USA Politics: Tea Party vs. the Establishment and other issues

[Ormond]

Since no one else has started this yet, I thought I'd link to this article in the Omaha World Herald about how the "Tea Party" challenger to the Nebraska District 2 US representative has refused to endorse Republican congressman Lee Terry for re-election and wants "true conservatives" to back someone else in the general election. This obviously makes it much more likely for a Democrat to win the Omaha house seat:

http://www.omaha.com/article/20140516/NEWS/140519002/1685#conservatives-opposed-to-lee-terry-mull-options-for-getting-independent-candidate-on-ballot

Does anyone else here know of far right primary losers who are refusing to back "establishment" Republicans in the general election?

[BloodRider]

25% of Americans are skeptical that owls exists, a fox news poll finds.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjuGCJJUGsg

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

BR,

I can't get to youtube links with my iPhone and I googled that story and couldn't find it elsewhere. Do you know of another link?

[Disturber of Peace]

25% of Americans are skeptical that owls exists, a fox news poll finds.

You can not expect everyone read J. K. Rowling's Fantastical Beasts And Where To Find Them.

[BloodRider]

BR,

I can't get to youtube links with my iPhone and I googled that story and couldn't find it elsewhere. Do you know of another link?

Its really about global warming. Its a segment on John Oliver's new show. There is a clip of Fox News reporting on how a new poll shows that 25% of Americans are skeptical about "Global Warming", to which he points out that it is silly to do a poll about a fact; the intellectual equivalent of doing a poll about "'Is 5 greater than 15', or 'Are there Hats?', or 'Do Owls Exist?'"

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

BR,

I had a discussion with a sheriff's deputy providin court security earlier this week. He asked me if I thought climate change was real. I told him there is no question that it is real. That climate, by definiton is fluid and non-static. It is always changing.

I went on to say that regardless of whether or not climate change was anthropogenic it is a reality and it is something we will have to deal with or adjust to. He seemed surprised I was so willing to speak so definatively.

[DanteGabriel]

Does anyone else here know of far right primary losers who are refusing to back "establishment" Republicans in the general election?

I had thought there had been plenty of cases where a Teahadi lost to an "establishment" candidate in the primary and refused to endorse, but I couldn't dig any up.

Closest I came was a freshman GOP Congressman who refused to endorse one of his state's US Senators, Lindsey Graham.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/21/tim-scott-lindsey-graham_n_4314127.html

Then there's the case of Ted Cruz refusing to endorse his fellow US Senator from Texas, John Cornyn.

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/headlines/20140227-ted-cruz-refuses-to-endorse-fellow-sen.-john-cornyn-in-gop-primary.ece

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

When will the Tea Party just break from the Republicans?

[DanteGabriel]

When will the Tea Party just break from the Republicans?

Why would they do that? A lot of people are making money off them. And they are certainly doing a fine job of pushing Republican candidates further and further right.

[Sci-2]

Stop Beating a Dead Fox: The conservative news channel’s only real power is in riling up liberals, who by this point should know better.

Every year, Fox News whips up some phantom “war on Christmas” plotted by what the network’s blowhard-in-chief Bill O’Reilly calls “secular progressives.” This seasonal stunt has long been old news, yet many in the liberal media still can’t resist the bait. You had to feel for the NBC News White House correspondent Kristen Welker, who was drafted into filing a Kelly-Santa story on the Today show for no ­discernible reason other than that she is not white.

When this supposed “national firestorm” (as Al Sharpton inflated it on his MSNBC show) finally died down, only two things had been accomplished beyond the waste of everyone’s time. Liberals had played right into Fox’s stereotype of them—as killjoy p.c. police. And Fox News could once again brag about its power to set an agenda for its adversaries even as it also played the woebegone ­victim.

And rebuttal:

Ignoring Fox News' Racism is Good for Democrats but Bad for the Country

Rich's point here, as far as I can tell, is that because the channel is fading in importance, and has an aging viewership, its racism, Islamophobia, and disgusting fear-mongering should be ignored by liberals. This conflates two entirely separate things, as if a channel that cannot elect presidents should therefore be given a pass on anything and everything.

