From the Texas Tribune: High Turnout Has Some Wondering if GOP Congressmen in Danger

The Tea Party looks to take out high profile Republicans - powerful ones.

- Click here for the article.

Expectations of a record turnout has some Texas Republicans on edge that a handful of U.S. House incumbents may be in tougher fights than usual.

Republican consultants are projecting the presidential primary will drive turnout for their party's primary to the highest levels in decades. And many of those Republican voters are expected to be first-time voters, drawn to the campaign by anti-establishment figures like real estate magnate Donald Trump and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz.

The question looming over the next 24 hours is whether those voters only weigh in on the presidential race or continue on down the ballot and vote against sitting members of Congress.

Four Republican incumbents, in particular, are the subject of the strongest interest among Republican operatives: U.S. Reps. Kevin Brady of The Woodlands, John Culberson of Houston, Pete Sessions of Dallas and Lamar Smith of San Antonio.

A key point to consider: All four of these incumbents have powerful committee assignments in Washington. A loss in a runoff may serve as a boon for base conservatives, but would decrease the state’s legislative clout.

None of these Republicans are expected to lose outright on Tuesday. In fact, all four could end up breezing past their rivals and onto re-election.

But they could also be kicked to a dreaded runoff on May 24 if they fail to draw a majority of the vote. Whether or not a runoff, where turning out voters can be tougher, translates to mortal electoral danger for these incumbents has become a point of speculative debate among Texas political observers.

From the Atlantic: The Great Republican Revolt

This applies to the section on political parties, and especially on the conflict within each party, particularly the Republican Party - which you probably figured out from the title.

These tags seem to me to fit the story best. Click on them for past stories if you want.
- Republican coalition.
- 2016 campaigns.
- party factions.
- party coalitions.
- Tea Party Republicans.

The authors tries to make sense of the current fascination Republican rank and file voters have with candidates that the Republican donor class detests. He argues that a class division within the party - as well the Democratic Party - is becoming more pronounced. This is especially resonant on immigration - both legal and illegal. The wealthy like it, the rest don't. The author challenges the idea that Republican rank and file is even "conservative" in the classic sense.

- Click here for the article.

Not so long ago, many observers worried that Americans had lost interest in politics. In his famous book Bowling Alone, published in 2000, the social scientist Robert Putnam bemoaned the collapse in American political participation during the second half of the 20th century. Putnam suggested that this trend would continue as the World War II generation gave way to disengaged Gen Xers.

But even as Putnam’s book went into paperback, that notion was falling behind the times. In the 1996 presidential election, voter turnout had tumbled to the lowest level since the 1920s, less than 52 percent. Turnout rose slightly in November 2000. Then, suddenly: overdrive. In the presidential elections of 2004 and 2008, voter turnout spiked to levels not seen since before the voting age was lowered to 18, and in 2012 it dipped only a little. Voters were excited by a hailstorm of divisive events: the dot-com bust, the Bush-versus-Gore recount, the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the Iraq War, the financial crisis, the bailouts and stimulus, and the Affordable Care Act.

Putnam was right that Americans were turning away from traditional sources of information. But that was because they were turning to new ones: first cable news channels and partisan political documentaries; then blogs and news aggregators like the Drudge Report and The Huffington Post; after that, and most decisively, social media.
Politics was becoming more central to Americans’ identities in the 21st century than it ever was in the 20th. Would you be upset if your child married a supporter of a different party from your own? In 1960, only 5 percent of Americans said yes. In 2010, a third of Democrats and half of Republicans did. Political identity has become so central because it has come to overlap with so many other aspects of identity: race, religion, lifestyle. In 1960, I wouldn’t have learned much about your politics if you told me that you hunted. Today, that hobby strongly suggests Republican loyalty. Unmarried? In 1960, that indicated little. Today, it predicts that you’re a Democrat, especially if you’re also a woman.

