On many occasions, the Tea Party movement has overestimated its power and chosen the wrong battles. There was simply no way that Obama was ever going to agree to defund his signature legislative achievement (a longtime goal of liberalism) as the price for keeping the government open. And as Townhall’s Conn Carroll pointed out, if Tea Party Republicans won’t vote for any plan to raise the debt limit that’s within the realm of possibility, it weakens the party’s negotiating hand and forces leadership to pass a bill relying on Democratic support.

This presents a broader problem for supporters of limited government. Forces within the party who embrace a large role for government (or are at least complacent in the face of its growth) know that they’ll lose the ideological debate among Republican voters. So what they’ll try to do is to make arguments on other grounds. They’ll argue that Tea Party-supported candidates are unelectable, too irresponsible to govern or don’t have a coherent policy agenda.

That’s why, in 2014, Tea Party activists should be focused on electing strong and prudent advocates for limited government as well as rallying around a set of concrete policy goals.