Posted on 08/28/2014 6:22:15 AM PDT by cotton1706
he dilemma facing the true grass-roots tea party believers -- the dilemma they do not acknowledge -- is that their primary goal of whittling and whacking away at big government undercuts their secondary goal of saving the middle class from the greedy grip of big corporations..
If Democrats have a unifying philosophy, it is that government needs to be effective enough to curtail the economic and environmental abuses of unfettered capitalism. Republicans, on the other hand, preach the dogma that smaller government and unrestricted corporate power serves the best interests of the common man and woman.
The tea party folks have largely bought into that belief, but still are uncomfortable with Republicans who appear to be too much in thrall to big business. That is partly why a big tea party effort was mounted against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in Kentucky’s Republican primary. McConnell was rightly seen as the epitome of the GOP establishment that the tea partiers so disdain. Yet, even with major support from national tea party organizations, such as FreedomWorks and the Senate Conservatives Fund, challenger Matt Bevin could not depose the incumbent senator.
Now McConnell faces a robust challenge from Kentucky’s Democratic secretary of state, Alison Lundergan Grimes, who, at age 35, has been alive exactly as long as McConnell has been in the U.S. Senate. Polls show Grimes is in striking distance of beating the old veteran.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
His last election was in 2008, where the presence of Obama on the ticket drove an abnormally large turnout in places like Louisville. Particularly West Louisville.
I don’t think that’ll happen again this year, unless Ferguson emerges as a major campaign issue. Which would be an across the board disaster for Conservatives.
You are advocating foolishness. Your hatred for Republicans is destructive. A Reid Senate is incomparably worse than a Mcconnell senate
Such fallacious thought got us Obama.
The Tea Party thought is great but it is not going to control in the immediate future. To trash Republicans in a fit of Tea Party self righteousness will continue the destruction.
/johnny
Since the formation of political parties very early in the history of the Republic, political power has been exercised by two parties. The names and composition of parties have changed over time, but it's always been two and all of the others have been irrelevant in their brief time in the Sun.
For most of my youth, the two parties were not divided into liberal and conservatives, each party was itself so divided. The Democrats held the majority in the Congress, but enacting legislation required either the conservative blocks or the liberal blocks to coalesce across party lines to get anything done.
This system broke up when the Solid South turned against the Democrats Party and became Republicans. That stared a trend that sent the Conservatives toward the Republicans and the Liberals toward the Democrats. The Democrat Party is much further along in this shift, they have essentially purged their party of all conservatives or have the few holdouts under firm control. Not so in the Republican Party, for various reasons. The Tea Party movement is doing something about that and is having success, especially at the local level.
But because this success is not fast enough for some and because the most powerful of the bunch are the ones best equipped to hang on the longest, a group of people are urging that conservatives vote for Democrats. That this idea is insane on it's face is demonstrated by the glee with which this LA Times journalist urges this Kamikaze approach forward. I have never seen a more wrongheaded idea in my life. The Democrat Party can never be a choice for conservatives and within our two party system staying home or voting for some third party fringe is the equivalent of supporting Democrats, as this author points out.
I am going to vote for my own best interests. I also vote for the best interests of my children and my grandchildren. I vote for the best interests of this great country of ours. I will never vote for a Democrat for any office, for any reason period. Those who do are dead to me.
No difference. McConnell has proven with his critical cloture votes that he is on-board with Reid's liberal agenda, and supports it.
All liberal republicans must lose in any election that they run in. Liberal republicans must be politically destroyed.
/johnny
Ditch Mitch by any means necessary.
I’m anti-Reid.
Too bad McConnell isn't. He supported Reid's liberal agenda with critical cloture votes when Reid needed them.
/johnny
Wrong. We can win the other Senate races, rid ourselves of McConnell
and be just fine.
The numbers people really need to look at are the ones for the Louisville Congressional seat. I looked at them a couple months back for a FB discussion I was having (will see if I can find and dig them out when I get home tonight), going back to when Anne Northup beat Mike Ward (1994 I think?)
The difference in margins between Presidential and mid term cycles was striking. And the jump from Obama being on the ticket in 2008 and 2012 was huge. Yarmouth wouldn’t have won the seat in 2008 without Obama, saw his margin drop significantly in 2010 and then rebound in 2012.
The numbers seem to show that Obama accounted for at least a 5 point, possibly an 8 point, drop in McConnell’s support in 2008. Iow if Obama hadn’t been on the ballot McConnell would have won by 11-14 points rather than 6.
Right now, seteris paribus (not even Labor Day yet) I think angry Conservatives will knock that margin back, but not enough and McConnell wins by 5.
ME,TOO!! I am very sympathetic to the Tea Party and agree with everything they stand for - except this one thing! Harry Reid in his position as Senate Majority Leader has done more harm to their cause than Mitch McConnell could ever do. The effect on the judiciary since Reid invoked the “nuclear option” has already been very harmful and we cannot afford to risk this opportunity to “demote” him forever.
In the long run, a radical Democrat (as they all are) is much more harmful than a moderate Republican! The evidence for that is right before your very eyes - the conservatives that stayed home rather than vote for Romney in 2012 gave us Obama's second term which has been much worse than I could ever have imagined!
This should have had a BARF alert on it.
I’m a TEA partier and I will vote for McConnell staying home means another vote for Grimes, ulgh!
“You are advocating foolishness. Your hatred for Republicans is destructive. A Reid Senate is incomparably worse than a Mcconnell senate.
To trash Republicans in a fit of Tea Party self righteousness will continue the destruction”
We’ve argued about this before.
1. I don’t hate republicans. I am a conservative that wants moderate or traitorous republicans removed from office. I know the game, which is “conservatives will vote for the republican no matter what so all we have to do is defeat the conservative in the primary and the conservatives will vote for the resulting squishy republican like sheep, because in their view, the democrat is far worse. But to us, nominating or electing a CONSERVATIVE is far worse than electing a democrat, so as long as an establishment republican is nominated or elected, it’s a win-win. The gravy train keeps flowing and conservatives have been defeated.”
2. I wonder how upset you have become when McConnell has “trashed republicans.” He has been doing so all year, along with his minions in the NRSC. And YOU choose to reward such behavior by favoring his reelection.
3. I am one man with one vote. That is my only power. Mitch McConnell is an insidious, backstabbing and vindictive oligarch, that lusts after more power. He has ceded enormous power to the position of Majority Leader over the last several years with his “handshake agreements” because he thought he’d be Majority Leader by now. But his hand-picked slew of moderates went down in flames in November, 2012. He is a dangerous man that needs to be removed from power one way or the other. The “r” next to his name means nothing.
> I want Harry Reid fired more than I want Mitch retired...
Well that’s a given with all of us but he has the AntiChrist protecting him
As I said... very weak.
/johnny
Unfortunately when the preaching is done they actually support a policy of larger government lovingly holding hands with corporate cronies serving their own interests.
There’s another problem that Tea Party folks have a hard time coping with.
A lot of people simply aren’t buying what they are selling. This is true for several reasons, but they can’t seem to grasp that their message falls on deaf ears, even among many people who are essentially sympathetic to their cause.
I'm sorry, but I believe the GOP has been the one trashing Tea Partiers, not the other way around. When the GOP embraces the Tea Party, instead of working to destroy it, we'll talk. Until then, we'll not support these traitorous RINOs any longer. You might like getting stabbed in the back. Most real Conservatives don't.
McConnell is as dangerous as Reid because they support the same agenda. McConnell has proven that with his cloture votes.
/johnny
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