Meanwhile, the dividing line that used to be the most crucial of them all—class—has increasingly become a division within the parties, not between them. Since 1984, nearly every Democratic presidential-primary race has ended as a contest between a “wine track” candidate who appealed to professionals (Gary Hart, Michael Dukakis, Paul Tsongas, Bill Bradley, and Barack Obama) and a “beer track” candidate who mobilized the remains of the old industrial working class (Walter Mondale, Dick Gephardt, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, and Hillary Clinton). The Republicans have their equivalent in the battles between “Wall Street” and “Main Street” candidates. Until this decade, however, both parties—and especially the historically more cohesive Republicans—managed to keep sufficient class peace to preserve party unity.

Not anymore, at least not for the Republicans.

Read on if you like - the internal dynamics within each party is in flux, and this seems a reasonable attempt to get to the heart of that.

How were moderate and liberal Republicans driven from the party?

When we start getting into political parties - in both 2305 and 2306 - we'll look at the history of party eras. The story varies slightly since we take a more in-depth look in 2305 and focus mostly at Texas in 2306. But we look at the recent shift from Democratic to Republican dominance in the states in both classes. I tend to spend more time looking at the Democratic side of the story, the national party's embrace of civil rights which drove southern Democrats away, as well as the shift in the Texas economy from an agrarian to business base.

I don't look at the Republican side of the story as much as I should. Just as progressives in the Democratic coalition drove out the Southern conservatives, ideologically driven conservatives in the Republican coalition did the same to moderate and liberal Republicans and redefined what it means to be a party member.

A recent book - Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, from Eisenhower to the Tea Party - tries to explain this shift with some detail.

Some recent reviews condense the story.

- Rule and Ruin: When and why did the Republican Party tip so far to the right?
- “Rule and Ruin” by Geoffrey Kabaservice.
- Ancient History.
- The GOP’s Reality-Based Community

- Click here for an interview with the author.

From the NYT: With Fear of Being Sidelined, Tea Party Sees the Republican Rise as New Threat

One of the themes of the election is the marginalization of the Tea Party.

As opposed to Texas - where the movement remains strong - the Republican Party has returned to the mainstream. The betting is that this means they are less likely to be confrontational during the next two years.

Establishment Republicans, who had vowed to thwart the Tea Party, succeeded in electing new lawmakers who are, for the most part, less rebellious. And when the new Congress convenes in January, the Republican leaders who will take the reins will be mainly in the mold of conservatives who have tried to keep the Tea Party in check.

But they have not crushed the movement’s spirit.

As Republicans on Capitol Hill transition from being the opposition party to being one that has to show it can govern, a powerful tension is emerging: how to move forward with an agenda that challenges the president without self-destructing.

Some conservatives believe that the threat of another shutdown is their strongest leverage to demand concessions on the health care law and to stop the president from carrying out immigration reform through executive order. Yet their leadership has dismissed the idea as a suicide mission that could squander the recent gains.

From Vox: Are Republicans and big business on the brink of divorce?

Ezra Klein discusses the potential rift between big business and the Republican Party.

- Click here for the video.

Erik Cantor was a proponents of business interests and that seems to have been part of what drove ideologically oriented - Tea Party - Republicans in his district to vote him out.

They are part of a growing movement that does not think recent Republican presidents have been conservative enough.

For 2305 and 2306 - but mostly 2305 - this highlights the coalitional nature of political parties, and the fact that the Tea Party movement has had a major impact within the Republican Party. It's still anyone's guess what impact this has down the line.

From the NYT: G.O.P. Senator Courts Blacks in Mississippi Primary Race

Incumbent Senator broadens coalition in order to win election.

- Click here for the article.

Inside an abandoned grocery store-turned-church here, a dozen black pastors gathered to discuss a seemingly impossible task: persuading their congregations to vote Republican next week.

“In tough times, you’ve got to do some unusual things,” said Bishop Ronnie C. Crudup Sr., a pastor of the New Horizon Church International in Jackson.

Unusual is an understatement. Mississippi, with its painful history of Jim Crow laws, may have the most racially polarized electorate in the country. Blacks make up a higher percentage of the electorate here than in any other state — 36 percent in 2012, according to exit polls. But they are so overwhelmingly Democratic that they remain nearly invisible in Republican politics, with just 2 percent participating in the Republican primary in 2012.

