◼ Getting Below the Surface
We of course know that the November 2, 2010, elections were historical on many different levels. The Republican gains of 63 seats in the House and 6 in the Senate dwarf the Republican Revolution of 1994 and double the historical average gains in the Senate for a party out of power. These gains were made despite a cash-strapped Republican National Committee (RNC), strategic decisions by the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) to spend $8 million in the long-shot California Senate race instead of Washington and Colorado, and the fact that the RNC, NRSC, and National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) had a zero ground game.
But what the November midterm elections did do was confirm and destroy some of the most talked-about conventional wisdom about the so-called Tea Party movement, as well as raise some warning flags for Republicans moving into the 2012 election cycle.
Tea Party activists revealed themselves to be, if not completely organized, at the very least politically pragmatic, engaged, and ready to press their agenda on the local, state, and federal level well after Election Day. Read the rest at American Spectator
