Not Democrats -- they see the far-right movement as their best hope for keeping political control in 2010, by forcing the GOP to run terrifyingly fanatical candidates like Sharron Angle. But the GOP, which denounced as "quackery" a Democratic attempt to tie the GOP to the tea partiers, might be getting a bit nervous.
They got to be careful, though. Republicans who denounce the far-right tend not to last long in Republican primaries (Bob Bennett and Bob Inglis, wave from the galleries!). I hardly think the tea party will be thrilled by public GOP efforts to disassociate themselves. But I hardly think voters will be thrilled if they don't.
Rough gig.
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Who are these generic "voters"?
For our analysis, there are two basic categories of voters: those who have strong feelings on tea party stuff and those who don't. Those who do tend to already have strong partisan affiliation.
Those who don't, well, yes, technically they won't be thrilled if Republicans don't disassociate themselves. And they won't be thrilled if they do, either. This is our pool of undecideds (and a smaller pool it is for mid-term elections).
Of course, the second category can be moved on specific "third rail" issues, say, Sharron Angle's comments on Social Security. But that's just a matter of message control. I have little doubt Republicans will perfect the art of going to Tea Party rallies and saying the right code words without leaving openings like that going forward.
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