Now, with Thad Cochran, the state’s senior Republican senator, fighting political extinction in next Tuesday’s primary, his campaign is taking the unlikely step of trying to entice black voters to help decide the most high-profile Republican contest in the country.

And it worked.

Here's commentary:

- Thad Cochran's run-off win is a victory for pork, not a racially diverse GOP.

Cochran ran partially on the idea that Mississippi needs the federal government. Haven;t that one in a while.

How incumbent Senators hold off Tea Party challengers

The Atlantic has two stories featuring how two southern senators - Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Thad Cochran of Mississippi - have attempted to fight of challenges from Tea Party Republicans who see both as too committed to Washington, too willing to compromise and not conservative enough.

These are among a series of stories I'll highlight which point out the internal conflict within each major political party, both the Democrats and Republicans. A quick read through these stories points out how these internal conflicts play themselves out.

- Click here for How Lindsey Graham Stomped the Tea Party.
- Click here for Thad Cochran, the Last of the Naive Republicans.

Tonight Senator Graham defeated six opponents in the Republican Primary. He won a majority of the vote (56%), which means that there is no need for a run-off. Neither Cochran nor his Tea Party opponent won a majority of the vote in June 4th's primary, so they are preparing for a run-off on June 24th.  

Since its development in 2009, the Tea Party has attempted to pull the Republican Party further right by funding challengers to Republican incumbents they deem too moderate. In some places this has been successful - like here in Texas - but in other's it has pulled the Republican Party far enough to the right to lose the support of moderate voters.

Democrats are hoping that continues to be the case.

2305 students should think about this in terms of party factions. You'll note in the section on parties that the Tea Party, is not a party - it is a faction within the Republican Party. There is a good reason for this, As an independent party they would have no chance to win elections, but if they are able to control the Republican Party - they are more likely to do so. This assumes that they do not nominate candidates judged too extreme, or just plain weird, for moderates.

2306 students should think about this as an example of the fact that the major parties are primarily state organizations. They are each reflective of the internal politics in each of the states. This explains why the Tea Party has enjoy more success in certain places than others.

From the Dish: The Texas GOP Has Two Right Feet

Andrew Sullivan hits some of the same material discussed below - but adds some links 2306 students might want to check out.

- Click here for his post.

The basic theme seems to be that the gap between the "establishment" and Tea Party wings of the Texas Republican party is very small - if there is a gap at all. M2 students might consider focusing on that issue as a potential paper topic.

Will Tea Party success move the Republican Party so far to the right that Texas Democrats can become competitive statewide?

Normally the answer would be yes, but the following has doubts about whether this is the case - at least in the near term.

- Click here for the article.

In both 2305 and 2306 we discuss the electoral process and the impact that primary elections have on the nature of the candidates that end up on the general election ballot. Primary voters tend to be more ideologically extreme, and they ensure that the candidates that face the general electorate tilt either to the left or right.

Sometimes a party's primary voters tilt so far to one side that they become unacceptable to the general electorate. The other party - with a presumably less extreme candidate - becomes more attractive to the moderate voters who dominate general elections. They vote for the candidate of the other party. This assumes that what drives the electorate in the primary is not the same as what drives the electorate in the general election. While Tea Party candidates have proven too extreme for the general election in some states - Delaware, Missouri, Nevada among them - this isn't necessarily the case in Texas. At least we will be finding out this November.

Political consultants don't the increasingly rightward tilt of the Republican Party will make the Democratic Party more attractive to moderates in the state now - but it might in the future:

The rhetoric that appeals to the tea party movement — including “closing down” the border, barring abortion for rape victims, the open carrying of guns and impeaching President Barack Obama — is polarizing to many moderate and Hispanic voters.

But experts largely agree it’s still not enough to entice middle-ground voters to window-shop at the Democratic Party. At least not yet.

“The more Republicans wander further and further away from the concerns of most Texans — not talking about education or the places they live — the faster they will hasten the return of the Democrats,” said Harold Cook, a Democratic consultant.
Republican strategist Matt Mackowiak said that’s not going to happen in 2014. He agreed that if “the party moves so far right that it creates problems and voters don’t like the direction, yes, in two or four or six years, that will be reflected in how people vote,” Mackowiak said. “But I don’t see a short-term problem.”

