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.
Excellent post, AJ. I wouldn’t say that O’Donnell is “not the Tea Party”; but, I would agree is she is the weak end of the Tea Party. I, too, am glad I did not have to vote in DE. That being said…..I hope she wins. I think it would be a big shake up. Her messaging was poor in the early phase of the primary. However, I think her messaging is very good now as evidenced by her response to Karl Rove and her performance in the political forum debate last night. I think with some good campaign advisors/handlers she absolutely can pull this off. Keep in mind that DE has a heavy religious Catholic population. According to Rasmussen, Voters not affiliated with either major party prefer O’Donnell by eight points. According to Gallup, DE is more conservative than liberal (37.4% to 19%). And, best of all is this:
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Odds Are Tough, but Not Hopeless, for GOP in Delaware
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703743504575494252317649106.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Ms. O’Donnell won not just in the conservative Sussex and Kent counties, but also in large parts of the much more populated and liberal New Castle County, which includes Wilmington and the suburbs of Philadelphia.
To win in November, the O’Donnell surge will have to encompass a significant share of Delaware’s 146,000 registered independents, while also siphoning off at least some support from the state’s 292,000 registered Democrats. The state has 182,000 registered Republicans.
The gulf of support the 41-year-old Ms. O’Donnell needs to bridge, though, may not be as wide as many assume. She ran a distant second against Mr. Biden in 2008, but still pulled in 140,584 votes in a very big year for Democrats. That’s only 30,000 votes shy of what the popular former Democratic Gov. Tom Carper tallied in winning Delaware’s other Senate seat in 2006.
Peggy Noonan’s astute observation:
Why It’s Time for the Tea Party —
The populist movement is more a critique of the GOP than a wing of it.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703440604575496221482123504.html?mod=rss_opinion_main
AJ; Glad the site is back – been missing it at this critical time;
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Where to begin…… The primary in DE was very awesome in that someone basically unknown, beat a candidate that was there for what 40 years.
But the truly interesting thing is how a number of conservatives, Republicans, Independents on this site and other sites, media etc., who want to beat the Liberals in DC are trashing O’Donnell. She is the pick (by the people) – she won, GET OVER IT. Support her 100% and help her win – even if she isn’t the “best” choice for you. This is a “battle” now between Democrats and Republicans winning the most seats in DC.
By people trashing her and saying “she can’t win” only adds fuel to the MSM fire. I’ve been around a long time and this is the first time I’ve seen this wave of disgust with DC, but it is also the first time I’ve seen people in the same party (same team) “go after their own”.
If this was football game and you didn’t like a member of the team, on the field now, would you trash them and possibly lose the game just so you could say “I was right” – Help O’Donnell, Help all the Republican Candidates WIN – this is our future you are fighting against !!!
Good post AJ. And welcome back.
I think O’Donnell is a disaster…and no I am not coming down on the Tea Party. And I have gone on sites and watched people trash people like Rove and Krauthammer just for being honest about what they thought. What did Rove say about O’Donnell that was not true? I mean come on, they might not want to hear it, they might be so caught up in the moment that they refuse to see it, but this lady has some serious baggage. There is no way she can win a general election if she does not deal with those issues…all these people trashing Rove for pointing that out are off base. I actually had one guy tell me that it was Rove’s job to help get O’Donnell elected and I though to myself..well how can he do that if you can not be honest about what you are facing?
Really. It is just ridiculous. For weeks they said they did not care if they won the general, they want to send a message and then we hear that somehow or other it is Rove’s fault if she loses.
No, it is her fault. The lies, the strange financial dealings, the problems with the IRS, the frivolous lawsuit, the dishonesty about her educational background, the talk about creationism and the remarks about doctors putting fully devoloped human brains inside of mice…all of this will cause problems in the general. That does not mean it is impossible for her to win, but it won’t be easy.
And then of course we had Mark Levin calling Patterico and the guys at Powerline all sorts of names…and I heard Hannity say that Castle voted for Obamacare when he did not…and Rush said he voted for the stimulus when he did not…and on and on.
It was just ridiculous.
My fear is that this thing with O’Donnell will spill over into other races, I hope not. I really don’t want to see that happen.
