by Hanna M. Jagow

Created on: April 07, 2010

The tea party movement, as it appears in the news currently, could be bad for Republicans for several reasons. 

First, the media coverage has sometimes created an impression that people in the tea party are largely a bunch of nuts who will believe anything they are told without doing any fact-checking on their own.  Gullible is a word that comes to mind but there are those who appear to profit from their willingness to believe.

People in the media who raise their own ratings by covering the outrageous and controversial do not necessarily seem to care about what political party could be helped or hurt by their ravings, just want the air time. 

Many Republicans, as recently reported by news people, are also distressed by the blatant ignorance sometimes displayed by self-declared spokes-people.  If this trend continues, the party will lose folks who do not feel fairly represented by those exploiting this splinter group.

Next, in the context of our population, their numbers are few, and seem to be dwindling in the overall picture.  However, if they are able to become strong enough to float their own candidates, they will weaken both parties, including the Republicans, by taking votes. 

Those Republican congress members who feed the flames with rhetorical twisting of the truth or outright lies may find themselves booted out along with the tea partiers by a system that has worked many years to produce civility and productivity in government.

In addition, some tea partiers have spoken out in radical prose about bloodshed, seceding from the United States, packing guns, "reloading," etc.  This coupled with public rudeness, such as the Republican shouting during a formal speech by the President of the United States, seems to be fueling an underlying suggestion to "think outside the box" in disrespectful, if not violent, postures.

Many observers feel that the underlying spring filling this fountain of angry protest is nothing more than thinly-disguised racism.  The Republican party may lose their younger, more forward-looking people who have been raised in an atmosphere that passes tolerance and attempts to live up to judging each other by "the content of their character rather than the color of their skin." 

Many of these more idealistic young people are frankly embarrassed by some of the antics being done by tea partiers, and the larger Republican party.  It is their future, after all, that is being marred by rudeness and lies.

Perhaps the tea party group will mature into a viable and lively part of the country's debate on how to solve our many conjoint problems, but until that happens, it seems that it would be surprising if they are not a detriment to the Republican party as a whole.

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