In a traditionally competitive campaign, candidates move toward the left or right flank for the primary but tack toward the middle to win the general election. But for nearly two decades, Texas Republicans have had to worry only about the first round.

“All a candidate had to do to be elected to statewide office is avoid being the Democratic nominee,” Cook said.

Democrats haven’t won a statewide contest in 20 years. But last week’s primary brought out a type of conservatism that has given some moderate Republicans pause and given all Democrats hope, he said.

“The more right-wing folks Texas ends up electing, the faster the day will come when people will regret those elections,” Cook said.

But for now, the Democratic base is small in the state, Hispanic Texans don’t yet vote in proportion to their booming population numbers, and the Democrats lack the money and star power to pull enough voters to their side.

How did the Tea Party do in last week's primary?

Better than expected, though some observers have pointed out that Tea Party ideals have been a staple of Texas politics for some time. Even candidates that are argued to be centrist establishment types are very conservative and trumpet the same positions Tea Party backed candidates do.

A few items to run through:

From the NYT: Texas G.O.P. Beats Back Challengers From Right. The story suggests that any losses the Tea Party suffered happened because "establishment" candidates tacked far to the right to survive the challenge:

The success of several Republican incumbents Tuesday suggested to some that the influence of the Tea Party here had waned. But to others, it merely showed that the incumbents had managed to appease Tea Party conservatives by steering farther to the right. Still others said the Tea Party-supported candidates who were successful in ousting incumbents in the state Legislature, or forcing them into runoffs, were a sign of the movement’s continued strength in Texas.

From Slate: A Good Night for Texas Conservatives; a Bad Night for Grifters. The author points out that despite the fact that John Cornyn - our incumbent Senator beat back Tea Party opposition - others weren't so lucky.

From The American Prospect: Why Does the National Media Get Texas So Wrong? This repeats some points made in the previous article and points out the difficulty of determining what "the establishment" refers to in Texas. While the Tea Party may lack a unifying leader, and it does not have the force it had 4 years ago. It's still pretty strong.

From the BBC: Texas: Reports of Tea Party death have been exaggerated. The authors points out that Tea Party candidates did especially well at the local level, and that candidates have learned what it takes to appeal to Tea Party voters. The story also contains the following text that points out how primary elections encourage party polarization by allowing the more extreme primary voters to determine the candidates that appear on the general election ballot:

All of this has the Dallas Morning News's Tod Robberson, a self-proclaimed centrist, lamenting the state's primary system: 

In several races, we are going to wind up with an arch-conservative tea party type who wins the primary and will represent the GOP in the general election. And he or she will wind up vying against a hard-left Democrat. It'll be the worst choice to put before voters. But that will be the choice because those two candidates will have done the best job of appealing to the extremists and die-hards within their respective parties. The winner will go to Austin or Washington and probably will do an abysmal job. And then we'll repeat this same process in another two years, adding yet another batch of abysmal, extremist performers to the mix.

Here's a look at the state of the national Tea Party movement. Success in Texas does not lead to success nation-wide necessarily since Texas' political culture is very different from the national political culture.

From the Hill: Tea Party at five: Dawning or dimming? The national movement has not had the same impact that the movement in Texas has had. The recent vote on the debt ceiling is an example:

GOP leadership and establishment business groups have begun pushing back more forcefully against the movement. The fact that both McConnell and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) were willing to break with most of their party to help increase the debt ceiling without conditions shows their frustration with the base might have surpassed their fear of it. While there are dozens of Tea Party challengers to incumbent Republicans, only Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) and Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) appear to be facing a real threat.

From Politico: Exclusive: Mega-donors plan GOP war council

This builds on a theme in previous posts - and it relates to discussions we have had about the efforts of the business sector to increase its influence within the Republican Party and push back against the party's Tea Party wing. It also touches on our ongoing look at the increased influence of money in politics, especially in the wake of recent Supreme Court decisions that have opened the floodgates.

