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Occupy Wall Street's roots are in Madagascar, while the Tea Party's roots are in American living rooms

Ryan Streeter
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As in the early Tea Party days, commentators from all across the spectrum are trying to figure out the essence and future of Occupy Wall Street (OWS). As Walter Hudson writes, the two movements share a rage at how large institutions are wrecking our economy and way of life – and the similarities basically stop there. OWS is the “idiot brother” of the Tea Party in its insistence that rich people and banks are the primary cause of our troubles, rather than the skewed and self-serving policies of politicians.

This view is basically correct.

There is another important way in which the movements are different, though, which I hope will become more a part of the public debate: their origins are very, very different from one another.

OWS begins in a land far, far away

In an illuminating article two days ago in the Chronicle of Higher Education entitled, “Intellectual Roots of Wall St. Protest Lie in Academe,” we learn that:

Occupy Wall Street's most defining characteristics—its decentralized nature and its intensive process of participatory, consensus-based decision-making—are rooted in other precincts of academe and activism: in the scholarship of anarchism and, specifically, in an ethnography of central Madagascar.

Madagascar?

That’s right. Between 1989 and 1991, David Graeber, an academic ethnographer and anarchist, studied the people of Betafo, a community in Madagascar for a book he wrote in 2007. The people lived an anarchist’s dream – decision-making without the apparatus of the state through what anarchists call “direct action,” a decentralized way of deciding what to do without ceding ground to the government.

This is supposedly at the heart of OWS’s organization:

The defining aspect of Occupy Wall Street, its emphasis on direct action and leaderless, consensus-based decision-making, is most clearly embodied by its General Assembly, in which participants in the protest make group decisions both large and small, like adopting principles of solidarity and deciding how best to stay warm at night.

This supposed solidarity is what the OWS representative in this video was trying to talk about when he said that the protestors were organizing a “model community in the heart of darkness.”

There is, of course, a fundamental tension at the heart of OWS. Its anarchist roots are difficult to square with the Marxism and the applied socialism that are splattered all over its web site and spewed from the mouths of the protestors themselves. They want a stronger state to enforce equality. Reconciling anarchism with Marxism will create some headaches.

Be that as it may, OWS couldn’t look more different in it origins from the Tea Party.

The Tea Party begins right here at home

Michele Malkin wrote up a useful chronicle of its origins in the Tea Party’s early days. The movement definitely did not start in the head of an academic off the coast of Africa. Many remember Rick Santelli’s rant on the exchange floor in February 2009 as the shot heard round the world that launched the movemenet, but as Malkin reminds us, the movement began even before that as ordinary Americans began organizing small rallies to protest the spending spree that Washington had embarked on as a misguided way to shore up the economy.

Malkin’s log of the events have photos spliced in that are well worth the look. The contrast between the photos that come out of Zuccotti Park is pretty stark.

Of course, after about a year into the Tea Party movement, liberal commentators like E.J. Dionne were scratching their heads about how so many people would protest what Barack Obama was doing since, after all, Obama was actually pretty moderate. Flavored by a little bit of nativism and racism, the movement, Dionne concluded, must have its roots in the long history of American anti-statism. What he failed to explain was why ordinary soccer moms and relatively apolitical workaday types hadn’t found their inner “anti-statist” roots earlier. To this day, elites on the left side of America cannot see how the actions of an administration unhinged from economic reality stirred the American populace to action.

The Tea Party began in American living rooms, around tables at McDonalds and Starbucks, and around the proverbial water cooler. OWS began in ethnographic studies of people far, far away and on the computer screens of disgruntled academics. It’s hard to believe the latter movement will achieve the same staying power as the former unless it rids itself of its radicalism and appeals to common Americans’ sentiment that inequality is best reduced by creating opportunity, not by applying a Marxist-anarchist hybrid to the American way of life.

Citing "continual lying" by event organizers, Sarah Palin put Iowa appearance "on hold"

Natalie Gonnella
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Christine O'Donnell's invite (or disinvite) is no longer the only conundrum facing event organizers at Tea Party America, as Sarah Palin officially puts her highly anticipated appearance at the group's Indianola rally 'on hold'.  As the WSJ reports:

[A] person close the former Alaska governor...cited “continual lying” from event organizers at Tea Party of America, including a recent mixup over whether former U.S. Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell of Delaware would also speak...The former governor will now appear at a Friday event in Des Moines sponsored by the group Conservatives4Palin. It is currently scheduled for 8 p.m. at The Machine Shed Restaurant, though the location will probably have to be changed, the person close to Ms. Palin said. Ms. Palin is still scheduled to appear at a Tea Party Express tour stop Monday in New Hampshire.