As for the ruling class and the GOP establishment and all that stuff, well you know what? Sarah Palin is a part of that establishment and so is Jim DeMint…and guys like Rush have a big voice out there, it is not as if they are without influence. I would just like to see them be a bit more responsible when they use that influence.
bob:
One of the reasons I had a problem with O’Donnell is that I do want to beat the Democrats and it would help if we had the Senate, something that is not likely to happen now.
As for saying she can’t win, it was known up front that she had has much chance of winning as whatever nameless Democrat is running for Senate in Wyoming…and yet people like Rush did their best to push her anyway.
Never mind the fact that she just flat out lied on audio in a radio interview about how many counties she won…never mind the fact that she did not pay her taxes in 2005 and they put a tax lien on her house in 2006 and she stopped paying the mortgage in 2007…and can not even explain how she was making a living..never mind the lawsuit for $7 million dollars against a conservative non profit group that she says demoted her because of their “philosophical” attitude that women are subordinate…never mind the accusations of people stalking her and hiding in the bushes, never mind the 2007 spot on O”Reilley when she said that scientists were so advanced in cloning that they had managed to put fully developed human brains in mice…and it goes on and on.
There were people out there saying this woman had a lot of baggage, the last time she ran and lost in Delaware the results were 65-35. No, Rove was castigated and despised for speaking the truth, he was supposed to pretend that all was well and there was no problem here…Kruathammer has been attacked as well for his apostasy. Now all of a sudden we are hearing about party loyalty. The same people who have been trashing the Republican party for months are saying, we need to unite behind O’Donnell. Well, I for one have written DE off. I do not even know what to hope for in that state..but I will tell you this, I would not buy a used car from this woman.
WELL now, word is Murkowski announces her write in campaign tonight.
The beltway insiders and assorted RINOs’ have no intention of letting either the “Little People” or conservatives enter into THEIR PLAYHOUSE.
How long before Castle does the same especially since we know he has talked to Obama and OBite-Me!
Karl Rove and Krauthammer can get their smiles back on again, since in the interest of Bi-Partisanship the RINOs have no intention of submitting to “The Will Of The People”
Oh wait let me guess it will somehow be the conservatives and Tea Parties fault that the RINOs run third party and help elect a Democrat.
What say you Terrye, Rove , Krauthammer?
If they had any sense of propriety the Krauthammers and Roves would publicly ask the RINOs’ to endorse the candidate the people chose instead of fight for their rightfully entitled ownership of the ship of state.
And they wonder why we vote them out and will continue to do so!
Because they are a dispicable lot!
dhunter:
Oh come on. Krauthammer has been completely supportive of Joe Miller and so has Karl Rove. As far as that is concerned they have both been supportive of Marco Rubio as well. If Murkowski does a write in that has nothing to do with bipartisanship or Rove or Krauthammer. In fact it is not a lot different than what Tancredo is doing in Colorado.
And at no point did either of them say anything about the will of the people, in fact in November the will of the people of Delaware will probably be to send a Democrat to Washington.
The problem is you are conflating unrelated issues because you do not want to deal with the very real problems that O’Donnell faces in the general election and apparently for all your talk about the will of the people you have a big problem with letting two of those people, Rove and Krauthammer exhibit something other than groupthink.
And btw dhunter, you tell me one thing that Rove said about O’Donnell that is not true. Do you honestly think that if he just ignored all that, or lied and covered it up that people would not be aware of all the problems she faces? And what did Krauthammer do that so wrong other than to have an opinion that is not in rigid lock step with the newly minted ruling class.
meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
I happen to think that Krauthammer had a point and btw, he had no problem putting someone up against Castle in the primary, he just wanted it to be someone who had a decent chance of winning in November. You can disagree with him on that, but it is not fair to call him names or say he does not respect the will of the people.
For Chrisake, the will of the people gave us Barack Obama, that does not mean I have to like it.
I don’t know about krauthammer but I saw Rove the night Murkowski lost and he was NOT HAPPY!
He called it the end of a Dynasty and was almost dejected about it!
The fact is the Archetect Karl Rove is a big reason we have socialists in charge now and he admitted it he and W passed big spending bills and never stood up for themselves against relentless attacks by the Dems. The Dems won on the Deficit for Gods sake the Deficit Bush and Rove and CO. ran up. And now we all pay!
