Before nonagenarian Rep. Ralph Hall lost his seat in a Republican primary in Texas, no incumbent had been defeated in primaries this year, leading to the dominant press and pundit narrative: The Republican Empire Strikes Back. Oops. Now with the stunning defeat of Eric Cantor, we have narrative whiplash: The Return of the Tea Party. …
The main lesson here may be the populist one. The tea-party movement is not a Republican movement, or a conservative movement. It is radical, anti-institutional, anti-leadership, antigovernment. It is driven by suspicion of the motives and actions of all leaders, including those in the Republican Party. Cantor’s glaringly obvious personal ambition fed those suspicions, but his defeat was a defeat for the broader establishment, which compromises too readily and feeds its own interests first. That attitude, by the way, also is embodied in many of the big donors to candidates and outside groups, meaning it represents an ongoing serious headache for party leaders. CONT.
Norm Ornstein, National Journal