A politician cannot be a Tea Party nominee as there is no political party named “Tea Party”, nor should there be in my opinion. But those who consider themselves as “Tea Partiers” will remain politically active in their area and coalesce around a candidate.
Sure, Tea Partiers in Boston will coalesce around a more liberal candidate than Tea Partiers in Wichita, but all it means is that they are supporting a candidate in their area who supports the things that are locally important to them.
The Tea Party movement is NOT a conservative movement, or a libertarian movement, or even a constitutionalist movement. It is an awakening. People are becoming aware of politics, of what politicians have been doing to their lives, and frankly they are angry at what they see now that they are awake.
The fact that conservative and libertarian political goals meld nicely with many of the Tea Party participants areas of outrage is a nice pat on the back for those movements fighting the good fight all along, but people who consider themselves Tea Partiers for the most part don't care about a coherent political theory that they can adopt and learn the nuances of.
They are just mad that they are taxed too much, that their tax dollars are wasted, and that their government is unresponsive to their wants and needs. So Doug Hoffman and Scott Brown don't share the same political views. So what. Each was responsive to the voters in their local area and hold the views that Tea Partiers in those areas agree with.
The Tea Party only supported Brown to kill obamacare. They knocked off the Republican in NY23 and ran Hoffman against her because she was a Rino. The Tea Party is not Republican. It is conservative and libertarian, though. However, that combination is like herding cats. We only met at the Tea Party because we both despise socialists, although libertarians love the culture of socialism -amoral humanism - and conservatives call it brainless it and self destructive.