First, in the ulterior motive category, they give Democrats a better shot at holding on to seats that the Democrats otherwise would have certainly lost. As a caveat let me just say that Democrats, as a party, are no great shakes. But they are closer to what I espouse in politics than Republicans, so that's where my tentative loyalty lies. So when I see races that should be Republican blowouts actually close and winnable for Democrats, I'm glad the Tea Party is doing well. Some examples of this are the Nevada senatorial race, the Kentucky senatorial race, the Delaware senatorial race, the Colorado gubernatorial race, and a slew of house races around the country. The primary voters are electing ultra-conservative candidates that moderate voters want no part of, and it's hurting their party. If the Republicans fail to win back the House and Senate, you can point to the Tea Party as the reason why.
Second, *deep breath* I actually think they are good for democracy. Most or all of those Tea Party primary wins came against the party-backed, system-approved incumbent or insider. These are the type of candidates that expect to win because they are supported by the institution. Reelection rates in America are somewhere north of 90%. Politicians get comfy and complacent and power-hungry. As a result we get a political class whose main goal is to continue to get reelected, as opposed to doing the work of the People.
So when a movement comes along which starts booting some of them out and putting the fear of the People in their hearts, I'm kind of on board. I wish it was a movement of moderates or something more benign, and I hope they win as few general election contests as possible, but I see their intrinsic value nonetheless. So, rock on, anti-establishmentists, vote out the stupids, but remember that I have a very different idea of what is stupid than you.
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I support the "tea party" I guess because I have been a part of the community that as far as I know originated the the tea party.
You can find the original post at the ticker forum run by Karl Denninger.
While that may or may not be the first modern day tea party, I can tell you that I knew about the tea bags being mailed before anybody on the major news channels even thought about reporting it.
That being said, I don't support what the tea party has become. At some point the topic of changed from being sick of government fraud, waste and abuse in their spending, policies and behavior to pretty much angry-at-the-establishment Republicans.
Most of the current day Tea Party supporters were silent as Medicare part D was happening, as the Department of Homeland Security was being formed and all the rest of the spending and massive government expansion, and government influenced and initiated fraud in our banking system.
I used to be sort of proud that I was a tiny part of this group of people that seemed like we had a real possibility of changing the political discourse from the broken rooting-for-the-home-team two party system to actually discussing how our government is screwing things up.
Then the next thing I knew Sarah Palin was being associated with the Tea Party and I've done my best to separate myself from that term's existence ever since.
The Tea Party now is mostly just angry Republicans, the tea party used to be something more meaningful.
Don't get me wrong, I'll support ANY group of people that can break up a party monopoly in Washington. So I'm hoping the house and/or senate flip this November just to force compromise on some level.
Personally I would support campaign reform that consisted of two things:
1) Term Limits
2) House and Senate cannot have a majority of any single political party.
That would be awesome.
So how to you propose to make sure that a single party doesn't have control of either house of Congress? It sounds good, but I can't see how it could be accomplished. Even if there were three or more major parties, the voters could still vote one in to the majority, then what do you do?
As far as the Tea Party, you are right that it is just riled up Republicans without any sort of meaningful new message (though that is not perhaps how it started). They have every right to be riled up, but lets not act like this anything other than that it is.
Obviously there's a bit of a paradigm shift that would be necessary, but it's actually not a difficult problem to solve.
The votes will just be staggered. I'm not even sure the order matters but for example's sake just have the House vote first, then the Senate, then the President (when applicable).
Yes it would take "longer" but not really longer since our election season is already terribly long and inefficient.
At a defined time (say 6 months) before any voting takes place, each candidate must put their hat in their ring (the specific ring, house, senate etc) to include their party affiliation (if any at all). That would eliminate last minute party switching or other shenanigans that would happen when one party wins or loses a race.
Then if say the Republicans hold the house after the vote, then the state elections would be for only non-Republicans on the ticket for the Senate.
I think it would be easily manageable.
The candidates have to declare
So it's not that a party can't have a majority in one or the other, but that they shouldn't have a majority in both. Do I have that right? While I think that is not such a bad goal to have, I don't think it is American or democratic to completely exclude a party from a race. That is a huge first amendment violation. Wouldn't the result be one house overwhelmingly dominated by one party and the other overwhelmingly dominated by the other party? I think the way to get closer to the plurality goal is to give more choices to the voters, not fewer.
We live in a humongous, diverse nation but our politics don't reflect that at all. The Republican and Democratic parties are different in the West, the Midwest, the Northeast, and the South. Why don't we have more regional parties that reflect those differences? We rightfully break up corporate monopolies because they are anti-competition, but we don't break up political parties who create the same problem. With too many parties nothing gets accomplished, but with too few we don't really have legitimate choices or checks on power.
So it's not that a party can't have a majority in one or the other, but that they shouldn't have a majority in both. Do I have that right? While I think that is not such a bad goal to have, I don't think it is American or democratic to completely exclude a party from a race. That is a huge first amendment violation. Wouldn't the result be one house overwhelmingly dominated by one party and the other overwhelmingly dominated by the other party? I think the way to get closer to the plurality goal is to give more choices to the voters, not fewer.
Why is it a first amendment violation to exclude candidates? We already do that with presidential term limits, we already alter representation in a bunch of states by not allowing people like felons to vote.
I just fail to see how a conditional exclusion like that would be a violation.
We live in a humongous, diverse nation but our politics don't reflect that at all. The Republican and Democratic parties are different in the West, the Midwest, the Northeast, and the South. Why don't we have more regional parties that reflect those differences? We rightfully break up corporate monopolies because they are anti-competition, but we don't break up political parties who create the same problem. With too many parties nothing gets accomplished, but with too few we don't really have legitimate choices or checks on power.
I agree completely, and I think one of the best bi-products of a system that prevented monopolistic power for one party in Washington would be the ability to see the amount of independent or smaller party candidates rise.
Since their "party" wouldn't be in the majority, they'd have the ability to run all the time.
I also find myself being more and more sympathetic to the Tea Party movement. Maybe even a little jealous. Why is all the mobilized discontent coming from their side? What happened to the anti-war marches and organized rallies against "the man"?
We've grown soft.
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