The word of the semester - so far - seems to be "mega-donor."

- Click here for the article.

A group of major GOP donors, led by New York billionaire Paul Singer, is quietly expanding its political footprint ahead of the midterm elections in an increasingly assertive effort to shape the direction of the Republican Party.

The operation was launched discreetly last year, with the previously unreported formation of a club called the American Opportunity Alliance to bring together some of the richest pro-business GOP donors in the country, several of whom share Singer’s support for gay rights, immigration reform and the state of Israel. Around the same time, Singer and his allies also formed a federal fundraising committee called Friends for an American Majority that raised big checks for a select list of the GOP’s most highly touted 2014 Senate hopefuls.

Those candidates are among the big names expected at a two-day retreat organized by the American Opportunity Alliance set for the last week of February at a swanky Colorado resort. The closed-door event — which is also expected to draw House Speaker John Boehner and New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte, according to Republicans familiar with the plans — is seen in GOP finance circles as a grand debut of sorts for Singer’s still-amorphous club.

. . . the list of big-name pols expected at the American Opportunity Alliance’s upcoming Colorado gathering highlights the influence that only a few big donors can command in the post-Citizens United era, when a small group of wealthy individuals can reorder elections with just a few huge checks. That new reality has shifted some of the power and control once maintained by the parties and their candidates to factions of major donors, like the libertarian-infused Koch network on the right or the Democracy Alliance club of major liberal donors on the left.

From the Dallas Morning News: Texas business groups ally to counter tea party influence in GOP primaries

More on the division within the Republican Party between the business and Tea Party factions. This story points out which interest groups are backing which faction.

- Click here for the story.

Some of Texas’ biggest business trade groups are moving to counter tea party and anti-government forces that have dominated recent Republican primaries.

The Texas Future Business Alliance — a mix of 10 major business groups, including the chemical industry, bankers, builders and contractors — is sending out mailers and providing other support on behalf of GOP candidates who have supported water infrastructure development, highway construction and education spending.

Many of the incumbents have been pilloried as big government spenders and liberals by fiscal hawk groups.

The movement mirrors the schism happening nationally between hard right and establishment Republicans. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce recently pledged $50 million to back pro-business Republicans in U.S. Senate primaries and fight tea party insurgents. Republican leaders, such as House Speaker John Boehner, have castigated hard right groups, accusing them of wanting contributions more than solutions.

“It’s part of the same trend you’re seeing nationally. A lot of the business community is tired of people who don’t want to govern,” said a person involved in the Texas Future Business Alliance, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The group isn’t talking about its efforts. Spokesman David Polyansky, who has worked on campaigns for Michele Bachmann and Mike Huckabee, said the business alliance aims to “recognize leaders dedicated to keeping Texas as the best state in the nation for business development and job growth.”

Insiders won’t say how much they are investing, but they describe it as the first major stirrings of business interests in GOP primaries.

Business interests are concerned that the Tea Party focus on limiting taxes and shrinking government makes it difficult for necessary infrastructure improvement to be made in the state:

Others see a fight that developed over willingness to invest in economic development projects. In Texas, that means a disagreement over infrastructure.

During last year’s legislative sessions, lawmakers refused to tap the $8 billion in the state’s rainy day fund to help pay for water projects in the drought-plagued state or help relieve crumbling and traffic-clogged highways.

The Republican-dominated Legislature was largely swayed by anti-tax and fiscal hawk groups that opposed increasing the 22-year-old gas tax or fees or diverting some money from the rainy day fund to pay for highways and water projects.

Ultimately, lawmakers punted the decision to voters, who in November overwhelmingly voted to spend $2 billion from the rainy day fund for water projects. Next November, voters will decide whether to divert about $900 million a year to pay for highways. Transportation advocates still complain that billions more are needed.

Republican incumbents have come to fear being labeled “establishment” and facing challenges from the right. In districts that are drawn for one party to have a heavy advantage, the primary is often the only contest that matters. There, candidates must appeal to the party’s base voters.

Lawmakers who worked to pay for water, education and highways found themselves tarred by Sullivan and other fiscal hawks, said Bill Hammond, president of the Texas Association of Business.

