Feb
5
Smart Republicans
Filed Under American Politics
Jonathan Martin has a great piece up about the lack of a civil war within the Republican party, something that doesn’t fit the narrative of circular firing-squads and tea-party takeovers.
And there enough examples now to understand that there is a pattern to GOP success, not just one-offs.
Example one:
GOP leaders easily swatted down a proposed “purity test” for candidates at last week’s Republican National Committee meeting — an indication that party officials are no more willing to turn over the keys to right-wing activists now than they were during the Bush years.
Example Two:
In Illinois, Rep. Mark Kirk is hardly a conservative heartthrob — and some activists are openly contemptuous of what they perceive as his moderation — but he easily won the Republican Senate primary there Tuesday night, against a more conservative, underfunded opponent, in part because he is seen as having the best chance to capture President Barack Obama’s old Senate seat.
Example Three:
Many activists may be unaware of what a mainstream political figure (Scott) Brown is. Even now, weeks after his election, conservatives are forwarding a 1½-minute video under the subject line “WOW! Powerful! Massachusetts Scott Brown Commercial.” It has gotten more than 1.4 million views.
It depicts Brown as a modern-day freedom fighter, comparing him to a revolutionary warrior and Democratic Washington to the British crown, with phrases such as “liberty” and “tyranny” sprinkled about and images of last fall’s tea party march in Washington in the finale.
But the ads that actually lifted Brown to victory were conventional, though smartly crafted, spots portraying him as a truck-driving Everyman — not a lamp-carrying colonist. In fact, it wasn’t Paul Revere but, rather, Democrat John F. Kennedy whom Brown was likened to in one of his commercials. In addition to the now-famous one of him driving his black GMC, another ad showed him working the triple deckers in gritty South Boston. The message was that he was safe for Democrats — or those who were raised as Democrats — to support, not that he wanted to start another revolution.
Example Four:
In Virginia, McDonnell also enjoyed great enthusiasm from conservative activists in his gubernatorial bid. And, unlike Brown, he was a genuine ideologue, having made his name in the state Legislature as a social conservative.
But McDonnell’s campaign was more Tom Davis than it was Pat Robertson, as the graduate of the latter’s law school ran straight toward the center with a campaign stressing jobs, education and transportation.
Example Five:
The one race where there is at least a perceived threat from the tea party crowd toward the establishment is the Florida GOP Senate primary.
But despite how the race has been framed, Marco Rubio, who is running against Gov. Charlie Crist, is hardly a wild-eyed activist.
And so on. Ace at Ace of Spades, a strong base conservative is selling his readers on Mark Kirk, the GOP nominee in Illinois for Obama’s old senate seat. He’s a moderate, he was one of the house Republicans to vote in favour of Cap and Trade. And yet because he has a strong chance of getting Republicans nearer to fifty senate seats, he’s now someone that can be accepted although not embraced by the base.
What a difference a year makes. Thanks to the Obama-Pelosi axis, the forthcoming battleground is a fiscal/size of government one rather than social. And that is a fight that conservatives and moderates can ally with each other on.
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Its the Democratic left that has made the Tea Party into some kind of leftist kook fringe group of nuts. I went to two teapartys and the crowd was pleasant, easy going and concerned mostly about the government’s overspending and future taxes. That’s what this movement was founded on…as simple as that.
If a Republican nominee says he will be frugal and use common sense with our tax dollars, he will get our vote. All of the other concerns like abortion will be put on the back burner.
Tea Partyers are concerned about our country spending more money than it is taking in, which is destroying it. Simple as that.