White House Paints GOP Presidential Field With Tea Party Brush

[onehandle]

Source: AP/Huffington Post



WASHINGTON (AP) -- The rising profiles of Republican presidential candidates Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann are giving the White House a new opening: linking the entire GOP field to the tea party, whose popularity has recently sagged.

If the strategy works, it could cause guilt-by-association problems even for non-tea-party Republicans like Mitt Romney.

That might be a lot to ask, however. Unflattering comparisons are a well-worn campaign tactic, and many Americans have only a hazy notion of the tea party movement. Still, President Barack Obama's top aides are giving it a go.

Republican candidates must decide whether to "swear allegiance to the tea party" or work with Democrats to create jobs, Obama campaign adviser Robert Gibbs said Tuesday. After last week's GOP debate in Iowa, Obama campaign guru David Axelrod claimed the presidential contenders were "pledging allegiance to the tea party."




Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/17/elections-2012-tea-party_n_929068.html

[Ship of Fools]

1. Personally, I think this is a good thing, except 18 months is a loooong

way to go and it may get old, fast. I hope the WH/PBO pace themselves.

[GOTV]

2. They'll know if it's working in less than 18 months from the polling.

If it is working they will have forced the GOP candidates to move away from their TP buddies.

[Ship of Fools]

4. A good thing in terms of the 2012 elections --

The more congresscritters are tied to TP at election time, the easier for dems to keep/gain seats. Same for pres candidate and PBO.

But if a pres candidate denounces TP and moves away and starts sounding sane, the more difficult for PBO at election time, right? And if congresscritters disavow TP and start working with PBO on JOBS, that's definitely the best possible outcome, even if dems/pres can't run as effectively against insanity later on. I guess I'm more for jobs than the elections. So is PBO, IMO.

[GOTV]

10. You could be right though for a GOP candidate to move away from the TP ...

... might cost more votes from their base than it gains from independents.

It's a balancing act.

[Andy823]

3. Good plan.

Old Mitt has been going further and further to the right to try and seem to be one of the "gang" when it come to the tea party. Linking them together is a great idea, and as the article state, after they all raised their hands saying they WOULD NOT accept a plan with 10 to 1 cuts, making them chose the tea party or working to make jobs is something that will back them into a corner they can't get out of. They are already in that corner, but this will force them to show their loyalty to our country, the people who they are supposed to represent, or the insane wing of their party.

[rpannier]

5. I agree with that one woman -- Vote the Bums Out

Everyone of those tea party cranks is a bum (actually worse)

[SoapBox]

6. I agree...link all these crazies to the T.HaterBaggerParty AND be sure

to get the KKKoch Brothers, the Amway family and DicKKK Armey mentioned.

Hit them often and hit them HARD!

[WranglerRog]

7. I wish everyone would call these people what they are

BIRCHERS. Early on they may have legitimately been called the Tea Party although even then I thought Tease Party was a more accurate description. Today this movement is nothing more than a reconstitution of the John Birch society so please call them out. William F. Buckley and other responsible conservatives (and yes a long long time ago such creatures existed) discredited them and, if possible, it's time to shame the current Republican party into doing the same.

[No Elephants]

9. I just googled. Fred Koch (yes, those Kochs) was a founding member of the John Birch Society.

The Koch brothers have been cooking up the Tea Party for 20 years, according to an article by Mayer in the New Yorker.

So, I'm thinking you nailed it.

[madrchsod]

8. meanwhile one of his staff calls some of us--"firebaggers"