Republican Establishment Tries To Tamp Down Tea Party Insurgency in 2012 Senate Races

Welcome to the Rockefeller Establishment Republican Party as ordained by the powers at be:

After the 2010 midterm elections, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) observed, "Candidates matter." Karl Rove, the current don of Republican establishment-oriented outside groups, called O'Donnell's loss in Delaware "a lesson." And former Senate majority leader-turned-lobbyist Trent Lott said, "We did not nominate our strongest candidates."

I agree we had several bad candidates, O'Donnell and Angle come to mind.  Never figured out O'Donnell as no one bothered to look at her background or they would have known she was not the best candidate.  Would say in her case, it was her looks that got her the nomination.  Do I think some are that narrow minded?  Absolutely because there is nothing else that makes sense.  As for Sharron Angle, she ran a better primary then she did a general   but she didn't seem to understand what she was doing in either as she would take time off where no one could get in touch with her.  She won that race because of the number of people in the primary as votes were split.

Is the establishment candidate always going to be the best?  No way!  We showed that in 2004 when the DC establishment headed by Rove tried to keep Senator Coburn from running for Senate by knocking him out in the primary with a very arrogant establishment candidate.  They went so far to cut off his DC fundraising but it didn't work as the Oklahoma Grassroots sent him to the Senate and we just sent him back for six more years.  Pat Toomey and Club for Growth played a huge part in getting Dr. Coburn the money to run his campaign.  That is when The Club concentrated on a few candidates not a lot.

The establishment prized candidate, Richard Lugar, has not lived in Indiana for years and was ruled he cannot vote in Indiana in March.  That hasn't stopped the DC establishment and their establishment Indiana Governor Daniels from pushing Lugar.  I have been part of the Republican grassroots for years, grew up in Ohio, and cannot stand Lugar, but then I detest arrogance and a know it all attitude.   The people supporting Lugar have gone way over the edge IMHO:

In an invitation to a Lugar fundraiser sent out last year, Fox warned donors to support the senator against "a formidable competitor." He warned that if Republicans did not take control of the Senate (and President Barack Obama was reelected), the country would slip into "European-style socialism" in which "a majority of people become dependent on government handouts and where tax cuts become virtually impossible." What Fox did not state was that the "formidable competitor" was a fellow Republican. 

This is right out of the Rove/Romney playbook to make sure the millionaires contribute a lot of cash in order to do 'scorched earth' to take out a fellow Republican.  They just think that people are going to sit back and take it without fighting back.  Do they want Conservatives out of the Republican Party so they came become the Rockefeller East Coast Establishment Party again that Goldwater started the destruction, Reagan helped destroy it more and now the Nixon/Bush 41 with Rove as the 'don' are building it back up.

Who is going to win this battle in 2012 -- the money establishment types or the grassroots Conservatives who always vote and do the work?  Are the establishment going to win the battle and lose the war?  Is there a viable 3rd Party around the corner who will field candidates for Congress?  Not all millionaires and people with money are on the side of the establishment as witnessed in Oklahoma and Texas.

The so-called know-it-all establishment Rockefeller Republicans are making their mistake in going after the Tea Party as the local Tea Party members in a lot of states are longtime members of the Conservative Republican Grassroots.  In States like me, most of us are not members of the Tea Party but the Conservative Republican Grassroots who sent Dr. Coburn to the Senate.  We have the same agenda but we don't have the problem of the liberal states so we didn't have the need to be part of the huge Tea Party movement.   That doesn't mean that Grassroots is not as mad as the Tea Party members because we are.  The National Tea Party leaders are jokes like the Tea Party Express.  The local people at grassroots level who believe in small government and a balanced budget are both in and outside the local Tea Party movement.  This establishment group looks to be telling all of us to sit down and shut up as they know better.  Same thing is happening with Romney as we are supposed to line up like lemmings to follow him off over the cliff even though we don't agree with him even 50% of the time.

