Frank Rich: The Grand Old Plot Against the Tea Party

[cal04]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/31/opinion/31rich.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

ONE dirty little secret of the 2010 election is that it won’t be a political tragedy for Democrats if a Tea Party icon like Sharron Angle or Joe Miller ends up in the United States Senate. Angle, now synonymous with racist ads sliming Hispanics, and Miller, already on record threatening a government shutdown, are fired up and ready to go as symbols of G.O.P. extremism for 2012 and beyond.

What’s not so secret is that some Republicans will be just as happy if some of these characters lose, and for the same reason.

But whatever Tuesday’s results, this much is certain: The Tea Party’s hopes for actually affecting change in Washington will start being dashed the morning after. The ordinary Americans in this movement lack the numbers and financial clout to muscle their way into the back rooms of Republican power no matter how well their candidates perform.

(snip)
What the Tea Party ostensibly wants most — less government spending and smaller federal deficits — is not remotely happening on the country club G.O.P.’s watch. The elites have no serious plans to cut anything except taxes and regulation of their favored industries. The party’s principal 2010 campaign document, its “Pledge to America,” doesn’t vow to cut even earmarks — which barely amount to a rounding error in the federal budget anyway. Boehner has also proposed a return to pre-crash 2008 levels in “nonsecurity” discretionary spending — another mere bagatelle ($105 billion) next to the current $1.3 trillion deficit. And that won’t be happening either, once the actual cuts in departments like Education, Transportation and Interior are specified to their constituencies.

[Andy823]

1. Well I would say...

What I wonder is how many of the so called tea party "candidates" are really feel this way, and how many are simply the same old brand of republicans we have see for years? I think some of them are just using the tea party to get elected and would simply fall in line as soon as they get to D.C. Now some are really just crazy as hell, Angle is one of them, but some of them I have seen in debates on CSPAN sound like the same old GOP!

Now I do think that the tea party groups, the ones who really thought they could make changes in D.C., will be upset no matter what. As you stated, even if they are for real, the republicans in D.C. aren't going to change their plans. I believe what has already been stated, the goal of republicans is to make president Obama a on term president, and no matter who gets elected, that is still going to be their goal!

[KT2000]

2. Delivering on their rhetoric

will not be very easy when they have been marginalized by the repub. power structure.

[WCGreen]

3. And since they are pledged to not compromise, well.....

That should speak for itself...

[greenman3610]

4. the GOP hopes to keep tea partiers in the same ghetto

they kept right to lifers.
unfortunately, that tactic, from the eighties, has been
feeding and nurturing a generation of vile, half educated
hateful ignoramuses like Sharon Angle, who may
have become too strong to be controlled.