Remember the Tea Party? They were going to transform the political landscape. And when the reds captured the House in 2010 everyone on the Right was writing the Bomber's political obituary and touting Dick Armey's organizational genius in re-aligning American politics. Now it wasn't Karl Rove's center-right coalition that was in the driver's seat, it was a hard right coalition led by Armey.
So what happened? Read below the fold
Armey started out by doing what they all do in DC; formed a not-for-profit organization called FreedomWorks, with money from, (who else?) the Koch bunch. They brought in the usual big-mouth crew - Bennett, Kemp - and basically wandered around the internet looking for something to do.
Armey hit a home run after 2008 when he used FreedomWorks to publicize and promote the Tea Party; never mind that nor-for-profit organizations aren't supposed to get involved in politics, but who cares? And when Tea Party candidates became Congressmen Armey was at the top of the list for every right-wing gab fest - Limbaugh, Hannity, you name it.
Only one problem. That guy from Kenya. Along with some financial hi-jinks at FreedomWorks and now Armey's out the door. He'll put $8 milllion in the bank if the money boys keep greasing the till. But like every other Republican victim of this year's election, Armey will remain delusional to the end. Why did the Republicans lose? Listen to this:
We had at least two candidates that should've won, that frankly lost because they said some stupid things on a subject that their party's leaders should've schooled them to stay away from in the first place.
Of course he's talking about Akin and Mourdock. They didn't lose because the Republican party has degenerated into rampant gutter-style politics. They lost, according to Armey, because they didn't know how to lie about their position on abortion.
The point is not that they lost. Every election ends up with one side winning and the other side losing. But have you ever seen a bunch who are
so unable to understand what happened?