WaPo: 'Tea party' candidates hurt by lack of organization in movement

[Amerigo Vespucci]

'Tea party' candidates hurt by lack of organization in movement

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/11/AR2010061105726.html?hpid=topnews

By Amy Gardner
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, June 12, 2010

The polls hadn't even closed Tuesday when "tea party" activists in Nevada started sniping at one another over whether Sharron Angle, the soon-to-be Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, was the best candidate to bring down Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid.

In Virginia, tea partiers vented on blogs and to reporters about the movement's inability to coalesce around a single, strong candidate in two House races, resulting in the nomination of establishment candidates instead.

The national tea party movement has never had a central organization or single leader; in fact, it has boasted the opposite. But Tuesday's primary results provided fresh evidence of the amorphous network's struggle to convert activist anger and energy into winning results. Frustrated and lacking agreement on what to do next, self-identified tea party leaders say the movement may be in danger of breaking apart before it ever really comes together.

"No one owns the tea party brand, and that's kind of the problem," said Brendan Steinhauser, grass-roots director for FreedomWorks, which organizes tea party groups. "In Virginia -- it breaks my heart. You've got six self-appointed tea party candidates and one establishment guy. You're not going to beat the establishment guy in that situation."

Judson Phillips, founder of another national organization, Tea Party Nation, said some activists are starting to act like mainstream politicians. "It's supposed to be something other than politics as usual, but some of these folks are only looking out for themselves and not for the country."

The discord is not only striking races such as those in Virginia's 2nd and 5th congressional districts, where large fields of tea party candidates lost the Republican nomination to better organized establishment picks. It is also evident in races where tea party candidates have won -- including Nevada, where Angle cruised to victory Tuesday with endorsements from the Tea Party Express, FreedomWorks and the fiscally conservative Club for Growth.

Even more demoralizing for activists, perhaps, is that disapproval of the tea party is at an all-time high, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. The poll showed that 50 percent of Americans have an unfavorable view of the movement, compared with 39 percent in March.

[MineralMan]

1. Huh? I though they were hurt by their lack of anything resembling

intelligence. Who knew?

[shraby]

2. Is there anyone at the rally pictured under the age of 40,

or of any designation other than white, mostly grey, white, dyed hair or balding..in other words senior citizens who are enjoying the benefits of Medicare?

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Unfortunately, our state Dem convention has the same age distribution.

[ProgressiveVictory]

6. You know people under 40 and minorities don't go out and vote

[Raschel]

7. Shhh. You're supposed to pretend you don't notice that they're all White, like the media does.

Imagine if they were all Black. What a story that would be!

[left coaster]

3. The guy holding the wooden cross says it for me..

Hey, Gramps! Did you forget your white robe and hood?

[Raschel]

5. They need more hove-arounds to organize.

[FBI_Un_Sub]

8. Their "candidates"

Sharron Angle, Rand Paul, Pat Toomey, Alvin Greene ???