Rich takes this argument even further, however, writing near the end of his piece that, "Rather than waste time bemoaning Fox’s bogus journalism, liberals should encourage it. The more that Fox News viewers are duped into believing that the misinformation they are fed by Ailes is fair and balanced, the more easily they can be ambushed by reality as they were on Election Night 2012."

[Spring Bass]

Honestly, even talking about "tea party" versus "establishment" Republicans doesn't seem to have a lot of meaning for me, since the "establishment" guys pretty much have completely adopted all of the tea party/movement conservative positions in politics.

[1918me]

Honestly, even talking about "tea party" versus "establishment" Republicans doesn't seem to have a lot of meaning for me, since the "establishment" guys pretty much have completely adopted all of the tea party/movement conservative positions in politics.

When the Tea Party first started up, my first thought was "How long before they're pushed out of the GOP for their extremist views?" Unfortunately, it seems like instead of being expunged, they've infected the rest of the party like some kind of hyper-conservative super virus.

[aceluby]

When the Tea Party first started up, my first thought was "How long before they're pushed out of the GOP for their extremist views?" Unfortunately, it seems like instead of being expunged, they've infected the rest of the party like some kind of hyper-conservative super virus.

And the best part is that they moved WAY to the right and then claimed everyone else just moved left. Not only this, but they've been very successful in moving the entire conversation to the right in a way that policies they supported in the past are now considered 'progressive' or 'socialist'.

[Spring Bass]

When the Tea Party first started up, my first thought was "How long before they're pushed out of the GOP for their extremist views?" Unfortunately, it seems like instead of being expunged, they've infected the rest of the party like some kind of hyper-conservative super virus.

We should have known better because it's happened before. The early 1990s also saw a whole bunch of new hyper-conservative Republicans knocking off challengers and winning seats for the first time, as the culmination of a decades-long takeover of the Republican Party by the conservative wing. Something similar has happened with the Tea Party conservatives, except much faster because of greater technology and money for organization (plus they figured out how to dominate the primary process in order to both get ultra-conservative Republicans and force existing ones to move in an ultra-conservative direction).

That said, if Democrats and the Left organized better (particularly during midterm elections), we could probably still handily beat them due to greater numbers. When Democratic voters do turn out in force (like in 2012 and 2008), they swamp Republicans not only in "blue" states but in a lot of "purple" ones as well.

[MerenthaClone]

When will the Tea Party just break from the Republicans?

You act like the Tea Party isn't essentially the Republican party.

[Horza]

You act like the Tea Party isn't essentially the Republican party.

Yeah, they're something of a Republican tradition

[Inigima]

Yeah, they're something of a Republican tradition

Great read, thank you.

[ThinkerX]

Does anyone else here know of far right primary losers who are refusing to back "establishment" Republicans in the general election?

That would be Joe Miller here in the now thawing north country. Been a series o very brief radio spots on the station I listen to at work describing the debates or interviews or whatnot between the three republican challengers for the seat held by Begich. All three present a sort of false front saying 'Begich must go, he's a danger to the country, and so on.' Yet, the things coming out at these screwy debates or meetings...

...the two 'mainstream republican candidates' seem ok with the loser supporting the winner come the general election. Miller, though, the Tea Party favorite, has said flat out he fears treachery on the part of the republican establishment, and cites Murkowski's successful write-in campaign as proof of said treachery.

Was a cartoon of Miller in the local (print) paper last week wearing a propeller cap with the slogan: 'Elect Miller - because government isn't dysfunctional enough'. Begich's adds don' even mention Miller (at least the ones on the radio).

In more strange AK state republican news, Ron Paul supporters who'd somehow attained fairly high office in the republican machine lost said offices for 'failing to raise enough campaign money', a view I take as a contrast between nuttiness and corruptness.

All in all, my personal prediction is Begich will win by a comfortable margin.

[Fez]

All in all, my personal prediction is Begich will win by a comfortable margin.

Aren't there a whole bunch of fringe third party candidates on the ballot too? That's liable to help him as well.

[SkynJay]

What can stop 10-30 million motivated militia members fro making their voice heard and restarting the constitutional process? Apparently the threat of rain. Operation Spring, sadly, is quite a disappointment. Hundreds instead of million.