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For a very long time, I have been ranting about how CNN is trying to keep the tea party viable and present them as something other than what they are. From their hiring of Dana Loesch and Erick Erickson to their shameless promotion of the very corporate, AstroTurf Tea Party Express bus tours, CNN has been on the job.
All that positioning as the best tea party network in television should reflect in the ratings their little tea party debate receives tonight. After all, this group is less popular than just about anyone else in the country, even among their own members!
In the most recent poll, most Americans took a negative view of the debt-ceiling negotiations, seeing them as “mostly about gaining political advantage.” With Republicans in charge of the House, more of the blame fell on them. And many people — a 43 percent plurality — saw the Tea Party as having too much influence on Republicans.
Perhaps not surprisingly, Democrats were most likely to have an unfavorable view of the Tea Party. But a plurality of independents, too — 40 percent — viewed the Tea Party negatively, and said it had too much influence on the Republican Party.
Still, CNN flogs away and continues to try to build their brand as TeaNewsNetwork:
"I'm starting to hear for the first time, we've got to be careful about the ideology," he said. "Winning the nomination is only half the game. This is about winning back the White House."
Griffin expects eventually both the GOP party establishment and tea party voters will come around to support the party's candidate so long as they see winning back the White House as a real possibility.
Whatever the outcome, don't count the tea party out, he said. Despite many predictions that the movement had reached its peak, the tea party continues to be a relevant force because it is based upon sustained anger among the electorate, said Griffin."The tea party is an organic movement that was largely created by people who were frustrated by Washington," he said. "There's not much you can do about something that's genuine, something that grew organically. You cannot crush that out given the noise coming out of Washington these days."
I got a kick out of Digby's rant this morning.
Loesch, in her guise as a normal person, replies that there really isn't a disagreement about this at all and that the "grassroots" (is "Tea Party" out of vogue these days?) believes that instead of redistributing wealth they should "expand the tax base" and if you look at the past six decades, "it's proven." She cleverly avoids saying what she means by that: that poor people don't pay enough taxes.
Now she's complaining that Obama didn't fulfill his promises, which she evidently wants people to think she supported, and says "the grassroots" want him to cut taxes, end regulations and pass the Keystone Pipeline project.
Why is she on my TV?
TeaNN. The network with less news, more bluster. Brought to you by the Tea Party Express, FreedomWorks, and corporate interests everywhere.
