The Tea Party isn’t dead. It’s just looking down ballot. While fiscal conservatives remain split over the GOP presidential candidates, grassroots activists are coalescing around a stellar slate of limited-government candidates looking to reinforce and reenergize the right in Washington.
And in the spirit of the modern-day tea-party movement, no entrenched incumbent — Democrat or Republican — is safe.
Utah was Ground Zero for the movement’s first major electoral upset. In April 2009, this column first reported on a Salt Lake City tea-party protest of 2,000 Utahans who repeatedly booed GOP Senators Bob Bennett and Orrin Hatch for supporting the $700 billion TARP bank bailout. In May 2010, the three-term, 76-year-old Bennett got the boot at the GOP state convention. Young conservative lawyer Mike Lee, who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, went on to win the seat.
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Now, young conservative entrepreneur and renowned state-pension reformer Dan Liljenquist is taking on Utah’s other big-government-Republican barnacle, 77-year-old Hatch. Liljenquist excelled in the private sector as a global-management consultant and business strategist; he also helmed a privately owned call-center company that has grown from two to 1,500 employees since its 1995 founding. Liljenquist was elected to the Utah Senate in 2008, where he spearheaded state pension and Medicaid reforms that earned him the non-partisan Governing magazine’s 2011 “Public Official of the Year” award.
Six-term senator Orrin Hatch was first elected 36 years ago on an anti-entrenched-incumbent platform. Hatch’s campaign line back in 1976 against his opponent Frank Moss: “What do you call a senator who’s served in office for 18 years? You call him home.” Now, Hatch is clinging to power after almost four decades in government — and vainly attempting to claim the tea-party mantle to stave off Liljenquist’s David vs. Goliath primary challenge.
Hatch co-sponsored the $6 billion national-service boondoggle and dedicated it to his good friend Teddy Kennedy, with whom he also joined hands to create the ever-expanding S-CHIP health-care entitlement. He slobbered over corruptocrat Democratic senator Chris Dodd, supported tax cheat Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner from Day One, lavished praise on Joe Biden’s manliness, and embraced and defended Attorney General Eric Holder’s nomination because, he said, “I like Barack Obama, and I want to help him if I can.”
In Indiana, another aging liberal Republican dinosaur is fighting for his political life by masquerading as a tea-party standard-bearer. The 79-year-old, six-term senator Dick Lugar — who prides himself on being Obama’s favorite Republican — hasn’t lived in his home state since 1977. He supported the Obama stimulus law, job-killing environmental mandates, and the taxpayer bailouts of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as well as the auto- and banking-industry bailouts.
Richard Mourdock, Indiana’s former state treasurer, offers a fresh alternative with widespread support from both grassroots activists and local and state GOP officials. While others hedged their bets, Mourdock took the federal auto bailout head on, lodging a court complaint against the Chrysler bailout to expose its illegal abuse of shareholders and punitive impact on Indiana citizens. He was elected to the treasurer’s office in 2006, a tough year for Republicans, and was reelected handily in 2010. Before politics, he worked in the private sector for 30 years managing businesses in the energy, environmental, and construction industries. He’s never had a Beltway ZIP code.
In Texas, young attorney Ted Cruz is making waves in the GOP race to replace retiring GOP senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. The former Texas solicitor general is a Tenth Amendment scholar who doesn’t just speak the tea party’s language. Cruz has put constitutional conservatism into action, winning many of the 40 cases he has argued in front of the Supreme Court. Cruz isn’t afraid to challenge the GOP establishment. In 2008, he successfully battled the Bush administration and meddling globalists all the way to the high court to prevent international law from superseding American sovereignty.
The GOP needs just four seats to take control of the Senate. With inspired and inspiring free-market candidates like Dan Liljenquist, Richard Mourdock, and Ted Cruz, 2012 bodes well for the tea-party footprint on Capitol Hill. Remember: Entrenched incumbency is the disease. Fresh blood is the cure.
Utah conservatives are frustrated with many of Hatch's votes and his inability to provide fiscal leadership. Liljenquist is in a great position to pull off the upset because he already has shown experience in entitlement reform and reigning in bloated pensions. Note that in addition to being backed by Tea Party organizations in Utah, Liljenquist also has the support of many Utah legislators, former GOP Party chairs, city council members and mayors. The Public Official of the Year award isn't too shabby either. Hope you win Dan!
As a Utahn I am full heatedly behind Dan Liljenquist. Not only has he done great things for our state but he has shown he is willing to tackle tough problems. That is what our nation needs right now, leaders who are willing to step up to the plate and make tough decisions.
That all sounds fine and dandy, but as long as McConnel and Boehner are the feckless "leaders" of the party, nothing's going to change. They are the bums who REALLY need to be thrown out.
Thanks, Michelle, for the synopsis of these candidates. I'm looking forward to voting for Richard Mourdock in Indiana! Dick Lugar is running one ad over and over in my area - how he fought for the Keystone Pipeline. Thankfully, Mr. Mourdock's ad is right after Lugar's, pointing out what he has really stood for all this time.
The entrenched GOP lifers need to finally get the idea. Their time has passed. Look what we have to show for their time in office -- $15 Trillion in debt and no end in sight. This is no time to "reach across the aisle" in the name of bi-partisanship. The time is for a partisan Party that is partial to the Constitution and the freedom of the American people...aka "We the People." (If I could have written those three words larger, I would have done so to remind those privileged few in D.C. for whom they work and where those words came from.) God bless you, Michelle, for your fearless fight for the country.
Yeah, because the "fresh blood" we sent to Congress in 2010 has accomplished so much... As soon as they get there, they become just as corrupt as the last guy.
