I believe Mitt and the RINOS will do the same thing to the Tea Party that was done to the JBS.
Which will it be? Co-opt or destroy the Tea Party?
IMO Dick Armey tried and failed to co-opt the tea party movement.. there is precedent and some might argue that the California recall of Gov. Davis was a tea party effort. California Republicans co-opted the recall effort after months of opposing it.
Once it was clear that California citizens' recall-the-governor effort was going to succeed and there would be a recall election the Republican Party abandoned the support of the Democrat governor, stopped trashing the citizens, and elbowed the citizens aside and claimed the effort was theirs.
The RNC take over of the Tea Party movement failed, so on to plan B. There is precedent for that
You are right the Republican establishment in the past did not try to take over Goldwater and the emerging modern conservative movement; instead..
Nelson Rockefeller according to Stuart Spencer (Rockefeller's public relations head) said, "We had to destroy Barry Goldwater as a member of the human race."