When Rand Paul in Kentucky and Sharon Angle in Nevada won the GOP primaries for Senate seats , almost immediately the hue and cry went up that they were “the wrong candidates”. Most of the braying came from the left, as expected, and also from the GOP itself…also as expected. It seems to me that far too many Republicans, both politicians and talking heads, still don’t understand just what the Tea Party is and is not. So it is left to me, your humble correspondent (Ha! I always wanted to say that!) to give the GOP a primer on who the “right” candidates are, and just what the Tea Party is.

First, let’s tackle the subject of picking the “right” candidates, using Paul and Angle as examples. People on both the right and the left have taken after Paul and Angle since their primary victories, claiming that they are “kooks” or unfit to run for office. Their judgments of the candidates seem not to be formed primarily on the records Angle and Paul bring to the table, but because they are more conservative than the GOP establishment has been in years. While I don’t necessarily agree with everything that Paul believes, or that Angle professes, I can agree with the vast majority of their stances and hope that they prevail in November. We need more people who believe that the limits placed on government by the Constitution are firm limits, not toothless suggestions. We need more people who understand that profligate spending by our government is a recipe for disaster by making us more and more beholden to foreign creditors who have no love for us at all. And yes, we need more people in the Senate who realize that the problem with American education is not at the local level, but comes primarily from federal involvement in the educational system. After all, a fish rots from the head…and the Department of Education is a prime example of that. If that makes you a kook, then sign me up for the North Carolina Kook Brigade!

Furthermore, a good deal of the GOP establishment has started whining about how the candidates will be portrayed by their Democratic opponents in the general election. Why, according to some of the GOP “enlightened”, Harry Reid is just salivating at the chance to call Sharon Angle a right-wing extremist because of her Tea Party backing….as if he WOULDN’T have called Danny Tarkanian the same thing if he had won the primary. It wouldn’t have been true in that case and it won’t be true in this case, but that doesn’t mean that the Democrats aren’t going to take that route. Hell, that’s what they always do! According to them in 2008, John McCain was as far right as Barry Goldwater had ever been…and we all know how true that is! But the GOP establishment longs for a candidate that has the much sought after “electability” that such former GOP presidents as Dole, McCain, and Ford had. Oops, my mistake…all those highly electable candidates failed to get elected, didn’t they?

Finally on this point, the establishment does not get to decide for the voters of any state or commonwealth who the “right” candidate for them is. Sitting here in my perch in North Carolina, a state that has generally been pretty conservative at the national level over its history, I can look at members of Congress from other states and say that they aren’t my cup of tea, pardon the pun. Olympia Snowe, Lindsey Graham, and even Chuck Grassley may not have been elected if they ran here, but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t the right people to represent their constituencies. The only people who get to decide who the “right” candidates are in the various states are the voters, not the establishment politicians. And by the way Rand Paul trounced the establishment candidate Trey Grayson, and the way Sharon Angle went from unknown to nominee the people of Kentucky and Nevada obviously felt that these were the right candidates for them.

As for the Tea Party question, the first thing the GOP establishment needs to understand is that the Tea Party is not a political party. It is a political/ideological movement based around several principles that the GOP claims to embrace in their words, but recently has abandoned when it came time for action. The Tea Party stands for limited government, personal responsibility, fiscal restraint, fealty to the Constitution, and personal freedom. That’s about the gist of it, and it is not something that is in the least bit radical. Because of the ideals and principles espoused by the Tea Party movement they have generated a great deal of excitement and support from all over the political spectrum, and have energized the electorate. If the GOP establishmentarians weren’t so caught up trying to safeguard their own lofty positions in the traditional political order of things, they would see that the Tea Party is not their rival but would like to be an agent of change within the Party and the nation. But has been pointed out here at the Spade, and at myriad other TH blogs, they don’t call the GOP “the Stupid Party” for nothing!

So to sum up for all the Republicans out there masquerading as conservatives, the Tea Party is not trying to displace the GOP…but the movement may just have to displace some of you. As for picking the “right” candidates, I think that the people who picked Angle and Paul know a whole hell of a lot better than the Party establishment which candidates are right for them.