Bob, in reality the folks that the Tea Party helped to send to DC in 2010 have been pretty solid in standing up and trying to do what they said they were going to do; the problem is one of numbers - there simply are not enough of them yet to change the direction of the nation. It doesn't happen in just one election.
I would say to you - and to MarkInF below - that we have to stand firm and cover the backs of these Senators and Representatives until we have a chance to shore up their ranks. They have influenced the conversation; many formerly reliable RINOs are starting to realize that they need to work harder to appeal to conservative voters.
Oh, and Mark? Those leaders you so despise are elected by the rest of their caucus. Until we can change the face of the Republican caucus by putting more conservative Senators and Representatives in office - and we can - we will not get the leaders we desire, so now is not the time to give up.
The GOP Freshmen that got elected in 2010 have completely caved into DC politics with 2 or 3 exceptions. Even the "Tea Party" conservatives stabbed us in the back with their votes to raise the debt ceiling (thanks Allen West). They don't need a majority to vote the right way. All that is left is to wait for a Greek style collapse.
blackadder - I'm all for holding Republicans' feet to the fire, but it's important to remember that the Democrats were completely unwilling to consider the slightest compromise. The only weapon House Republicans had in the debt ceiling fight was to shut down the government, which would have been a terrible gamble given the control of the narrative by the mainstream media and the low esteem Congress is already held in by the public.
If the worst happens in November and Democrats retain the Senate and the Presidency - then yes, it will be time for them to take as hard a line as the Democrats have, and risk being blamed for the government shutdown. But that was quite a risk to take now, with electoral victory still available. With control of both houses, Republicans can cut the budget without shutting the government down - surely the preferable approach when Democrats refuse to be reasonable.
Do you actually live in the same reality as the rest of us. The Dems have done nothing but try to compromise. Until recently that is, once they finally figured out that the party of no was not going to give an inch even if it was good for the country. It's always party first when it comes to the right.
Amen, JB! This is not the time to give up - with hard work, we could wind up with the Presidency and both houses of Congress this fall - and enough Tea Partiers to either force Boehner and McConnell to implement truly Conservative policies, or force them out of their leadership roles.
The State Conventions every 2 years should select our "Speaker-Candidate", with our nominees bound to nominate that individual for speaker, on threat of some combination of primary back-lash, loss of ballot-access (legally dubious but some contend we can do that), and/or loss of party funds if they don't vote for the choice of our party.
When we pick the leader, we set the direction. The leader sets the course.
This is exactly why we need federal term limits. Two terms for Senate and 6 for Congress. The elected officials need to realize that they will not get a lifetime of feeding at the public trough when they get to Washington. Cut the legs out from under the notion that all they have to do is lay low until election time and they get to retain and accumulate power and then we'll see if they can get some actual work done.
If I am not mistaken, when our esteemed Senators etal leave office they continue to receive their salaries and benefits for life. If you are really serious about cutting the deficit and want to make these folks that are supposedly representing us earn their pay then end that practice. While we are at it why hasn't the National Revue done any reporting on the insider trading that is legal in congress? I hear a lot of chatter about accountability and responsibility out there but where is the real reporting? I first heard of it on John Stewart...a comedy show!!!! Where is the fact finding as opposed to being a sound bite machine for the sounding boards. Where is the voice of the Tea Party in this? Aren't you the guys that are supposed to be turning our country around? Or are you only about gun rights and how the Liberals are wanting to turn us into a socialist country. You folks are clueless sheep.
I'm sick and tired of listening to and reading 'conservative' commentary about what needs to be done to 'save' the country - it always addresses Medicare and Social Security - things many average Americans are depending on to be able to maybe someday retire - and never with local, state and federal government entitlements like lifetime pensions and benefits. That, in reality, is what *will* bankrupt this country, just as it did Greece, regardless of any 'reform' done to Medicare or SS.
I too am continuously outraged at how the whole insider trading issue, which to me is a no-brainer to eliminate, is completely ignored. 'Our' side is as complicit in this as the liberals, so I suppose it isn't worth bothering about by the 'conservatives' in talk radio and here at NRO, who are so in the tank for a party that has no more interest in real, actual reform that might really, actually save this nation than the Democrat party does.
I've said it for years now, and nothing has happened, or will happen, to change this fact - unless and until the myth, supported by the media and politicians, that the people actually have a legitimate choice every two and four years is exposed as the fraud it is, we will continue on the path to oblivion. That will never happen as long as the 'two' party system in place exists as it currently does.
So go ahead and continue to buy into the idiocy that simply electing Republicans is the answer to all our problems - we tried it in 2000, and the table was eventually set for the group in control now to finish the job.
And where was National Review when these RINOS, Lugar, Hatch, and above all BUSH were running for reelection ? Supporting them as I recall. Where was National Review when Bush was running up half trillion dollar deficits ? Cheer leading as I recall.
Mr Obama is running the country precisely the way Mr Bush did, fake numbers, numerous lies, and everything paid for by our Grand kids. I have always been opposed to this but I do wonder why NR only complains now? Only cares now. How is that Ms M ?
Yes H.B., we still wound up with Murkowski, despite our best efforts - and she's still a walking, talking disaster. Is that an argument for giving up the effort? Not in my book. You win some, you lose some, but you still have to try. I'll see your Joe Miller (or Sharon Angle) and raise you a Marco Rubio and a Ron Johnson...
You could have had a Republican seat in Delaware with Hunt...you went with Witchie-poo.
You could have had a Republican on your side, not angry as hell at you, from Alaska....you went with Joe Miller because Sarah Palin hated Lisa Murkowski.
You could have taken out HARRY REID with Lowden....instead you went with "2nd Amendment remedies" Sharron who was "purer".
