Tea Party: The 2011 Special Congressional Election in the 26th Congressional District in the...
...State of New York shows how important the name “Tea Party” is and how attractive a strictly fiscally conservative candidate can be. A candidate (who had previously and repeatedly run as a Democrat) ran as a self-proclaimed “Tea Party” candidate and got 9% of the vote. That 9% enabled a Democrat to win the 26th Congressional District that has long been a Republican stronghold. The Democrat claimed she won because of her attacks on the Republican plan (US Rep. Paul Ryan’s plan) to deal with Social Security and Medicare. She didn’t. She only got 1% more than Obama did in that district in 2008 and Obama lost the district to McCain by 5%. The deciding factor was the third party “Tea Party” candidate and the way he pulled votes away from the Republican candidate. Herein lie two conflicting Better Tomorrow Challenges that make up the original challenge.
Future Challenges: At a press conference, calling for the Republican Party to adopt a strictly fiscally-conservative limited-government platform and change its name to the Tea Party, first:
1) Major Tea Party organization (100,000 members or more) to make those two goals part of their official platform.
2) Coalition of at least ten US state Tea Party organizations (at least 1,000 members in each and none from the same US state) to change their platforms to include those two goals.
3) Coalition of at least one US state Tea Party organization (possessing 1,000 members or more in each) from each US state to change its platform to include those two goals.
4) Republican, who is a sitting US House Representative or US Senator.
5) 100 sitting Republican congresspersons in the US Congress.
6) Majority of sitting Republican congresspersons in the US Congress.
7) Republican governor of a US state.
8) Majority of sitting Republican governors.
9) State Republican Party.
10) Majority of state Republican Parties.
At a national convention of the Republican Party,:
11) First group of delegates to get a floor vote on these two goals.
12) The Republican Party officially changes its platform to a strictly fiscally-conservative limited-government platform and its name to the Tea Party. This future challenge is offered in case the Democratic Party is able to achieve the original challenge set for it above before the Republican Party achieves the original challenge set for it. If the Republican Party achieves the original challenge set for it, this future challenge is then redundant and thus considered achieved at the same time.
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