Tea Party Series: How the GOP can use the tea parties and why

For the last six to eight months, the Democrats have been placing their hopes in the tea parties. Yes, I said the Democrats. They have placed their hope that the tea partiers, or "tea-baggers," as they've derisively labelled them, will redeem everything wrong with them, that the Nazi-sign wielding right-wing extremists would make the GOP look so bad that all the mistakes of the current administration would be dwarfed by the ineptitude of the opposition. And at first, they were right.

But the tea party crowd, and the Republican Party itself, may just be beginning to learn from its mistakes. The oft-predicted bloody GOP civil war hasn't materialized. In fact, there are many groups working to unify the GOP's progressive, centrist, and right-wing conservative factions, such as Republicans United and David Frum's Frum Forum. There seems to be less in-fighting than last year, as if the GOP is actually starting to listen to the Big Tent speak. Look no further for evidence than the recent Scott Brown victory; a Progressive Republican by all accounts-he even describes himself as fiscally conservative yet is a social moderate. And not only did he get GOP backing, he won in a traditionally all dem state. And the tea partiers did not get upset that a moderate won-quite the opposite in fact. In Sarah Palin's keynote address at the tea party convention, she said that "...in many ways Scott Brown represents what this beautiful movement is all about..."

In a syndicated op-ed piece, The Potent Tea Party, Rich Lowry writes:

If the tea partiers were to split from the GOP, or be spurned by it, that
would indeed spell disaster for Republicans. It's an unlikely prospect, though.
In a survey for the National Review Institute, pollster John McLaughlin found
that tea-party activists and their sympathizers self-identify as Republicans,
and 68 percent of them voted for John McCain. They are pro-life, pro-tax cuts
and pro-defense -- in other words, mainstream conservatives who are particularly
engaged by the debt-fueled growth of government.

Palin's rapturously received speech in Nashville could have been delivered
almost line for line at a Republican Convention. She skipped the social issues,
but otherwise rehearsed unalloyed conservative orthodoxy on national-security
and fiscal issues. This is not the stuff of ideological fissure or
self-immolation.

Any activist-driven movement will inevitably have rough edges. The
Nashville convention itself was beset by feuding among tea-party groups and
allegations of profiteering for its extravagant $550 admission price. It gave a
platform to ranters Tom Tancredo, a former Republican congressman, and Joe
Farah, editor of a right-wing Web site, both of whom predictably delivered
cringe-inducing screeds.

But such embarrassments are a trifle compared with the enthusiasm of the
tea partiers, and their populist-tinged purifying impulse. They want to
reconnect the GOP to the people, to its principles and to an ideal of public
service that got obscured in the decadent latter days of its congressional
majority.

Tom Tancredo gave a terrible speech, and was rightfully called out by Meghan McCain when she said "...I'm sorry [but] revolutions start with young people. Not with 65-year-old people talking about literacy tests and people who can't say the word 'vote' in English. It's ridiculous..."

And she is right. Speeches like Tancredo's, and in fact speakers like Tancredo, should be scorned by the tea party and the GOP itself. The way to really start winning again is to continue to embrace the "big-tent" ideal that Reagan spoke of in the '80's; by embracing our brothers and sisters that are more progressive than us, and also those that are more conservative than us, so that we can, together, reconnect the GOP to the people.

Crossposted at Republicans United

Tea Party Movement beginning to fracture

CNN-It emerged in anger and it threatens to split in anger.
One major group in the Tea Party movement -- named after the famous Boston Tea Party -- is set to host its first convention in February, with former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin as its keynote speaker.

But there are fractures in the movement that threaten its future. And if history's any guide, such movements tend to flame out.

The Tea Party movement erupted on April 15 -- tax day -- over criticism of President Obama's economic policies and what organizers called big government out of control. The movement, made up of local, state and national groups, continues to protest what it considers fiscally unsound policies.

And the movement is well funded. Action groups like FreedomWorks -- chaired by former House Majority Leader Dick Armey -- helped organize and fund its April 15 rally in Washington.
Other groups, including Americans for Prosperity, Tea Party Nation and Tea Party Patriots, are also vying for the helm of the movement, and it's creating what some are calling "competitive chaos."

Some Tea Partiers have voiced anger and concern over whether the powerful groups are "astroturfing'' what is supposed to be a grass-roots coalition -- the idea that the movement is being organized by old-fashioned GOP bigwigs to promote their agenda.