I think Krauthammer and Rove could use their bully pulpit to encourage Castle to concede!
They are complicit if Castle goes third Party also, because of their tearing apart a candidate nominated by the people of DE.
It was to be all party unity and koombya when RINOs win but if the favored RINO is defeated its a jump all over the oppostion . the only reason I can see for that is personal power, prestige and perhaps investments.
Castle was Roves guy he should use the bully pulpit to tell Castle to get on board, but that would not be Bi-Partisanship I guess!
BiPartisan must be when Rinos like Mukowski and Crist get defeated to run as third party and elect the Dems!
Rush said it best if the Republican elites keep it up they will find themselves the third party with 10% support while the Tea Party draws conservatives ( a majority) from Dems, Repubs, Liberatarians and indys and the socialists stay with the Dems!
Pros arguments and cons against Christine are OK.
What is not OK is “far right” crappola thrown against those perceived not of the mushy/squishy/wo. a spine or principles pedigree…
dbostan:
The people of DE have every right to vote for whoever they want to…I would not ever question that…but you know what? You might hear less stuff about ‘far right’ if you did not characterize the people who disagreed with you as ‘mushy’squishy/wlspine or principles pedigree’. Believe it or not, a lot of those people actually are not squishy or unprincipled, they just have a different opinion. And right now, we need to be doing what we can to slow down the Obama agenda, hopefully stop it in the long run.
“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! ”
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Same thing in Colorado: Scott McInnis vs Dan Maes. Just before the primary elections, it was revealed that McInnis had been paid big bucks for some water-advisory paper that was, in fact, plagiarized. So, Colorado Republicans voted for the “clean” candidate, Dan Maes. Now weird stuff is coming out about HIM (he had claimed he worked undercover for the FBI and they deny it). So come November, Colorado conservatives will split their votes between the GOP’s now-besmirched Maes, and ACP candidate Tom Tancredo — and most Colorado pundits think this will allow Democrat John Hickenlooper an easy victory.
{Way to go, Colorado GOP: don’t vet your candidates, let the Democrat dirt-finders do it AFTER you’ve approved them… }
One reason a candidate like O’Donnell could well succeed has more to do with emotion than with logic. O’Donnell gives people a sense of regaining some amount of control over a situation they feel is out of control. The current politicians seem to run the situation more and more out of control with every step they take.
People feel helpless, O’Donnell offers them a sort of “yes we can” approach to reigning in a bloated government who doesn’t listen to them. The people don’t feel heard by the establishment, the establishment talks down to them and does not listen to them. The establishment acts like royalty. O’Donnell acts like “one of us”.
Also, Delawareans have a huge affinity for the underdog. Coming from a tiny little state, it’s history is full of stories of the little state or the little guy making a big difference. The story of Caesar Rodney’s ride being but one example. John Dickenson made a huge difference early in the country’s history, too.
Rodney’s ride is not even mentioned in Rodney’s Wikipedia entry where he rode all night from near Dover, Delaware to Philadelphia to decide the deciding vote among a deadlocked Congress for adopting the Declaration of Independence.
O’Donnell might appeal to the voters broadly in a more emotional sense and if so, there is no telling what is going to happen because logic has no value in matters of the heart.
crosspatch:
She might ride the wave. That is true, however, it is also true that only 56,000 people voted in that primary…that is all the Republicans there were. Now it is time for the other 800,000 or so people who live there to have their say.
I think that O’Donnell could also benefit from taking Rove’s advice. I know a lot of people were angry with him, but he knows about winning and losing elections. If she deals with the questions about her past up front and then moves on from there, she might have a chance.
Of those 800,000 people, there are only something like 15% Republicans. Republicans are tiny in Delaware compared to Democrats. Independents even outnumber Republicans.
Under normal circumstances a Republican candidate generally needs to attract the votes of about a third of the Democrats going to the polls in order to be elected in that state.
It is really easy for people outside of Delaware to say this that or the other but it really doesn’t matter one bit what they say. Delaware is a deep blue state. I sincerely hope O’Donnell wins, but I don’t give her a snowball’s chance in hell that she can actually win there. She just can’t attract enough support from Democrats.