Is this 2012 election about the establishment taking back full control under the leadership of one of the most underhanded consultants dating back to when Bush 41 chose him over his opponent in a nasty contested race for the College Republican Chair -- none other then Karl Rove?  He has been praised as being this guru but looking back how did Bush almost lose Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004 which would have cost him the election?  There was no margin for error and my question is WHY?  Maybe he is not the guru they claim he is but a consultant who knows how to do 'scorched earth' to take out candidates as we have seen in this primary election and now look to be seeing in the Senate races.

Lugar, moreover, isn't the only incumbent or establishment Republican candidate receiving strong support from big donors through super PACs and political nonprofits. This election cycle the GOP establishment has turned to these new unlimited-money vehicles to help tamp down the Tea Party insurgency that many in the top tiers of the party blamed for the Republicans' failure to take control of the Senate in 2010. 

Read this and ask yourself how far is the Republican Party going to go by tossing the conservatives who make up the Tea Party and the Grassroots overboard because that is exactly what is happening.  Their underhanded tactics against opponents of their favorite establishment candidate is wrong because they will lie, cheat, and steal to win the election as we have seen with Romney.

Was always proud to be a Republican as I knew we didn't cheat with voter fraud, dead people voting, and missing ballot boxes like the Democrats were known for going back to LBJ.  Lived in Texas when the Civil War veterans were still voting in 1994 and was a resident of the county where the local Sheriff was famous for holding off the LBJ goons with him and his sons protecting the ballot boxes with shotguns.  His goons when he ran for Senate were going all through the Hill Country helping deliver ballot boxes for counting, but our Sheriff said no.  I can no longer say that after this RNC Chair, Rove, Ailes, Fox News,and their goons got through with this Republican Primary where we had missing ballot boxes, dead people voting, people voting twice, people being turned away from the caucus' IOTW a typical Democrat run primary like what happened to Hillary in 2008 by the Democrat establishment who wanted Obama.

Both parties have major problems and they reside inside the beltway.  Both parties are basically telling Middle America to sit down, shut up and you will vote how we tell you to vote as the other party is so bad you cannot risk voting for their candidate.  Both sides are as guilty.  Bush could do no right from the left and now Obama can do no right from the right.  How much of the garbage we are getting by the Clear Channel pundits is even true?

This article is a warning shot to the Conservative Republican Grassroots to sit down and shut up as we (the establishment) know best.  It is not going to go over well and frankly I find it disgusting that Trent Lott is now a consultant and part of this group who double crossed Senator Don Nickles (R-OK) on becoming Majority Leader and was always giving into Bill Clinton as he negotiated with out his #2 person Nickles.  Now he is taking lobbyist dollars.  For what?

For every battle the Establishment Rockefeller Republicans win, they are getting closer to losing the war with the Conservative Republican wing.  Will this election signal a beginning to the birth of a new Party like what happened when the Whigs got so arrogant and the Republican Party was formed?   We are slowly becoming a party of a bunch of rich white guys unless you are a more liberal Republican woman and then you can be accepted.  This is not going to last long in the days of the internet.

Former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson who is running for the Libertarian nomination for President has a plan to balance the budget immediately which will sendss establishment members of Congress from both parties up a wall as it doesn't fit their narrative:

So, what does a Gary John­son bud­get look like? Well, like ones when he was Governor—balanced. Plat­form plank num­ber one: 

I want to end deficit spend­ing and cut fed­eral spend­ing by 43%.

Given that the fed­eral gov­ern­ment bor­rows 43% of what it spends, it’s another way of say­ing the Gov­er­nor wants a bal­anced budget. 

When does John­son want to achieve a bal­anced bud­get? He says 2013 

Stay tuned as 2012 is about to get more interesting as the establishment Republicans attempt to take back the Republican Party from the Conservatives.  If they are successful, then look for a new party with 'common sense' to be formed who will listen to the people of the Heartland and elsewhere not the Wall Street and K Street money people who are buying this election.

Senate Races 2012: Republican Establishment Tries To Tamp Down Tea Party Insurgency
Posted: 04/19/2012 2:54 pm Updated: 04/19/2012 4:41 pm   

WASHINGTON -- Six-term Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) seemed all alone in facing an insurgent Tea Party primary challenge from state treasurer Richard Mourdock, who is backed by big money from the Club for Growth and FreedomWorks. In the past few weeks, however, top GOP senators, establishment Republican groups, and big-name donors have stepped in with a mix of ads touting Lugar's long career and blasting Mourdock in an effort to save the embattled incumbent. 

