Quote: Justme wrote in post #31

---

Quote: Tribune7 wrote in post #27

---

We are looking for articulation of the truth. We are looking for people willing to take on the media and to be called names on issues like Obamacare and our $17 trillion debt and right-to-work and the morality and necessity of immigration laws. Name me one person in the traditional leadership willing to do that. Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Mike Lee do that. They are hated by the leadership, which frankly many of us are starting to suspect are going along to get along because they are getting theirs in a very nice way.

---

I think everyone can agree with this. I don't know any conservative who has issues with the TeaParty tenets ...

15 Non-negotiable Core Beliefs

1. Illegal aliens are here illegally.
2. Pro-domestic employment is indispensable.
3. A strong military is essential.
4. Special interests must be eliminated.
5. Gun ownership is sacred.
6. Government must be downsized.
7. The national budget must be balanced.
8. Deficit spending must end.
9. Bailout and stimulus plans are illegal.
10. Reducing personal income taxes is a must.
11. Reducing business income taxes is mandatory.
12. Political offices must be available to average citizens.
13. Intrusive government must be stopped.
14. English as our core language is required.
15. Traditional family values are encouraged.

Zitat

---

What those decent people inclined to accept the existing GOP leadership have to realize is that we in the Tea Party are not looking for fights.

---

Here is the issue. We really have no choice but the Tea Party don't see that. They are willing and almost eager to lose rather than try to take small steps toward victory. Cruz, and Lee are just two guys of many. Not enough to make a major impact and while Paul and dozens others supported Cruz and Lee shutdown strategy they didnt agree with them. I don't see any flexibility in the Tea Party voters today.

On one hand they are grass roots unorganized group of individuals and on the other hand they want recognition as a powerful group to be reckoned with and do look like a fight is exactly what they want. But not a fight to defeat liberals, it's a fight to defeat moderate conservatives. Too big a bite in my view.

---

Here is the issue, America is and has been majority center-right for a long time. It's not like the people do not care about the country and stay home out of apathy, its because there is nothing to vote for. There is massive anger out here in America that if the GOP wanted to win they could easily tap into it. Unlike the left most conservatives in this country do care, but see no real choice. Its as sneakypete said. Americans are being repeatedly offered the choice between a firing squad or an electric chair. Telling us to sit down and shut up is not going get the majority out to vote. Putting up conservatives will get the people to turn out to vote.

Quote: Justme wrote in post #31

---

Here is the issue. We really have no choice but the Tea Party don't see that. They are willing and almost eager to lose rather than try to take small steps toward victory. Cruz, and Lee are just two guys of many. Not enough to make a major impact and while Paul and dozens others supported Cruz and Lee shutdown strategy they didnt agree with them. I don't see any flexibility in the Tea Party voters today.

On one hand they are grass roots unorganized group of individuals and on the other hand they want recognition as a powerful group to be reckoned with and do look like a fight is exactly what they want. But not a fight to defeat liberals, it's a fight to defeat moderate conservatives. Too big a bite in my view.

---

Quote: Polybius wrote in post #20

---

As I see it, the Tea Party leadership has several crippling flaws:

1.) Bunker Mentality that is shockingly out of touch with the local reality of Purple and Blue States.

2.) Rookie inexperience combined with refusal to listen to more experienced advice

3.) “Do it my way or you are a coward or a traitor”.

<SNIP>

---

Quote: Mechanicos wrote in post #23

---

Correlation is not Causation: People love the Tea Party Principles of Smaller Government, Less Taxes and Fiscal responsibility. Your graph and argumet made reflect the vicious wall to wall combined GOPe and Democrats' vilification of the TERM Tea Party in the news NOT the principles of what the Tea Party Stands for.

---

Quote: Polybius wrote in post #20

---

Likewise, the Tea Party leaders live in a fantasy world where every voter in a Purple State like Delaware or Virginia or Maine is assumed to think and act exactly as they do. In the 2008 Delaware Senate race, the Tea Party darling, Christine O’Donnell was slaughtered by Democrat Joe Biden 64.7% to 35.5%. What on Earth, besides a Bunker Mentality on Steroids, made the Tea Party believe that the Purple voters in Delaware had turned into white Alabama voter clones by 2010? So, with their Bunker Mentality, the Tea Party ensured the primary defeat of a hated “RINO” that was favored to win Purple Delaware’s general election. Result: Christine O’Donnell got slaughtered once again 56.6% to 40.0% by the current Delaware Democratic Senator Chris Coons that had once written an article entitled "Chris Coons: The Making of a Bearded Marxist".

In both Delaware and even in her own home state of Alaska, Tea Party candidates backed by Sarah Palin were slaughtered. That is what happens when Bunker Mentality fantasy rejects local reality.

In North Africa, the British had ample combat experience against the Germans but Fredendall did not want to hear about it and was barely on speaking terms with his British counterpart. Thus, the inexperienced American forces fell victim to a tactic that had been previously used against the British. At Faid Pass, an apparent German retreat led American tank forces into a prepared Kill Zone where German 88’s devastated the American forces.

Likewise, a green Senator Ted Cruz who had never fought a battle outside of his home turf of Texas did not want to hear any advice from political veterans with experience on the national stage. Ted Cruz would force a battle at ObamaCare Pass and be victorious because ….. Well ….. Just because. “Charge!” Once in battle, Ted Cruz then found out that the News Media that he ASS/U/MEd would report the battle in a Fair & Balanced manner was actually manning the 88’s that were blasting the GOP tanks to Kingdom Come. Result: A bloodbath for the GOP in public opinion polls when America’s attention should have been focused, 100%, on the ObamaCare Hindenburg that was about to explode without any help from Ted Cruz.