Ms. Palin may still hold an event Saturday, the person said, though she has no firm plans. It’s also possible she could still attend the Indianola tea party rally, the person said.

The former governor’s team decided to back out Tuesday night after rally organizers re-invited Ms. O’Donnell to speak on stage. Organizers had booked Ms. O’Donnell, who lost her 2010 bid for a U.S. Senate seat from Delaware, to speak but quickly withdrew the invitation in an effort to avoid controversy.

What they're saying: Conservatives take on Maxine Waters

Natalie Gonnella
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President Obama may have called for an end to incendiary rhetoric earlier this year, but if Democrats' recent behavior against the Tea Party is anything to go by, it seems his own party may have missed the message.

Still awaiting an apology from Vice President Biden (and a growing list of liberals) here's a look at what a number of conservatives have had to say in response to Rep. Maxine Waters contentious remarks from this past weekend:

Former Senator and 2012 hopeful Rick Santorum:

She’s a caricature of what’s wrong with Congress...She’s one of these real nasty anti-basic traditional and fundamental values of this country (types), so I’m not surprised that she would say to a group of folks who stand up and defend the constitution of this country, who stand up and defend the declaration and our founding principles, that she finds these people folks that should be condemned...This is the left in America...They absolutely despise the founding principles of this country that believe in free people and believe in limited government.

Jenny Beth Martin and Mark Meckler, co-founders, Tea Party Patriots:

We’ve had Democrats calling American citizens ‘terrorists’ and ‘hostage takers,’ and now an elected Democratic representative says that we can ‘go straight to hell..The president and all leaders of the Democratic Party, who have called for civility in the past, are neglecting to censure their own. Is civility only required from their opponents? Perhaps it’s time for a new-NEW era of civility. ... The president’s silence on these latest violations of civility has been deafening, but not surprising.

Ryan Rhodes (Iowa Tea Party Co-Founder who confronted Obama at the Iowa State Fair about Vice President Biden's 'terrorist' comment):

I think it's this type of the stuff that President Obama as the leader of his party has to come out and say something about or I encourage Tea Partyers across the country to continue asking him how we come to middle ground, how we have civility when their telling us that they basically want us to die...it's just not acceptable language 

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich:

The people who are attacking Tea Parties have noting to offer. They have no solution, and they are creating no jobs, they are presiding over the worse unemployment since the Great Depression, the largest deficits in American history, and therefore the only thing they can do is smear their opponents...I think it's a sad commentary on the American left that it has no new thinking it has no willingness to be inventive.

Washington Post Columnist Charles Krauthammer:

Look, they are very upset because they lost the debate; they weren't even in the debate on the debt ceiling. But I do think that it works for liberals to talk to liberals in that kind of dismissive and sort of angry tone about Tea Party, it's sort of accepted on the Upper West Side. But it doesn't work in the general election. And I think that's why you get less of that out of the White House. Tea Party involves a lot of independents, a lot of disaffected Democrats. And when you insult it or really get vile about it, you are alienating people you are gonna need if you want to win.

The Weekly Standard's Steve Hayes:

I do expect to see the Democrats do quite a bit of this in the campaign because they don't have a positive argument to make on behalf of the policies that the White House and fellow Democrats have made. But if this were effective, we wouldn't have a Republican majority in the House. I mean this is exactly what Democrats did all throughout the summer and throughout the fall of 2010 and Republicans won in record numbers. Simply beating up the Tea Party is not a good electoral strategy for Democrats.

Does the Tea Party have Michele Bachmann's titanium spine? Let's hope not

Ryan Streeter
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Pete Wehner’s and Yuval Levin’s op-ed in the Wall Street Journal today was refreshing - and important.

Why? Because they called on the Tea Party to live up to its own terms – something America needs in a big way going into 2012 and beyond. Here’s what I mean: the Tea Party has been the greatest force for limited government in America since the Republicans’ victory in 1994, maybe since Ronald Reagan. And yet the movement has been less enthusiastic about limiting the REAL drivers off long-term government dominance (entitlements) than about limiting discretionary spending, which everyone knows will do virtually nothing to reduce our deficit on its own.

