Tea Party was not ineffective. Rather, the Dems got people to the polls. The only way to win Prez elections in the future is to start now developing a masterful GOTV apparatus AND to do a much better job of education through TV, etc. (No, I don’t mean just trashing liberals, as fun as that is. I mean simply doing what the public schools refuse to do — give basic non-threatening education about the Constitution, economics, etc.)
On the presidential level the tea party was as good as nonexistent. They couldn’t get a good conservative candidate fielded, let alone to win the nomination, and then of course Romney lost to Barry.