On Tuesday, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) endorsed Lugar and announced they would cut ads to support him. Last week, the American Action Network, a conservative group with ties to the Republican Party in Washington, D.C., launched a campaign of negative ads against Mourdock, costing $590,000. Major donors, including former fundraisers for President George W. Bush and McCain, are putting money into pro-Lugar super PACs. 

(snip)

Super PACs and political nonprofits, despite arguments that they have expanded the ability of competitors to challenge incumbents, may actually be doing the opposite. The flow of money released by the 2010 Citizens United and SpeechNow.org decisions has encouraged independent GOP establishment-oriented groups and donors to get involved in primary contests that had previously been dominated by the more radical Club for Growth and FreedomWorks. 

This has a double benefit: Incumbents and GOP insider choices are receiving financial support, while the party's hands are kept clean, as the national party organs do not have to step in to fight their conservative base. 

In Utah, Sen. Orrin Hatch appears to be successfully fighting back a Tea Party challenge with the help of the American Action Network. In Texas, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst has the support of two super PACs, backed with major contributions from the biggest Republican donors, against a challenge from former state Solicitor General Ted Cruz, who is supported by Tea Party-aligned groups including the Club for Growth and FreedomWorks. 

The effort is even evident at the presidential level where Mitt Romney has become the presumptive Republican nominee with the help of a super PAC backed by establishment GOP money. Restore Our Future spent more attacking Romney's top two competitors, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich, than those two candidates together spent on their entire campaigns through the end of February.

Along with the help of the American Action Network, two super PACs have launched in Indiana to back Lugar. Hoosiers for Jobs, which has already run ads attacking Mourdock, is funded by former Bush bundlers Sam Fox, Roy Pfauch and Frank Islam. 

(snip)

The American Action Network has telegraphed that its efforts to support Lugar stem from a fear that Mourdock would hurt Republican chances of taking back the Senate. "We're investing in this race now because a Mourdock primary victory would only embolden [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid and his liberal allies this November," the group said in a recent release. 

Down in Texas, the two super PACs supporting Lt. Gov. Dewhurst have raised a combined $1 million to beat back the insurgent Cruz. Donors to the Conservative Renewal PAC and the Texas Conservatives Fund include the most giving names in Republican donor circles, like Harold Simmons, Bob Perry and Kenny Troutt. Simmons, the second biggest super PAC donor this election cycle, gave $500,000 to the Conservative Renewal PAC, and Perry, the third biggest super PAC donor, gave $100,000 to the Texas Conservatives Fund.
The mission statement of Conservative Renewal PAC states that Dewhurst is "under fire by special interest groups including well-funded 'Super PAC's' from outside of Texas and he needs us to fight for him." Again, there's no notice that the candidate's main competitor is a Republican. 

While it is unlikely that a GOP candidate, whether the establishment or the Tea Party choice, would lose in either Texas or Utah, Republicans fear having to divert funds from closer races in other states, as they did in 2010. 

In the last electoral cycle, Republican candidates like the fire-breathing Tea Partier Sharron Angle in Nevada, the inept Christine O'Donnell in Delaware, Ken Buck in Colorado, and Linda McMahon in Connecticut all lost general election races that many believed could have been won by more seasoned candidates. Investing money in their races sucked party funds away from other close contests, like the nail-biter in Washington won by Democratic Sen. Patty Murray. 

(snip) 

None other than Sen. Lugar explained on CNN's "State of the Union" in December 2011, "They were people who claimed that they wanted somebody who was more of their Tea Party aspect, but in doing so, they killed off the Republican chances for a majority. This is one of the reasons why we have a minority in the Senate right now."
Correction: An earlier version of this article stated that the American Action Network spent $300,000 to support Sen. Dick Lugar in Indiana. The correct amount is $590,000.                              

Excerpt:  Read More at  Huffington Post