The Tea Party's Bad Primary Night
Newsweek reports on the lackluster performance of Tea Party candidates during the primaries held on August 3rd:
Another Tuesday, another round of Republican primaries pitting self-proclaimed tea-party candidates against their (sometimes slightly, sometimes considerably) more moderate opponents--and yet another sign that the Glenn Beck brigade is a long way from "taking back the country," despite all the hype.
So far, the tea party has been the major political story of the 2010 election cycle, and in many ways it's a fascinating, vibrant reflection of America's current fixations and frustrations. But given that the vast majority of the movement's favored candidates have lost their Republican primary battles--and given that the few candidates who've won, like Rand Paul and Sharron Angle, seem to be underperforming against vulnerable Democratic opponents--there's little reason to think that it will be a major electoral force anytime soon.
The "weak tea" trend continued Tuesday in a series of marquee primary battles stretching from the upper to lower Midwest. In Michigan, moderate Rick Snyder--a former Gateway executive who supports embryonic stem-cell research and sought to attract Democratic crossover voters with ads featuring Bill Ford--was competing against a flock of more conservative candidates (Oakland county Sheriff Mike Bouchard; state Attorney General Mike Cox; Rep. Pete Hoekstra) for the GOP gubernatorial nomination. In Missouri, Rep. Roy Blunt fought for Kit Bond's open U.S. Senate seat against state Sen. Chuck Purgason, an anti-tax, anti-government conservative who has worked hard to position himself as a true-blue tea partier. And in Kansas, the two orthodox conservative congressmen running to replace Sam Brownback, Todd Tiahrt and Jerry Moran, seemed basically indistinguishable until Tiahrt started harping on some of Moran's more moderate votes and secured the endorsement of a lady named Sarah Palin as a result.
Unfortunately for the tea party, the so-called "mainstream" candidates--Moran, Blunt, and Snyder--swept Tuesday night's races. Palin's endorsement couldn't push Tiahrt past Moran; he was trailing by 20 points in the polls when she announced her support earlier this summer, and lost last night by four. Purgason's strategy of pounding Blunt as the consummate Washington insider didn't pay off; he never raised much money and lost last night by almost 60 points. And Snyder’s vow to “reach across the aisle”—a cardinal sin in the tea party bible—actually paid off, landing him 11 points ahead of Hoekstra, his next closest opponent. The news wasn't much better for the tea party in a handful of House races. Social moderates, including Kansas’ Kevin Yoder, won several high-profile contests over their further-right challengers.
