Democrat
leaders have finally realised that anti-establishment sentiment
is the driving force behind the Tea Party movement, announcing
a plan to demonize it via a national campaign to associate the
GOP and the Tea Party as one and the same.
"Democratic National Committee sources say the party's
strategy is to pose the November midterm elections as a contest
between Democrats and a joint GOP-tea party plan for the country."
The campaign will see grassroots activists painted as tools
of the Republican establishment and the GOP associated with
"extremist" ideologies.
The official launch of the campaign was made Wednesday by DNC
Chairman Tim Kaine.
A website at www.republicanteapartycontract.com,
a play on Newt Gingrich’s 1994 GOP "Contract With
America", along with a crudely produced video, mark the
direction the DNC is taking.
The video urges viewers to "GET THE FACTS", as it
outlines a 10-point blueprint on what policies Tea Party candidates
would enact if voted into power.
The items on the "Tea Party Contract on America"
are:
1. Repeal the Affordable Care Act (Health insurance Reform)
2. Privatize Social Security or phase it out altogether
3. End Medicare as it presently exists
4. Extend the Bush tax breaks for the wealthy and big oil
5. Repeal Wall Street Reform
6. Protect those responsible for the oil spill and future environmental
catastrophes
7. Abolish the Department of education
8. Abolish the Department of energy
9. Abolish the environmental protection agency
10. Repeal the 17th Amendment which provides for the direct
election of senators
These are mostly libertarian rooted positions that various
tea party affiliated candidates and incumbents have espoused,
except for numbers four and six, which are more direct accusations.
The video features images of Rep. Pete Sessions, who runs the
GOP's effort to elect House candidates, and Republican Caucus
Chairman Mike Pence, as well as Senate candidates Rand Paul
and Sharon Angle, amongst others.
Watch the video:
The idea is clearly to depict such positions as outside of
mainstream political thought, yet multiple
recent national polls indicate that such a notion
is deeply misguided.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee has described
the campaign as part of an "increasingly desperate strategy
that remains ignorant of exactly why independent voters are
fleeing them in droves".
The key flaw in the Democratic campaign is that voters are
now painfully aware that it is not the Tea Party and the GOP
that are one and the same, it is the two establishment parties.
Democrat
leaders have finally realised that anti-establishment sentiment
is the driving force behind the Tea Party movement, announcing
a plan to demonize it via a national campaign to associate the
GOP and the Tea Party as one and the same.
