OpEdNews Article: "Tea Party" Brand Now a Liability to "Tea Party" ... and Republicans

Palm Beach Post's George Bennet wrote last week about how so-called "Tea Party" groups seem to be running away from the "Tea Party" name in places like Florida.

The South Florida Tea Party, for example -- the one that helped launch the national career of Sen. Marco Rubio and hosted Donald Trump while he was initially pretending to think about running for President -- is changing their name to the National Liberty Federation.

"As Tea Party groups go," observes Steven Benen at MaddowBlog, "the South Florida Tea Party was one of the bigger and better organized outfits."

But it's little wonder these folks are running from the name. Their popularity, and their name brand, is now plummeting along with the fortunes of the Congressional Republican Party. As Bennet notes, even Rightwing pollsters like Rasmussen are finding that support for the "Tea Party" movement is absolutely cratering...

Rasmussen, a favorite polling firm of conservatives, found in a survey this month that only 8 percent of voters identify themselves as Tea Party members, down from a high of 24 percent shortly after passage of the federal health care law in 2010. The Rasmussen poll found 30 percent of voters had a favorable view of the Tea Party and 49 percent had a negative view.
...
An October Rasmussen poll found 44 percent of voters considered "tea party" a negative label, eclipsing "liberal" as the most potent negative adjective.

Read the rest of this article at The BRAD BLOG

2 comments