Colorado Tea Parties & 9/12 Groups Challenge GOP
by elpresidente | 11:44 pm, January 22, 2010 | Comments Off
And are now appearing on page A1 of the New York Times:
Across the country, many Tea Party activists believe that they have to work within the Republican Party if they want to elect fiscally conservative candidates. But they want the party to work for them — not, they argue, the other way around.
For Republican officials, managing the tensions between the two parties — one official, one potent — can be something like a full-time job.
“I do spend a lot of my time running interference,” said Dick Wadhams, the chairman of the Colorado Republican Party.
“I’m a big believer in the Tea Party groups,” he said. “I’m not going to claim that every Tea Party or 9/12 leader thinks I’m hunky-dory, but I do think the people who I’ve reached out to would acknowledge that I’ve welcomed them into the Republican Party. It’s a big priority of mine.”
Wadhams’ willingness to open dialogue with the Tea Party and 9/12 groups has not quelled justifiable frustrations from grassroots activists not wanting to be co-opted or dismissed:
“They thought the platform was going to tie into what we were after, that we would be one big happy family,” said Lesley Hollywood, the leader of the Northern Colorado Tea Party.Mr. McInnis was promoting the platform on Fox News when they identified him as the Tea Party candidate.
Ms. Hollywood was on the telephone with Ms. Busse, the coalition leader, when she saw the interview. “Did you see that?” she shouted. She sent an e-mail message to her members warning that they were “being played like pawns,” and another to Mr. Wadhams expressing her “extreme disgust” at the “blatant hijacking of the Tea Party.”
. . .
“My frustration is, I have to do all of this work, now the G.O.P. wants us to do what they want to do?” Ms. Hollywood said. “If we’re the ones doing the work, it has to be the other way around.”
There is more to this story, however, than simply airing grievances.
Lu Busse, the Colorado 9/12 coalition leader, told People’s Press Collective in a brief interview that “We’re glad the 9/12 and Tea Party groups have received national media attention. More importantly, we’re pleased to see that the New York Times has given us a decent article that outlines our deep concerns with supporting facts.”
The two separate incidents described in the article–the Jane Norton/NRSC domain flap last August and the Scott McInnis/”Tea Party Candidate”/Cavuto interview from early December–raised the ire of both grassroots activists and rank-and-file Republicans alike. Both stories appeared first on People’s Press Collective–and yes, both were authored by yours truly–and went on to have national implications.
The first incident inspired a Facebook group and petition that provoked a rash of emails among the GOP county chairs and ultimately a rather pointed call by Chairman Wadhams to the NRSC to back off the Colorado Senate primary battle. Several stories in the local media reported the domain registration row, following PPC’s initial reporting.
The second incident, brought to my attention via Lu and Lesley, prompted another post that provided PPC with its largest surge in traffic in its entire existence when it was picked up by Colorado’s most prominent blogger, Michelle Malkin, creating the most heated comment section ever on a post. That prompted responses from the McInnis campaign on the Cavuto television appearance, and even more local stories.
So despite the impetus from the Scott Brown victory in Massachusetts earlier this week, there is clearly more to the story. Local grassroots activists have been toiling for months, first in expressing their frustrations at Tea Party rallies and town hall meetings last year, and now actively engaging in the GOP caucus process.
Whether or not someone agrees with the Tea Party and 9/12 movements is irrelevant–it is clear that their concerns are substantive and possess a great deal of merit (the NYTimes article makes that fairly clear), posing important questions to the Republican Party and the larger conservative/libertarian spectrum as a whole.
What is the proper role of government?
Do we need parties if a transparent primary process is not available?
Who better reflects the concerns of Colorado voters?
Is the grassroots outrage ephemeral or indispensable?
None of the electoral outcomes in recent months has answered all or even some of these questions thoroughly–not the successful gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia, the failed Congressional contest in New York, or Brown’s Senate victory on Tuesday in Massachusetts. The questions remain, and those who choose to ignore them or impugn the character of those that ask them do so at their own electoral peril.
And you can count on PPC to be first in bringing you updates on these issues over the next nine months.