Donna Klink, of the Golden Triangle Tea Party-Texas, said in a post on the Tea Party Patriots Web site that the chaos needs to be addressed.
"We must craft a simple coalition message that we can all agree on. ... We should all remember the simple principles of 'Strength in Numbers' and 'United We Stand, Divided We Fall,' " she wrote.

Klink added that individual Tea Party groups can keep their own identity and beliefs while "still reaching out to and working with other groups that share common goals."
"We MUST stop this battle within and fight together," she insists.
The factions, however, have said they are only trying to engage citizens in fiscal conservatism -- and disagreements are inevitable...

...While anger over economic issues sparked the movement, it has come to represent anger in general -- from anger over health care reform to just anger against politicians, like Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

At rallies over the summer and fall, crowds carried signs portraying Obama as Hitler and likening his policies to those of Nazi Germany. In one case, heavy criticism forced a Tea Party group in Danville, Virginia, to cancel a bonfire in which an effigy of Pelosi was to be burned.
And there's the threat that fringe members will taint the public's perception of the movement.

"The Tea Party combines the best elements of civic activism with some of the worst elements of fringe extremism," said GOP strategist and CNN contributor John Feehery in a CNN.com commentary. "While most Tea Party activists are genuinely concerned about the future of the country, some others see conspiracies around every corner and use unacceptable rhetoric to communicate their displeasure with the president."

Steinhauser noted that the fringe elements only make up a small part of the movement and should not come to represent the cause....

...That issue is similar to what other populist movements in the U.S. have faced over time.
Jon Avlon, author of "Independent Nation: How Centrists Can Change American Politics," has said that history shows that Tea Party-esque movements and "demagogues rise when the economy turns south."

"They specialize in blaming others for the troubles with wild accusations. It's a time-honored formulation, a powerful narcotic for the nervous and dispossessed, with violent side effects," he wrote in a CNN.com commentary.

The populist movement started in the 19th century. The Populist Party later emerged, made up largely of farmers, and coalesced around opposition to the gold standard as currency.
Its ties to the free-silver movement, among other things, failed to resonate with a broader base of Americans -- especially urbanites in populous states.

Later in the 20th century, populist anger rose up during the Great Depression, focused on big business's role in the 1929 stock market crash and its subsequent effect on American society. And in the late 1960s, populist anger was geared against big government.
"But now we've got both -- anger at big business and big government," said Avlon, a columnist for The DailyBeast.com. "It's a perfect political storm, primed for a return to pitchfork politics. ... The fringe is blurring with the base, creating leverage on the party leadership."

Nathan Gonzalez of the Rothenberg Political Report said that in order for Tea Party activism to blossom into a lasting movement, it "has to exhibit some real influence that goes beyond a set of rallies."
He said that while there's the risk of fading away -- based on the divisions within the movement -- it has growth potential.

"There's certainly a risk of dying out [like many populist movements] but there's the potential for having some staying power as well," he said. "If they become larger or more organized there's a potential to have more influence. It depends on how they're able to harness the energy that's there now and translate that into future success."

And part of that organization could come from having a face to associate with the Tea Party name.
Palin, Fox News' Glenn Beck and Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minnesota, have emerged as Tea Party darlings.
Gonzalez said the Tea Partiers need to have a one person to identify with their message -- much in the way Obama became identified with "change" in the 2008 presidential election.

If the Tea Party movement wants to develop into a political party or force, Gonzalez added, it should take the lessons of the populists and other third-party movements to heart.
"I think if a third party wants to take off, there has to be a face with it. And Ross Perot was a good example of that in 1992 and 1996. It's become more difficult [with this movement]."
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Watching the tea-party movement, I've seen some things that are worth protesting. But I've also seen the fringe there; those that call Obama a Hitler/Socialist/Fascist etc...I liked that they were protesting fiscal irresponsibility. But I really wish those same people would hold accountable those they hold up as heroes. For example, both Bush and Palin were extremely fiscally irresponsible while they were in charge of their respective states. Bush caused the worst deficit ever (Obama's hasn't hit yet, so it doesn't really count as the worst-yet), and Palin's bridge to nowhere was a disaster (yes, she started the bridge to nowhere, she was for it before she was against it, it was in fact her baby).

What I hope to see if this movement takes hold and becomes a third party, as the commentary above postulates, is true fiscal responsibility [read: fiscal conservatism]. Until then, it's just another populist movement destined to fizzle out.