The association is not part of the Texas Future Business Alliance, but Hammond said he fully supports its goals.

The story makes a point - above - about the impact of politically gerrymandered districts. Ideologically driven voters also tend to be most likely to vote. In districts drawn to elect Republicans, this tends to give an advantage to the more ideologically extreme candidate. This point is repeated regularly.

The Republican Party establishment tries to undermine Tea Party candidates in state primaries

For our upcoming look at elections, especially primary elections since they are on their way very soon.

The national Republican Party is convinced that its inability to win back the Senate in 2010 or 2012 - and possible the presidency in 2012 - was due to extremist candidates winning primary elections, but then losing the general elections. Extremism works when a small group of like minded voters dominate the election, as happens in primary elections, but not when moderates show up, as happens in general elections.

The party is trying to defeat candidates it judges to be extreme at the primary level by throwing money behind moderates who prioritize fiscal and economic issues over social and moral ones.

The danger for the party is that if they alienate the Tea Party, they could lose their support. They wont be voting for Democrats, but they might just sit the election out. Even if they do decide to vote, they may not supply the energy necessary for victory.

It'll be a tough needle to thread.

Here's detail in the NYT:

The Republican Party establishment, chastened by the realization that a string of unpredictable and unseasoned candidates cost them seats in Congress two elections in a row, is trying to head off potential political hazards wherever it can this year.

In House and Senate races across the country, many of the traditional and influential centers of power within the party are taking sides in primaries, overwhelming challengers on the right with television ads and, in some cases, retaliating against those who are helping the insurgents. In Mr. Black’s case, one by one, powerful Republicans started backing his rival, Barbara J. Comstock, a member of the State House of Delegates. First Mitt Romney endorsed her. Then came Citizens United and the president of Americans for Prosperity, the group financed by the wealthy Koch brothers.

A few day after he announced his candidacy, Mr. Black dropped out. “It was pretty evident that she had all the machinery,” he said in an interview.

One of the biggest challenges for Republican leaders in the 2014 midterm elections will be how to hang on to the Tea Party support that has been so instrumental to the party’s growth, while winning back voters alienated by hard-right candidates. These conflicting goals were evident last week as Speaker John A. Boehner of Ohio shelved plans to tackle immigration reform in the House, bowing to pressure from conservatives.

“We’re not picking a fight with the basis for the Tea Party,” said Scott Reed, the senior political strategist for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, who noted that most Republicans were sympathetic to the free-market, small-government philosophy that inspired the movement. “But some have hijacked the Tea Party model and taken it to an extreme level.”

Its doesn't matter if the Tea Party is unpopular, it is still powerful

Thus concludes The Dish in comparing two articles. One points out that 56% of Americans hold a negative view of the Tea Party, the other points out that 2/3rds of those who report voting in the Republican primaries consider themselves members of the movement.

We discussed this in 2305 last week. Turnout is power.

Can the Tea Party recruit competitive candidates?

Apart from Texas and a few other states where Tea Party views seem more mainstream - the movement seems to not be able to attract candidates who can win general elections. This spells trouble for the ability of the party to take advantages of opportunities to gain control of the Senate and expand their lead in the House:

Jonathan Bernstein:

. . . three election cycles in, it’s pretty clear that nominating a candidate favored by Tea Partyers over what they consider “establishment” candidates is a formula for risking Republican disaster. And that it’s not going to change any time soon.

So it was for Christine O’Donnell and Sharron Angle in 2010. So it was with Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock in 2012. And so it’s likely to be with the 2014 crop.

The thing is, four years is plenty of time to develop solid, seasoned candidates. Indeed, once upon a time Marco Rubio was one of those solid, seasoned candidates. Rubio was a successful Florida Republican who had risen rapidly to become speaker of the Florida House; he then adopted the emerging Tea Party and went on to easily win an open U.S. Senate seat. But Rubio’s Tea Party credentials were tarnished because he actually tried to legislate on immigration; while it’s much too early to declare his career in trouble and it wouldn’t be surprising if he still ran a solid race for the Republican presidential nomination, it’s also very easy to imagine him having to fend off a Tea Party primary of his own if he runs for reelection instead of the White House in 2016.