Levin and Wehner make this point by highlighting how Michele Bachmann, darling of the Tea Party, refuses to commit on exactly the issue that has the most to do with restraining the cost and expanse of government. They put it this way:

[Paul Ryan's plan] is the best, most far-reaching reform of health-care entitlements on the table. Yet when asked about Mr. Ryan's Medicare plan, Mrs. Bachmann's titanium spine seems to fold.

She has said she supports the Ryan budget's discretionary cuts but puts "an asterisk" over its Medicare reform. "We have to make sure going forward with senior citizens, that we're focusing on a higher quality of life, dealing with cures for instance for senior citizens," she told one interviewer.

If Mrs. Bachmann is worried that Mr. Ryan's reforms would not address her concerns, then there are other approaches to choose from. But she has declined to offer or endorse any, expressing only vague support for a small increase in the retirement age and greater means testing—neither of which would make a real dent in Medicare's growth, since neither would reform the grossly inefficient payment system that causes costs to explode throughout the health sector. An asterisk is not enough.

They continue:

The tea party movement has been indispensable in forcing Republicans (and through them forcing Washington) to start reversing the rampant spending of the last few decades. It can now do the same with respect to the far greater spending explosion looming over the next few decades—holding politicians, including presidential candidates, to a high and principled standard when it comes to addressing our fiscal problems. It can educate voters about our entitlement crisis and demand that office holders and candidates explain what they will do to fix the problem, and especially to reform Medicare.

If the tea party movement does this, it will take its place among the great, constructive political movements in U.S. history. If it doesn't, it will be judged to have been fundamentally unserious when it came to reining in the spending Leviathan.

Back in May I made a similar point:

In one big way: Tea Party 1.0, which led to historic gains in the House last November, was based on cutting (discretionary) spending. It's time for Tea Party 2.0, which needs to be based on reforming entitlements and the tax code. The movement's various leaders have not been as active or vocal on entitlements as they have been on spending…Tea partiers in Congress and activists around the country understand that the REAL mission is bigger than they thought, but the movement has not yet updated its rallying cry…If any movement can turn entitlement reform into a winning issue for candidates, the tea party can. If it tries.

The Tea Party cannot risk supporing Bachmann if, on the single greatest cost-driving issue of our day, her titanium spine turns to cardboard. They need to hold her, and all other candidates, accountable for what they will do on entitlements, and especially Medicare.

What they're saying: Reacting to the US credit downgrade, GOP freshmen once again make the case for 'Cut, Cap, Balance'

Natalie Gonnella
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After a dramatic conclusion to Washington's latest budget battle, Americans ended the week with the unfortunate and unnerving news that despite the latest debt deal the US has lost its AAA credit rating.

And with the ever present possibility of further downgrades, lawmakers have been quick to weigh in on the unprecedented move, with many Republican freshmen once again raising their voices on behalf of the 'Cut, Cap, Balance' proposal.

Advocating for substantial spending reform and offering 'we told you so's' as Washington contends with the possibility of further economic decline, here's a look at what a number of GOP newbies had to say in response to Friday's downgrade announcement:

Congressman Mike Pompeo:

Since Obama has been President, we have accumulated an unprecedented $4 trillion in new deficits.  After 3 years, the President has yet to produce a plan to decrease spending or improve our economy.  I've seen enough.  As a result, I voted for a plan passed by the United States House of Representatives that would have trimmed almost $6 trillion in spending—Cut, Cap and Balance. 

Sadly, the Senate and the President mocked this plan.  Worse still, they refused to take action by even considering it in the Senate.  Cut, Cap and Balance is a credible plan that would begin to properly right the ship..The American people get it—cut the spending—I pray the President finally understands.

Congressman Joe Walsh:

Heeding the warnings of the rating agencies, Republicans in the House of Representatives took a different path and passed Cut, Cap and Balance legislation which would have brought structural change to the way Washington borrows and spends money. Regretfully, the Administration responded by calling the legislation an "empty political statement" and the President threatened a veto."

Simply put, if President Obama and Democrats in Congress had embraced Cut, Cap, and Balance and if the President were sincerely focused on the severe financial challenges facing the country instead of his re-election, this action by Standard and Poor's could have been avoided.

Senator Rand Paul:

There is plenty of blame to go around. Both parties have contributed to our $14 trillion debt. But it is hard to say this crisis wasn’t predictable, because it was. House and Senate conservatives clearly predicted this, and also offered the only solution that could have prevented our downgrade with our Cut Cap and Balance plan...We must rescue our finances through a Balanced Budget Amendment, and we must do it soon. We must cut spending immediately. And we must get new leadership, and put in place people who have seen problems coming and offered credible solutions, rather than those who continue to misdiagnose and mismanage our economy.

