Tuesday's Election Results Torpedo The Dominant GOP Narrative ... Again

[DonViejo]

ED KILGORE – MAY 14, 2014, 7:06 AM EDT

The dominant primary narrative for 2014, that the sensible, pragmatic Republican establishment was putting the “constitutional conservative”/Tea Party extremists back in their place, has somehow survived less than impressive establishment wins in Texas and North Carolina. At some point, the narrative may need to change, beginning with Tuesday's results from West Virginia and Nebraska, where the establishment is again struggling.

In the one major contested primary in West Virginia, for the House seat currently held by Senate candidate Shelley Moore Capito, a carpetbagger from Maryland (he was once state GOP chairman in Maryland, but says he needed to move from that sinful secular socialist Blue State to secure “freedom”), Alex Mooney, won a comfortable victory over a field of six other GOP candidates. He was endorsed by the Senate Conservatives Fund, the Tea Party Express, the Madison Project, and Citizens United -- all the ideological heavies. He’ll face Democrat Don Casey -- another state party chair, but from West Virginia -- in November.

Across the country in Nebraska, the marquee Senate race featured Republican establishment candidate and former state Treasurer Shane Osborn against college president Ben Sasse, with self-funding banker (and alleged “moderate,” as the other candidates hastened to accuse him of being) Sid Dinsdale. Sasse was endorsed by nearly every Tea Party and ideologically right-wing group in sight, including the Senate Conservatives Fund, FreedomWorks, and the Tea Party Express, plus Sarah Palin and Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Mike Lee (R-UT). Osborn was backed avidly by Mitch McConnell (R-KY). Sasse romped past Osborn by better than a two-to-one margin, as the establishment candidate finished third, narrowly behind Dinsdale. Sasse will face Democrat Dave Domina in November.

As Osborn’s sinking fortunes became obvious in the run-up to the primary, some elements of the Republican establishment tried to disclaim him or dismiss the contest as no big deal (just yesterday, Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin noted the two main candidates had similar positions -- which you could have also said about the North Carolina Senate contenders a week ago, in a primary trumpeted across the land as a huge establishment victory -- and dismissed the race as “irrelevant”). But it’s hard to avoid the impression that the spin would have been very different if Mitch’s boy had, as was originally expected in this race, beaten the Tea Party insurgents.

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http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/2014-gop-primaries-nebraska

[Timez Squarez]

1. The tea party ran out of steam a long time ago... and

and the voters are just tired of the same stupid shit, and will all vote D instead of R.

Hell, i bet if there was a vote on what issues they'd like to match with their interests, and every single Republican would lose.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

2. It seems like we might get helped either way:

If the teabaggers are nominated, we do better. If the establishment wins, the teabaggers might be less motivated to vote, and we do better in that event.

[Cal33]

3. There aren't that many Teabaggers, I don't think. But they do make a lot of noise, yes.