This brings us to the last point which is downright toxic: Anybody that disagrees with the Tea Party tactics is labeled either a coward or a traitor.

Such a tactic works when a North Korean Supreme Leader has the power of life and death over anybody that does not applaud him enthusiastically enough. Such a tactic works when your public image truly has strong majority support as Lincoln did during the Civil War.

However, when your national Favorability Rating is only 30% and the other 70% of America is insulted as either cowards or traitors in your own Republican Party or are totally ignored as Democrats or Independent who are lower than whale scat at the bottom of the ocean, engaging in such a tactic is the political equivalent of putting the barrel of a loaded gun in your mouth and pulling the trigger.



There is nothing wrong with the Tea Party principles. The problem with the Tea Party is that their TACTICS, their conduct, their percieved recklessness and their image are only popular with 30% of America and the Tea Party leaders absolutely refuse to take into account that the other 70% of America also has a vote.

All politics is local. Alabama, Delaware, Virginia, Maine, Michigan, Indiana and Massachusetts are all different. The Tea Party needs to understand that.

The Tea Party needs to wise up and realize that a Tea Party darling like Christine O'Donnell never had a snowball's chance in Hell in Delaware and that a "RINO" Delaware Senator is a gift from Heaven in comparison with the "Bearded Marxist" Delaware Senator that the 2010 Chritine O'Donnell/Tea Party fiasco resulted in.

The Tea Party needs to wise up and realize that, although Scott Brown was a hated RINO in their eyes, in slightly-to-the-Right-of-Che-Guevara Massachusetts, a "RINO" Scott Brown was also a gift from Heaven in comparison to a Senator Ted Kennedy and Senator Elizabeth Warren.

The Tea Party principles of fiscal responsibility and smaller government can never be achieved as long as the Tea Party keeps killing so-called RINO's in Blue and Purple States so that "Bearded Marxists" can then cruise to easy victories in the general election.

In addition, when, for whatever reasons, fair or unfair, the Approval Rating is only 30%, a wise faction does not insist that the General Election candidate spend month after month in the Primaries swearing Political Purity to the unpopular faction. Did you notice how the Gay Rights lobby hit the jackpot in the 2008 Elections? By keeping as quiet a church mice when Obama paid lip service to their opposition.

---

Quote: Palinista wrote in post #37

---

Palin flitted on down to Georgia and helped drag Saxby Chambliss to victory. Damn that woman! You can say that she is ineffectual but she helped saddle me with Senator Chambliss for four more years. There is a distinction between what the Tea Party espouses and what people dream it can be …. You can see all of this as tactics and winning. I find it distasteful and undesirable.

---

Quote: Polybius wrote in post #38

---

Quote: Palinista wrote in post #37

---

Palin flitted on down to Georgia and helped drag Saxby Chambliss to victory. Damn that woman! You can say that she is ineffectual but she helped saddle me with Senator Chambliss for four more years. There is a distinction between what the Tea Party espouses and what people dream it can be …. You can see all of this as tactics and winning. I find it distasteful and undesirable.

---

I am not saying that Sarah Palin is ineffectual. In the Deep South, Sarah Palin can be very effective in deciding whether a Georgia Senator will be Medium Red, Light Red or Deep Red.

What I am saying is that Sarah Palin is like a bird hunting dog. She is only good for one thing: Flushing out Southern and Bible Belt Deep Red Pheasant Voters. In states where over 51% of the voters are Red, Palin can be the determining factor of what shade of Red but, in the end, you still end up with Red.

Take the Sarah Palin bird dog to the Purple State of Delaware to try to catch Delaware Blue Crab Voters and Sarah Palin is absolutely worthless (not to mention downright counter-productive) unless you take a meat cleaver to her and chop her up for use as crab bait. Sarah Palin could not attract a Purple Voter, let alone a Blue Voter, if her life depended on it. In states where over 51% of the voters are either Blue of Purple, that is a huge problem.

As I have noted before, I have lived all over America and, now that I am enjoying my early retirement, I live here and there in all my past “home cities” and that includes Atlanta, GA. Last February, I lived in the north Atlanta, solid GOP area of Dunwoody that once had Far Left black radical Cynthia McKinney as their Congresswoman as a result of gerrymandering with the Atlanta inner city. Do you really think that the voters of Dunwoody really care what shade of Red their representative is if they had a snowflake’s chance in the Atlanta summer to have ANY shade of Red representing them? If Dunwoody had a chance to have a Light Red RINO representing them (instead of Far Left black radicals representing them), all of Dunwoody would be kissing his feet.

Obsessing over the shades of Red is a luxury that only rural areas and suburbs faaaar away from the city have. In addition, that only applies to Deep South states and Bible Belt states. Everywhere else in America, it is a huge struggle to get ANY shade of Red. In order to do so, Purple voters need to be wooed and you cannot do that by imposing Red Political Purity on the political candidates in those Purple areas.

---

Quote: sneakypete wrote in post #39

---

I don't agree with all your conclusions,but that was a very well thought-out post.

You are spot on about regional conditions,but I mostly disagree with your portrayal of Tea Party leadership. Frankly,I wasn't really aware there was such a thing on a national level. I thought it was all about local power.

And make no mistake about it,if actual conservatives are going to change the direction of the country,they/we MUST focus on the local level and work our way up,not down the food chain.

---

Quote: Polybius wrote in post #40

---

....In my opinion, the same thing has happened with many politicians wrapping themselves in the Tea Party banner. This is complicated by what I see as the Tea Party embracing what used to be a phenomenon of the Far Left: namely the Cult of Personality.

---