So what do Republicans have for 2014? Matt Bevin, taking on Mitch McConnell in Kentucky, is a first-time candidate; should he win, Republicans would probably lose that seat. In Georgia, Paul Braun in particular is thought by many to be a particularly weak candidate, capable of losing that open seat to Democrat Michelle Nunn if he emerges as the nominee. In Louisiana, Republicans had settled on a solid candidate to challenge Mary Landrieu, but Tea Partyer Rob Maness has jumped in with plenty of serious organizational support.

This is more evidence of the factional basis of parties in the United States, and the ongoing struggle within each over what the party stands for and what tactics they choose to use to advance their agenda.

Prominent conservative David Barton will not primary John Cornyn.

We discussed this technique ideologues in each party use to pull candidates to either extreme and simultaneously punish moderates.

From the National Review:

Controversial Evangelical author David Barton just announced that he won’t challenge Senator John Cornyn in the 2014 Texas Senate primary. On Glenn Beck’s radio show this morning, he told Beck’s listeners that, though the primary is “winnable,” the timing isn’t right for him.

“What can I do to talk you into this?” asked Beck, disappointed.Texas tea-party activists had been hankering for Cornyn to get a primary challenger ever since he removed his name from Mike Lee’s letter urging his Senate colleagues to refuse to support a CR that funded the Affordable Care Act. But finding a candidate with the requisite name recognition, connections, and willingness was a tall order.

Now they are looking for Louie Gohmert to run

Esquire wonders why this is happening.

There's a whole book out now on the subject of primarying.

Business leaders plan to challenge the Tea Party

This will be fun to watch:

A slice of corporate America thinks tea partyers have overstayed their welcome in Washington and should be shown the door in next year's congressional elections.

In what could be a sign of challenges to come across the country, two U.S. House races in Michigan mark a turnabout from several years of widely heralded contests in which right-flank candidates have tried — sometimes successfully — to unseat Republican incumbents they perceive as not being conservative enough.

In the Michigan races, longtime Republican businessmen are taking on two House incumbents — hardline conservative Reps. Justin Amash and Kerry Bentivolio — in GOP primaries. The 16-day partial government shutdown and the threatened national default are bringing to a head a lot of pent-up frustration over GOP insurgents roughing up the business community's agenda.

. . . Call it the wrath of establishment Republicans and corporate America, always considered the best of friends. Since the Republican takeover of the House in 2010, they've watched the GOP insurgents slow a transportation bill and reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank, block a treaty governing the high seas and stand in the way of comprehensive immigration legislation.

The final straw was the bitter budget standoff that partly shuttered the government, precipitated by Republicans like Amash and Bentivolio who enlisted early in the campaign demanding that President Barack Obama dismantle his health care law in exchange for keeping the government operating.

Even after 16 days of a shutdown, falling poll numbers for the GOP and a threatened economy-jarring default, the two broke with their House Republican leaders and voted against the final deal to reopen the government.

Long before the shutdown, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has spent tens of millions boosting mainly Republicans in congressional races, urged the GOP to fund the government and prevent a default, then double back and try and work out changes to the health care law later.

A significant number of House Republicans have given a cold-shoulder to the Chamber's agenda.

The article mentions a new political action committee - Defending Main Street - that looks to back center right candidates against the more conservative candidates backed by Heritage Action, Club for Growth and Freedom Works.

Will the Tea Party become its own party?

Normally the winner take all rules embedded in the American electoral system prevents this, but this author suggests that Tea Party Republicans - since they already hold office and have established funding sources - might be able to pull it off:

Advocates of a big shake-up in the partisan landscape, whether in the centre or on the right or left, tend to talk about building new political parties from the ground up by fielding candidates in elections. This is vanishingly unlikely to work in the first-past-the-post American system; third-party candidates almost always lack the resources and the name recognition to compete. Voters tend to stick with one of the two major parties in order to avoid the risk of wasting their vote. So upstart parties like the Greens on the left, the Libertarians on the right, or Ross Perot's United We Stand America in the centre face tremendous hurdles, and in practice none have been successful.

