Tea Party People Complicate RINO Plans

The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article today (Registration may be required.) on how Tea Party people are throwing big wrenches into a common GOP strategy. That strategy is to nominate “moderate” Republican candidates who are supposedly more electable.

Tea Partiers are having none of that and may even cost Republicans elections, particularly the upcoming special election in New York’s 23rd Congressional District. After Republicans nominated “moderate” Dede Scozzafava, who supports abortion “rights”, gay marriage, and Obama’s stimulus, Tea Partiers threw their support behind Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman. It’s a now a three-way race with Democrat Bill Owens narrowly ahead in the polls. He may take a seat that would otherwise go back to the Republicans.

To which I say . . . good! No, I’d rather not Owens win that seat. (Although that may be preferable in the long run to Scozzafava. Owens will likely be beatable in 2012. If Scozzafava wins, we may be stuck with her.) But the Republican Party needs to learn that nominating RINO (Republican in Name Only) candidates is both bad policy and bad politics. To win elections in the long run, one needs to provide people something to vote for, and “me, too” ain’t it. Who is the most successful Republican presidential candidate since WWII, elected in two landslides? Ronald Reagan.

Besides, is it not the duty of parties to provide the electorate with alternatives? But I am getting idealistic there.

And, if one succeeds in electing RINOs, it is bad policy. What is the point of electing Republicans if they will simply enable Obama and big government? Take Charlie Crist, please:

In Florida, Republican leaders were elated when popular Florida Gov. Charlie Crist agreed to run for the Senate. He has adopted policies such as an aggressive approach to global warming that appeal even to Democrats. Those very policies infuriated conservatives, as did Mr. Crist's decision to campaign with President Barack Obama on behalf of the president's $787 billion stimulus package.

The man campaigned with Obama for that stimulus. That is no alternative. What is the point of electing such a RINO?

So good for the Tea Partiers. This former Republican precinct chairman thinks someone should make the GOP pay when they push such RINOs on the electorate.