Congressman Reid Ribble:

Our legislation passed the House of Representatives on a bipartisan basis but was flippantly rejected by both Senator Reid and President Obama as being ‘draconian.’

In Washington, where some seem to act like rhetoric matters more than facts, spin more than substance, and misdirection more than problem solving, I wonder how the Democrat deficit doubters will react to these S&P analysts. I urge Senator Reid to give Cut, Cap and Balancethe full and proper debate that it deserves before our economy veers more dangerously toward crisis. Alarms are sounding for a reason...because our fiscal house is at risk of burning down.

Congressman Chris Gibson:

Given S&P's downgrade of our credit last night, I'm calling on the Senate and President to reconsider their position and pass this legislation. By passing "Cut, Cap, and Balance," and enacting comprehensive tax reform that closes "loopholes" allowing for lower marginal tax rates to grow the economy, we will solve the current fiscal crisis putting us on firm footing to make the the 21st century our best yet.

Senator Kelly Ayotte:

This is a blow to the United States, and it is a grim signal that we cannot continue to delay addressing our crippling debt. One of the reasons I opposed the recent deal to raise the debt ceiling was because it still left us vulnerable to the threat of a downgrade. The President and Congress must end business as usual in Washington and finally confront our debt crisis in a meaningful way with real cuts, serious budget reforms and entitlement reform.

Conservatives hit back at Democrats who liken the Tea Party to terrorists

By Tim Montgomerie
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In the Washington Examiner Cal Thomas has hit back at reports that Vice President Joe Biden likened the Tea Party to "terrorists":

"It is not Tea Party people who are the "terrorists." A terrorist seeks to destroy. Who is the real destroyer in the debt-ceiling debate? Who wants to continue spending money we don't have, borrowing it from nations like China that would be happy to destroy us if our politicians don't do it first? Tea Party people simply want to make their government accountable again and for this they are called "terrorists"?"

The Vice President has denied making the remarks but in the Boston Globe Jeff Jacoby is not ready to believe him:

"What makes Biden’s denial so implausible is that liberals and Democrats have been flinging the “terrorist’’ slur across the aisle for weeks...

Listen, for example, to former Obama administration official Steven Rattner, speaking on MSNBC last week: “These Tea Party guys are, like, strapped with dynamite, standing in the middle of Times Square at rush hour and saying, ‘Either you do it my way, or we’re going to blow you up, ourselves up, and the whole country up with us.’ ’’

Or to New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, warning that “if sane Republicans do not stand up to this Hezbollah faction in their midst, the Tea Party will take the GOP on a suicide mission.’’

Or to Representative Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the House minority whip, talking about “Russian roulette’’ with loaded chambers, and how House Republicans “want to shoot every bullet they have at the president.’’

Or to former Ted Kennedy aide William Yeomans, now an American University law professor, who says labeling Tea Party Republicans “hostage-takers’’ doesn’t go far enough, since “they have now become full-blown terrorists.’’

And as Jacoby also writes, were these the same Democrats who called for more sensitivity of language after the Tucson shootings?

What they're saying: Republicans weigh in on why they voted against the debt deal

Natalie Gonnella
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The Budget Control Act may have cleared Congress, but despite bipartisan support (although somewhat grudgingly) for the legislation's passage, in total 85 Republicans voted against the bill (19 Senators and 66 Representatives). 

Unimpressed with the proposal's key provisions, here's a look at what a number of congressional Republicans had to say about why they voted 'no':

Senator Jim DeMint:

This debt deal doesn't solve anything, it puts America at risk. At the end of his four-year term, Obama will be responsible for nearly $6 trillion in new debt. More than any other president. Washington's debt deal doesn't change our course, it taps the brakes as we speed toward a fiscal cliff.

Senator David Vitter:

We can -- we must -- do better. #tcot #latcot #debtceiling #deficit

Senator Dan Coats: 

I opposed the final vote because it falls significantly short of what is needed to address the severity of this fiscal crisis.  For months I have been saying a credible must include at least $4 trillion over a decade and a commitment to restructure entitlements and our tax code. This bill only cuts as little as $2.1 trillion over 10 years and most of these reductions don't occur til years down the road.

