Has the Tea Party Lost its Luster?

[stewstewstewdio]

Comments

[telemann]

The New York Times published an article about a new effort to adjust the Republican Party to a more moderate image with its conservative base in an attempt to appeal to a wider audience.

And Cantor did by borrowing heavily from President Obama in the process, almost verbatim in some instances; and tried to co-opt the same Republican ideas with Obama's language.

Video comparison here.

[Details back here]

Point One: “Fair Shot”

Obama in 2011:

“Well, it starts by making sure that everyone in America gets a fair shot at success. The truth is we’ll never be able to compete with other countries when it comes to who’s best at letting their businesses pay the lowest wages, who’s best at busting unions, who’s best at letting companies pollute as much as they want.”

Cantor in 2013:

“Our goal - to ensure every American has a fair shot at earning their success and achieving their dreams. In America, we do have higher expectations for our nation. Since our founding, we believed we could be the best hope to mankind. That hope led generations of immigrants to

[devil_ad_vocate]

The moderate Republicans will throw a serape on Rubio and have him join a Tejano band, thereby changing him from Cuban-American to Mexican-American. Meanwhile, more conservative Republicans will fall back on their "BenghaziBenghaziBenghazi" chant - since they have nothing else.

[telemann]

Hispanic friends of mine say Rubio is considered by their community to be a LINO anyway; and they won't fall for any of those gimmicks.

[dexeron]

Do they have an opinion on Jeb Bush? Here in Florida, there's a lot of mixed feelings about the guy. His name is CONSTANTLY floated around as a potential candidate for anything from VP to Secretary of ANYTHING. The news always makes a huge deal about his wife being latina, and that this might undo the damage done by familial association (all things being equal, he wasn't a TERRIBLE governor. Not a huge fan myself, but our current guy is a lot worse.) My thought is that voters aren't so easily distracted by who somebody's WIFE is, but news folks sure like to make a lot of noise about it.

[telemann]

I never hear much about Jeb Bush from them, but I know his son George P Bush (who is Anglo-Hispanic) is running for office in Texas (Texas Land Commissioner), and is fluent in Spanish. He certainly is photogenic, but he gave a speech recently and it was pretty god awful. So who knows what will happen with him.

[sophia_sadek]

During the '04 election, I was approached by two Republican activists who tried to sucker lure me into their "big tent."

[telemann]

What did they use to lure you in?

[sophia_sadek]

They used ingenuous arguments about Republican "inclusiveness" and the threat of another Bush term.

[kylinrouge]

Caesar.... salad.

[telemann]

You're killing me here ;) Haaaaaaaaa!

[dexeron]

I like to treat the GOP "big tent" like I would a dingy, windowless van.

[sophia_sadek]

That is, you would either avoid it like the plague or you would inspect it carefully for evidence of past acts of foul play.

[telemann]

[sandwichwarrior]

Have been thourough purging of the moderates from both parties.

[telemann]

That's wrong if you're implying Democrats have been increasingly become liberal as Republicans have moved further to the right. Both parties have increasingly become more conservative (tons of data about that topic on Vote View).

[sandwichwarrior]

If that is true, what happened to the "Blue Dogs"?

Truth of the matters is that the "centerists" have been been purged from both parties and the pigs are looking like they're about to start walking upright.