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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.

CHALLENGE #1: The Democratic Party gets its pragmatic, devious, rich members to run as Tea Party candidates in any congressional district that has a Republican or an at-risk Democrat. The goal is not for these candidates to win but for them to siphon off enough votes from the Republicans to enable the Democrats to gain seats in the US House and US Senate. [As was shown in the 26^th, the pragmatic, devious Democrats do not need to even hide their roots. They only need to campaign on strong fiscal conservative grounds and heavily attack the Republican candidate for not being as fiscally conservative as they are.] For the Democratic Party to win this challenge, at least 100 Tea Party candidates must run in a single federal election for 100 US Senate and US House seats currently held by Republicans.

CHALLENGE #2: The Republican Party changes its platform to a strictly fiscally-conservative limited-government platform, changes its name to the Tea Party, [and beats the above Democrats to the punch. The Republican brand has long been stale with a lot of negative baggage. This name change would re-energize the party and the public’s perception of it, just as it essentially did in 1855 when it changed its name from the Whig Party to the Republican Party. However, this won’t be an easy change since the social conservatives (such as Rick Santorum) who want government to control our private lives and bodies and neo-conservatives (such as Charles Krauthammer) who want the US to be the world’s policeman will not find the new Tea Party caring about their social agenda. Neo-conservatives are simply social conservatives on a global scale. And it is social conservatism that drives away independents from the Republican Party whereas, as shown in the 2010 federal elections, strict fiscal conservatism (e.g., the Tea Party) attracts independents to the Republican Party. However, social conservatives should be able to find this new party acceptable as a way to at least end, and prevent, government from advocating social liberalism government programs that cost taxpayers money.]

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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