Sep 16 2010
O’Donnell Is Not The Tea Party
I really hate group think. I really hate being told by a mindless mob to get with them or else. It’s so socialistic.
Let me echo something I put in a comment at Hot Air while our site was down (and it may go down again – fingers crossed it won’t). There are MANY of us who have been at the Tea Party protests since 2009, been with the Tea Party in spirit since it began. Promoted it and applauded it for months now.
I never once winced when Tea Party backed candidates took on the establishment in PA, FL, CO, NV, AK, SC, etc. I believe the grass roots movement shaking DC to its core is exactly what is needed to give the nation any hope of recovering from the hyper-partisan crap we have been dealing with for the last 4 decades.
But let’s be honest here – the Tea Party is not going to be 100% right, 100% of the time. It is a grass roots effort, and occasionally results will be produced that are just not all that impressive.
Take Christine O’Donnell’s win in the GOP primary in DE. In that state there were two seriously flawed candidates for the GOP side. So flawed the only argument going on right now is which one was worse! I am not impressed by O’Donnell, though I have moments where I can connect with her (I did not know she was such a Tolkein fan). I don’t wince at her MTV discussion, I do cringe at her efforts to equate Creationism to Evolution (horribly ignorant stuff). I was not impressed with Castle – the epitome of the entrenched Political Industrial Complex. Thank god I did not have to vote in THAT primary!
But my issues with ONE candidate does not reflect at all on my views of the Tea Party or other Tea Party aligned candidates. Angle, Buck, Rubio, Miller, etc – none of them bother me. O’Donnell does. BFD! Tea Partiers need to get a grip – I don’t HAVE TO agree with your movement 100% of the time. Don’t come off sounding like big brother telling me I have to love everything your movement thinks, says, does or produces. Not going to happen.
There is no need for a silly civil war on the right (hint, hint DeMint) over the fact one Tea Party candidate did not win over the hearts of America. Heck, she did not get the support of all Tea Party organizations in DE!! Again – BFD.
The polls are showing a massive wave coming November that will easily lift nearly all the Tea Party challengers to smashing wins. For example, I am highly confident Angle will beat Reid – he is polling low 40’s. Which means over 50% of the voters in NV have decided they will not vote for him. He is the known quantity and their decisions were made months ago. Many voters have not decided to vote for Angle (yet), but there is a reason incumbents are dead when polling 45% – that is their ceiling come election day. A law of political physics. The late breakers will go to Angle. And in this year with a massive enthusiasm gap and a ‘throw the bums out’ mindset, Ried is gone.
The wave is so massive it could even raise O’Donnell to a win – especially since I believe it will wipe out Dems in WV, WI, WA, CA and CT. I don’t think Coons is a shoe-in. And being Reid’s ‘pet’ just cost him quite a few votes. So let’s not get too out of control here. The woman does not reflect the Tea Party or the conservative movement very accurately. She claims to believe in a lot of common ground, and she has some unique views too. So be it.
This is not over, but people need to chill out. Just because Tea Party supporters are not comfortable with O’Donnell it does not make them traitors to the cause (or to conservatism or the GOP). Come on folks, the right is supposed to be all about freedom of speech and freedom of choice. True patriots don’t go all ballistic when those rights are exercised. Not if they are ‘true’ patriots.
speaking of corruption – new info is out on Bank United, the outfit that Maxine Waters violated all kinds of rules to help. She said it needed special treatment because it helped minority lenders. She got all kinds of TARP money put into it, even though the rules said the bank was ineligible. How much? 20, 30 million dollars – hard to say how much.
Oh, by the way her husband owns $12 million of stock in that bank. That’s where the TARP money actually went.
She just stole somewhere between $10 and $20 Million from the US Treasury. All the info is out in the open. The fact’s aren’t in dispute.
She *Might* get a reprimand from Pelosi’s House. After the election. That’s it. Because she’s exempt from all other laws. She will never be charged with any crime like you or I would.
you might think I’m exaggerating. I swear to you that I am not.
I, too, am glad I didn’t vote in the Delaware primary. However, everyone is saying that the people were dumb to vote for a dumb woman. Have you ever thought about this? Maybe the republicans of Delaware knew more about both candidates than the rest of the country does? I read somewhere that Castle voted with the republicans 52% of the time. That’s not good. He was more or less sitting on a fence between the two parties. Not any more with one than he was with the other. I have wondered if he had plans to jump to the other side after being elected. When I heard that Obama and Biden called him after he lost, I wondered again. Why would they call a republican after he lost unless they had an agreement? This has happened before. Remember Jeffords? The party in majority in the senate changed because of him. Does anyone seriously think the dims are incapable of such treachery?
I don’t think O”Donnell is really of the tea party. She has been around a long time before the tea party was started. She has run for the senate before and really, was there anyone else to run against Castle? However, I think she is a conservative and will be a much better senator than Castle would because Castle is not a conservative by any stretch of the imagination. Sarah never said she would only support tea party candidates. She said she would support conservative candidates of either party. Goodness knows she was safe in saying such a thing because there are no conservative democrats. Besides, Castle is 71 years old. The odds of him running again in 2014 are not good. Maybe he was intended to hold the seat for one of the Bidens and that was the real agreement with the dems. Either way, I am not sorry Castle lost. He is one of the establishment that we want to get rid of. What would be the use of having the majority of the senate if we have a senator who would vote with the dims 48% (or more) of the time. I understand the importance of hacving a republican majority, therefore, republicans should get behind O’Donnell and help her win instead of announcing there is no way she can win. That is a defeatist attitude.
If the best the media and the republican establishment and the dims can come up with is O’Donnell had financial problems over the years and sued a former employer for wrongful termanation, she can’t be a very bad candidate when you think of the graft and corruption going on in DC today. The media reported she was terminated because she ran another business while on the job. Why would anyone believe her former employers? It would be in their bet interest to make themselves look good and O’Donnell look bad. At least, she doesn’t owe any back taxes she has no intention of paying.
“She doesn’t need democrats to vote for her, Crosspatch. That’s not the “only” way to win.”
It is in Delaware where Republicans are outnumbered by 22 percentage points. It is one of the most lopsided states in the union. California has a higher percentage of Republicans than Delaware does, so does Massachusetts. It is probably one of the most lopsided in the nation in voter registration.
Fai Mao and Crosspatch;
I read both your comments and said to myself, gee, what is O’Donnell saying about the school and tax issue and foreclosure. So I went to her web site and low and behold, she has the documents and a very explanation.
School – Needed to pay back her student loans before diploma issued – has it now.
Foreclosure – house was actually sold by private real estate broker to private person – never went to foreclosure.
Taxes – There was an error by the IRS appeals process – shows supporting documents – take a look. PS. While she was running against Joe Biden, the IRS decided to audit her. Just saying.
I know, some will now say she made this stuff up, supporting documents are fake. Will everyone PLEASE stop throwing our own under the bus.
Nobody is throwing anyone under a bus. My question is … what part of her message is going to get a considerable number of Democrats to vote for her as that is what is needed to win in Delaware. A Democrat candidate can win there without a single Republican vote, the opposite is not true.
It isn’t opinion, it is basic arithmetic.
O’Donnell could do best by not running down Democrats per se but approaching it as the Democratic party leadership has moved far to the left of the people they represent. The establishment candidates of both parties have begun to act as royalty and speak condescendingly to the people and have become patronizing to their constituents. She must now emphasize that she would be the Senator for all of the people in Delaware.
Most importantly, I believe she needs to emphasize that through her, the people will be on a road to get government back under control by the people and less in control of the people.
I wish her luck.