republican Party," he said. But the Tea Party is still the source of the "excitement and enthusiasm" inside the GOP, he said.

The message, Gonzales said, is that "we should expect the Republican civil war to continue."

LaTourette is ready for battle. He said he's raising money through two organizations, a non-profit advocacy outfit called Main Street Advocacy and a connected super PAC, which he dubbed Defending Main Street. The PAC had about $40,000 in cash at the end of June, according to its most recent campaign filing. The advocacy group does not have to disclose its donations.

LaTourette said he has raised about $4 million since ramping up his efforts. He hopes to raise $8 million in total, to spend on eight to 10 congressional races in 2014.

It's unclear how effective his effort will be. The ultra-conservative Club for Growth spent nearly $18 million in the last election. And as the 2014 election approaches, the group is already gunning for another set of Republican incumbents that it says are weak-kneed.

With a project called "Primary My Congressman!" the club is targeting 10 GOP House members it says are soft on spending and debt issues.

"We'll do what we need to do to win races," said Barney Keller, the club's spokesman, when asked how much the group would spend this election cycle.

Keller shrugged off LaTourette's effort as ill-conceived.

"These are people who would rather have Charlie Crist instead of Marco Rubio," Keller said, referring to the former GOP Florida governor who lost a Senate race to Rubio, a Tea Party star. Crist has since switched to the Democratic party.

"It was the Republicans who bailed out Wall Street. It was the Republicans who wanted the 'bridge to nowhere.' And it's the Republicans who joined with Democrats" to raise the debt ceiling last month, Keller said. "What's the point of having a Republican if they're just going to drive the car off the cliff just a little bit slower than the Democrat?"

But LaTourette said the Club for Growth and other advocacy groups have cost Republicans control of the U.S. Senate by supporting super-conservative primary candidates who can't appeal to moderates in a general election. And they've made Boehner's job as House Speaker nearly impossible by electing Republicans who are "very rigid and have no interest in governing."

He said he hasn't talked to Boehner about the super PAC, a special kind of committee that can raise and spend unlimited sums in campaigns.

"The ultimate goal is to have the big millionaire donors to the Club for Growth . . . say 'You know what? Maybe my money would be better spent getting more Republicans elected, rather than weeding out imperfect Republicans'," he said. "I would hope it would mushroom into the 2016 (presidential) election and we'd all be singing from the same song book . . . rather than engaging in this fratricide."

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/polit...-party/3469043/