Congresswoman Martha Roby:

I am pleased that a default has been avoided as a result of the vote tonight. However, I was unable to support this legislation because, after a careful reading of the bill, I fear it could ultimately result in devastating and unjustified cuts to our national security. This bill, unlike previous proposals I supported, has a weak firewall against potentially destructive defense cuts. To be sure, there are savings to be found in the Pentagon’s budget, and I have already voted this year to trim wasteful and unnecessary defense spending. But this bill goes much too far. The legislation would use our defense budget as an insurance policy to guarantee savings in the event that the special joint committee, which this legislation creates, fails to achieve cuts in other areas of the government bureaucracy.

Congressman Tim Scott:

[T]his compromise did not take enough steps towards ensuring a stable economic future in order to earn my vote. The short-term spending reductions in the bill were insufficient, I believe the Balanced Budget Amendment should be mandated, and I have concerns with lingering questions regarding defense cuts. 

Despite my decision on this particular vote, I am pleased with the direction we are moving the debate, and want to thank the American people for supporting the principles of Cut, Cap, and Balance. I will continue the fight to reign in spending, reform our tax code, and get the government out of the way of our job creators.

Congressman Tim Huelskamp:

Despite having pledged to the American people an open and transparent process and despite having months to fix this problem, we were asked to vote in the 11th hour for a bill that the public had less than 16 hours to read and understand. The culture of fiscal irresponsibility may not have been created by this Congress, but we were sent here to put an end to it; I'm afraid this bill does not rise to that occasion.

Senator Marco Rubio:

I cannot support this plan because it fails to actually solve our debt problem, fails to diminish the risk of a credit rating downgrade and is not a long-term solution to avert a debt crisis.

Congressman Connie Mack:

The Congress voted again to continue funding the President’s reckless spending and financial irresponsibility. The President and Congressional Democrats have played games, used scare tactics, and offered ‘schemes’ not solutions to Washington’s spending problem. While I did not support the plan put forth today, the House has put forth three plans and the President has failed to put any plan on the table. America needs a permanent fix to Washington’s spending problem and today the co-sponsorship of the Mack Penny Plan has reached a new high of fifty-six Members of Congress, and I expect many others to join the effort during the August recess.

Senator Jeff Sessions:

[M]y great reservation that compels me to oppose this bill is that we are undermining the one thing most vital to ending the debt crisis looming over us: accountability. 

The new normal in Washington has become panic-driven 11th hour votes in which Members are told to fall into line before pandemonium ensues. This is no way to run the Congress or to run the government.

I fear we are relinquishing our responsibility as Senators.

Senator Chuck Grassley:

I voted against the plan because it delays meaningful spending reductions, fails to address entitlement spending in a way that will save the programs for future generations of retirees, and leaves open the possibility of tax increases.

In fact, the White House said yesterday it will seek to increase taxes in the second part of the deal.  Tax increases are the wrong answer for a struggling economy, and recent history proves that higher taxes don’t go to the bottom line.  Instead, they’re a license for Washington to spend even more.  Since World War II, for every dollar in new taxes, the government has spent $1.17.

Senator Pat Toomey:

Unfortunately, the debt ceiling deal...does nothing to deal with the path of our government's unsustainable deficit spending. For fiscal year 2012, this legislation will only cut two-tenths of 1 percent of total spending. Not only will our debt grow each year under this plan, it will continue to grow even as a percentage of our economy. Finally, I am concerned that the long-term cuts over the next decade will not materialize. All Congress has to do to override this bill's spending restraints in the future is pass another law that overrides them. If Congress is truly serious about cutting spending, it would mandate serious spending cuts in next year's budget - the only year in which cuts are actually guaranteed.

Senator Dean Heller:

I respect the effort by all involved to reach a compromise, but this agreement simply does not make the long-term, structural changes necessary to rebuild our economy. Congress has again shied away from making the tough decisions necessary to seriously address our nation’s need for fiscal health and economic growth. Twice I have voted in favor of forward-looking plans that would prevent tax increases, protect Social Security and Medicare and require Congress to send a Balance Budget Amendment to the States. 

Barack Obama, the transformational President, can't cut a deal with Republicans because the GOP has been hijacked by the Tea Party...or so the story goes

Ryan Streeter
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Gloria Borger made the point as clearly in this roundtable with Chris Matthews as anyone has to date. The "Tea Party has stopped" the kind of transformation people expected from Obama by hijacking the GOP (note the "stop" hand gestures added for effect).

