49 Days: The Tea Party's Big Gamble

I have a great deal of respect for the Tea-Party movement. But as Delaware conservatives who consider themselves to be part of this movement enter the voting booth for today’s GOP Senate primary, they should remember this; Your movement's strength and wisdom is being meassured in these elections by both the Democrats and the Republican establishment. If you appear reckless and consistently push the nomination of candidates who are unelectable, the GOP will begin to work against you and the Democrats will dramatically increase their numbers in future elections by default.

The Tea Party movements have defeated multiple establishment candidates so far in these primaries. Some deserved their drubbings and some did not. But if the balance of power in the Senate in 2011 is determined by Nevada and Delaware and Angle and O'Donnell get beat, groups like the Tea-Party Express will be solely to blame. And blame you we shall. That's a lot of responsibility for a fledgling political movement with little national infrastructure to bear. They might not survive such blame.

- Dan Joseph

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