The distinction between the Tea Party movement and the official G.O.P. is real, and we ignore it at our peril. While Washington is fixated on the natterings of Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, Michael Steele and the presumed 2012 Republican presidential front-runner, Mitt Romney, these and the other leaders of the Party of No are anathema or irrelevant to most Tea Partiers. Indeed, McConnell, Romney and company may prove largely irrelevant to the overall political dynamic taking hold in America right now. The old G.O.P. guard has no discernible national constituency beyond the scattered, often impotent remnants of aging country club Republicanism. The passion on the right has migrated almost entirely to the Tea Party’s counterconservatism. The leaders embraced by the new grass roots right are a different slate entirely: Glenn Beck, Ron Paul and Sarah Palin. Simple math dictates that none of this trio can be elected president. As George F. Will recently pointed out, Palin will not even be the G.O.P. nominee “unless the party wants to lose at least 44 states” (as it did in Barry Goldwater’s 1964 Waterloo). But these leaders do have a consistent ideology, and that ideology plays to the lock-and-load nutcases out there, not just to the peaceable (if riled up) populist conservatives also attracted to Tea Partyism. This ideology is far more troubling than the boilerplate corporate conservatism and knee-jerk obstructionism of the anti-Obama G.O.P. Congressional minority. (I highly recommend that you read the entire article by clicking the title of this post.) I actually covered some of what Frank Rich writes about the Teabagger movement in my post from January 29th . However he now has the added information provided by the goings on at the Nashville convention and CPAC to flesh out his contention that the group may resort to domestic terrorism to get their voices heard and failing that might even be preparing for an all out civil war. Personally I don’t fear a civil war from these people, but domestic terrorism does not seem a bridge too far for some of these incredibly angry individuals. And if that happens I expect the government to throw Glen Beck, Sean Hannity, and Sarah Palin into prison for inciting violence against their country.
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Columnist Frank Rich writes that we ignore the Teabaggers "at our peril".
