The tea party erupted for a lot of reasons, but a big one was frustration with Washington business as usual. Activists in the main weren’t demanding the Republican Party become something new, or ultra-right-wing. They were demanding the party—beset at that time by logrolling, earmarks and corruption—simply hold true to its stated and longtime principles of free markets and limited government. It was a quest for a better-quality product, not a different one altogether.
That’s evidenced by where tea-party activists accomplished most of their successes. A few high-profile Senate missteps aside, activists targeted much of their fire on reliably conservative or gettable House districts, inhabited by lazy incumbents who cared mostly about staying in office. They focused on recruitment, and their new crop of reformers resulted in 2010 in one of the greatest incumbent turnovers in congressional history. Over the years, they have only gotten better at fielding and supporting winning candidates (see the 2014 Republican Senate takeover).
The Democrats’ problem is that all their reliably liberal states and districts are already occupied with good liberals, who take orders. Those members will joyfully boycott and filibuster and protest and obstruct. There will be no need for primaries.
Those in the firing line are instead the Mike Castles of the Democratic Party.
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