This is quickly becoming the latest narrative about the Tea Party.

The story goes like this: Boehner and the more sophisticated Republicans were ready to cut a deal with Obama, and because Obama the Transformational One was open to touching Social Security, the sophisticated Republicans knew they would have to "do something on the revenue side." Then the Tea Partiers crashed into the room and started turning tables over, pulling back the sophisticated Republicans. The One keeps getting thwarted in his historical calling to help the American people evolve to a new level because his political opponents are now being run by 21st century Neanderthals.

The one nugget of truth in the narrative, of course, is that the freshmen class in Congress is in no mood for tax increases, if that's what doing something "on the revenue side" means.

But when it comes to the debt negotiations, the problem isn't that the Tea Party has made any missteps. The problem is that GOP leadership hasn't done enough to build consensus across the movement that "the revenue side" could mean ending loopholes in the tax code that many Tea Partiers would be just as happy to see go away. This is one implication of Ross Douthat's column today, and the point of my post from last Friday.

The movement is not as streamlined and focused as Borger says and the liberal elite wants to believe. The movement is made up of a diverse group of people who share a common worry that politicians are least disciplined when it comes to spending taxpayers' money. And because the movement is difficult to pigeonhole, characterizing it in an oversimplified way has become something of a sport.

At Contentions, Jim Ceaser and John York do a nice job of chronicling the the "seven deadly sins" of which the Tea Party has been accused. In summary:

1. They are uneducated poor racists
2. They are uneducated poor dupes
3. They are privileged whites who don’t want to pay their fair share
4. They are folks with understandable concerns, but they don’t comprehend what will solve our problems
5. They are just the old-conservatives rebranded
6. They are parts of a fragile and conflicting coalition
7. Supporters are historical fetishists, concerned with quaint and outmoded things like the principles of the Revolution and the Constitution

Of the Tea Party, Clark Judge wrote in the WSJ this morning:

The national tea party movement is just the most vocal element in this much larger wave. By and large, polling has not captured it. Pollsters follow the movements of demographic groups or the changing preferences of party loyalists and independents. They typically do not try to identify something like Bush voters of 2004 who became Obama voters in 2008 and GOP House voters in 2010. The tea party is the first broadly based American political insurgency since California's Proposition 13 in the 1970s. Sure, its fervor will make the old guard uncomfortable, but intensity is what the GOP needs.

In short, the tea party movement is Reaganism updated.

Good points. And I'm sure it won't be the last word on the Tea Party this week as pundits try to figure out the nature of their overall influence on the GOP's bargaining tactics.

As debt negotiations stall (yet again), another freshman threatens to filibuster

Natalie Gonnella
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With less than a month to go before a possible US default and little progress on a debt deal, Senator Rand Paul plans to flex his filibuster muscles in an attempt to push negotiations out in the open.

Speaking about the stagnated debt debate in an interview on C-SPAN's Newsmakers this morning, the Kentucky freshman threatened to all unanimous consent calls next week in an effort to force lawmakers to get serious about deficit-reduction proposals.

Picking up where freshman Senator Ron Johnson left off with his own filibuster attempt last week, here's a look at what Senator Paul had to say about his plans:

I’m part of the freshman group in the Senate that’s saying no more...we will filibuster until we talk about the debt ceiling, until we talk about proposals...And many of us in the conservative wing are going to present our own proposal [this] week, and that is to raise the debt ceiling. We will actually vote in favor of raising the debt ceiling [this] week if we can, but it’ll be contingent upon passing a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.

9 in 10 Tea Party voters intend to vote Republican regardless of who wins the nomination

Natalie Gonnella
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While many remain skeptical of the current crop of 2012 candidates, a new Rasmussen Reports survey reveals that 83% of GOP voters plan to vote Republican in 2012 no matter who wins the presidential nomination.

And surprisingly, Tea Partyers are the most committed to the unknown nominee:

Among GOP primary voters who are Tea Party members, 92% will vote for the Republican candidate even if their favorite falls short of the nomination.  Among non-Tea Party members, only 78% are that committed to the Republican candidate.

Ninety-three percent (93%) of Tea Party members think any of the GOP candidates would make a better president than Obama, a view shared by just 66% of non-members.

Despite a few weak showings at the New Hampshire debate, overall, 77% of likely GOP voters believe that "every one of the party's presidential candidates" would do a better job than the current administration.

The full results from Rasmussen's latest survey are available to view here.