A factional split in an existing party reduces that wasted-vote risk. When a faction cleaves from an existing party, it comes with ready-made political power in Congress, and can even play the role of kingmaker. A party that already has members in Congress is a more serious contender in subsequent elections. A strong regional base would probably be needed to stay in contention in any first-past-the-post system; a splinter party that draws 10% of the vote nationwide probably won't win many seats, but a splinter party that draws 10% of the vote concentrated in 25% of the country could.

The biggest weakness in a top-down effort to form a third party via congressional revolt, rather than a bottom-up party-building effort, would be a lack of ideological coherence or connection with voters. A collection of members of Congress disaffected with their leadership will probably not have a strong organic link to any common voter base. But if those members of Congress already come from a common movement with shared organisations and voter bases that had helped elect them, they might take that organisation with them when they split off. Or national political organisations and movements that wanted to form a third party might themselves be the ones pressuring sitting members of Congress to form a breakaway faction.

He doesn't think this is very likely right now, but events might make this more likely to occur:

Of course, there's not much incentive for tea-party Republicans to leave the party right now, since they've succeeded in bending it to their will. But if moderate Republicans finally revolt and dump their agenda, I think tea-party Republicans would have a better shot at launching a sustainable third party than we've seen in America in a long time. Not that it would be a particularly good shot; the segregationist Dixiecrats had a similar combination of congressional power, loyal voter blocs and a unifying ideology when they tried to set up the States' Rights Democratic Party in 1948, and it didn't last past that one election. Still, for anyone who does want to see American politics shaken up through the entrance of a third party, it's worth thinking about the congressional-revolt strategy in combination with the bottom-up one.

More on fragmentation within the Republican Party

Here are a few more stories that amplify the theme of the previous one:

- Whither the GOP? Republicans Want Change, But Split over Party’s Direction
- A tea party exit would be a blessing for GOP
- The GOP Can't Survive Without the Tea Party

The Tea Party is not interested in compromise

That's the theme of a handful of recent stories. Here are a couple examples

- ‘People don’t fully appreciate how committed the tea party is to not compromising'
- The Tea Party Doesn’t Want Compromise; It Wants Surrender

Most highlight a recently published book which tries to detail how Tea Party members are distinct from other Republican Party identifiers. The authors uses surveys and other methods to determine that Tea Party members are far more likely to be reactionary (take may country back) and conspiratorial than other Republicans.

- This focus group report on Tea Party members hits the same point.

Some quotes from the book's author: 

So if you look at this postwar discourse in the National Review Online you have some content about limited government, some about social conservatism, and some about national security. That content accounts for 76 percent of that National Review online. Now if you look at the Tea Party Web sites, that only accounts for 30 percent. Then there’s this conspiratorial discourse Hofstadter talks about that says government is really trying to bring about socialism, etc. That’s only about five percent of what you find at the National Review. On tea party Web sites it’s about a third.

So it’s not just that we’re seeing results like 76 percent of tea partiers want to see Obama fail. We also ask if people think Obama is destroying the country. We asked this question of all self-identified conservatives. If you look at all conservatives, 35 percent believe that. If you look at tea party conservatives and non-tea party conservatives, only six percent of non-tea party conservatives believe that vs. 71 percent of tea party conservatives.

So to draw this together, the reason people should believe us is we have disparate data sources that collapse on the same answer. It’s that these people are not the traditional, mainstream conventional conservatives. If you look at tea party conservatives, or as we call them in the book, reactionary conservatives, they don’t want change at all. They want to go back in time.

. . . You’ve got about 52 members of the Republican conference who are affiliated with the tea party in some official way. That’s a bit less than a quarter of all House Republicans. That’s enough in the House. They refuse to compromise because, to them, compromise is capitulation. If you go back to Hofstadter’s work when he’s talking about when the John Birch Society rode high, he talks about how conservatives would see people who disagree as political opponents, but reactionary conservatives saw them as evil. You can’t capitulate to evil.