Depending on how she plays it she could turn her negatives into positives.
1. Lots of people actually do not believe in evolution. For others who are somewhat Bergsonian like me it is a non-issue.
2.Non-payment of taxes – She should claim that taxes are too high and should be lowered She can also point to New Yawk Cholly and ask: “Why are his taxes not an issue? Are only Republicans supposed to pay taxes? Democrats advocated this during the Reagan administration. They wanted to not pay any tax that supported the military. Sauce for goose after all sauce for the goose
3. The lien on her house – Those evil banks in collusion with those evil democrats caused this. Talk about how the fair Housing act is the root of the mortgage lending crisis and how that was started under Jimmy Carter, expanded under Clinton and exploded under Dodd and Frank. Then tell people that “i know how those of you facing foreclosure feel.
4. exaggerations – 57 states anyone.
5. Educational background – Where is Obama’s? Did he even graduate from Harvard? Did he even pass the Bar exam? We don’t know. If CoD’s educational prevarications are an issue then Obama;s opacity in the same area is more of an issue. bring up Biden and stolen speeches. perhaps mention that Al Gore flunked out of graduate school three times and his best semester was worse than G.W. Bush’s worst semester. Yet democrats thought that a Dumb-ass like Gore was educated enough to be president.
Is she flawed as a candidate? yes probably. But if she plays this right she could really wound the democrats and I think she can win the election.
CoD needs to run with flaws in plain view, indeed she need to flaunt them and ask voters: “Would you rather vote for a person with their failing in plain sight or someone who hides their past because they are ashamed or afraid of it?”
Slam dunk the Bearded Marxist goes down
I am in a rather mean mood today
“Depending on how she plays it she could turn her negatives into positives.”
The bottom line is how does she get Democrats to vote for her because that is the *only* way to win in Delaware.
“Lots of people actually do not believe in evolution.”
That question is irrelevant and doesn’t even belong in a political discussion. That belongs in a theological discussion.
“Non-payment of taxes – She should claim that taxes are too high and should be lowered”
Not paying taxes is against the law. Not agreeing with a law is not a valid excuse for breaking it.
The bottom line, though, is how does she get a third of Delaware Democrats who go to the polls to vote for her as that is absolutely required in order to win.
She doesn’t need democrats to vote for her, Crosspatch. That’s not the “only” way to win. This is a mid-term, and democrats are discouraged.
All she needs to do is to get more Independent and Republican voters to show up than the depressed turnout of the dems.
I’m thinking across the country we’re going to see something around 80% – 90% Republican turnout and about 33% dem turnout.
That turns every assumption about who can win and who can’t on it’s head. All we can say for sure is that anyone who claims to know how this is going to turn out is full of crap. Anything is possible.
Another interesting bit from David Brooks tonight (and I think he’s not very happy about it)
“Many of my liberal friends are convinced that the Republican Party has a death wish. It is sprinting to the right-most fever swamps of American life. It will end up alienating the moderate voters it needs to win elections.
There’s only one problem with this theory. There is no evidence to support it. The Republican Party may be moving sharply right, but there is no data to suggest that this has hurt its electoral prospects, at least this year.
I asked the election guru Charlie Cook if there were signs that the Tea Party was scaring away the independents. “I haven’t seen any,” he replied. I asked another Hall of Fame pollster, Peter Hart, if there were Republican or independent voters so alarmed by the Tea Party that they might alter their votes. He ran the numbers and found very few potential defectors.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/17/opinion/17brooks.html?_r=3&ref=opinion
Yes, I agree that not paying taxes is against the law. But if democrats are not going to prosecute their own for violations of the tax law then CoD should get a pass on that as well; especially when those violations by democrats are far more egregious than hers.
When the democrats get rid of their crooks who are far more flagrant in their crookedness than the republican crooks then they can make an issue of this. Until then shut-up. Or does the rule of law only apply to republicans?
Incidentally, I agree with you it isn’t an excuse – except it is for elected democrats
I also agree that evolution-creation discussions should not be a political issue but that was brought up by A.J. not me.
I think that democrats need to be forced to look at how corrupt their party is. They need to have their face rubbed in it