What are the GOP tea party's successes?

Their success has been to bring Congress to a point of inaction on every major issue facing the country. That is and was their goal.

If you agree with that, support them. If you disagree, do what you can to elect those running against them.

@zenvelo It took two parties to make that happen. Neither would compromise on anything.

One success is they stopped emotional/nonsensical legislation on gun control.

….that’s about it. Oh, They have been the scapegoat for everything else. That was a victory!?

I’m basically in the center politically, neither party represent me or my interests. That said, I don’t know if either party is serving anyone except for the very rich or themselves. It’s hard to point fingers here. When we do they seem to get away with this shit.

They got their mugs on TV.

They fractured the Republican party in such a a way that it was not able to provide a viable alternative to Obama.

They provided an excuse for Congress to do nothing.

They heated up racism in the US by using images of the President of the United States with a bone in his nose, proving how thing the veneer of respect is between older white people with money and ethnic minorities.

The list goes on and on.

Oh, and I identify myself as conservative.

One other thing they did successfully was to deflect any criticism on the banks following the 2008 recession. And they, led by Rick Santelli, fought against all the recovery efforts that had been started under the Bush Administration. And they have been blatantly racist for 5½ years now.

“they have been blatantly racist for 5½ years”
Please explain the thought process behind that conclusion….

Yes, do explain that one.

@cheebdragon @ARE_you_kidding_me What drove the creation of the Tea Party was the inauguration of a black man as President of the United States. They have questioned his qualification to be President since February of 2009; they criticized him as ineffective after one month in office! Here

Bill Maher

There have been racist placards at Tea Party rallies since February 2009. There isn’t any thought process on my behalf other than seeing what is in front of my eyes.

A.Y.F.K.M.?

The tea party was grassroots but was immediately taken over by special interests and political saboteurs. Even then it’s one hell of a stretch to call it “racist”

@ARE_you_kidding_me No, I am not FKY. Open your eyes to who is in the Tea Party, The “Tea Party” doesn’t denounce its racist components, it excuses it by saying “we’re inclusive of everyone regardless of their opinion on race.”

Oh, my god. This is the kind if nonsense that pushes me away from the left also. Calling your opponent racist without any real evidence with substance is like calling planned parenthood eugenics or the pope a nazi. It’s just straight up slander. There are no more “racist” components to the tea party or conservatives than there are racists in green peace or in affirmative action.

@ARE_you_kidding_me False,

Now, I’m not saying that the Tea Party is racist, but they do have more racist members than Greenpeace. To claim otherwise is to wear blinders; you’re not seeing them because you don’t want to. I’ve never heard/seen many from the left call black people “porch monkey” or “nigger”; the majority of the people I’ve heard do that are from the right. As complicity is considered consent, the Tea Party’s acceptable of racists is considers mildly racist. But the party-line call to deport pretty much all non-whites, make English our official language, and vigilante groups shooting Mexicans in the desert may be getting misinterpreted. maybe that’s not racist at all, just like disenfranchising black voters is actually class warfare instead of racism.

You’re correct that it’s a grassroots movement that got taken over, but given their actions, I don’t think it was special interests; í believe they’ve become a terrorist organization. They’ve taken our nation hostage on several occasions, crippled government, and otherwise done far more actual harm than Al Qaeda.

While the average Tea Party member may not be (and actually probably isn’t) a racist or terrorist, actions of the ones in office and those in the public eye paint a different picture. Want to change that perception of the Tea Party as racist? Change history, and get them to do a little housecleaning.

See any racism?

No? Then how about now?

At least they’re leaving the poor Pope alone.

Equating all conservatives and tea partiers as racist by calling all right wingers as racist is a failed political tactic. No shit there are more racists on the right. That does not make the right “blatently racist” I personally don’t know any conservative or right wing racists first hand. ( I don’t know any left wing racists either) Tea party rallies are notorious for attracting the dim wits. The tea party as a whole is not fucking racist, off base…..yes but not racist.

@ARE_you_kidding_me That I would agree with, but most people only see what gets publicized. You don’t hear much about the racially tolerant Conservatives as they’re not interesting; they don’t get ratings,so they don’t get coverage.

Ok, but to get back to the original question, What are some of their successes?

and personally I would like to hear from some of the folks who are of a more conservative bent and perhaps supportive of the movement

Here is an interesting little tidbit:

“The common public understanding of the origins of the Tea Party is that it is a popular grassroots uprising that began with anti-tax protests in 2009.

However, the Quarterback study reveals that in 2002, the Kochs and tobacco-backed CSE designed and made public the first Tea Party Movement website under the web address www.usteaparty.com.

CSE describes the U.S. Tea Party site, “In 2002, our U.S. Tea Party is a national event, hosted continuously online, and open to all Americans who feel our taxes are too high and the tax code is too complicated.” The site features a “Patriot Guest book” where supporters can write a message of support for CSE and the U.S. Tea Party movement.

Sometime around September 2011, the U.S. Tea Party site was taken offline. According to the DNS registry, the web address www.usteaparty.com is currently owned by Freedomworks. ”

And:

Freedomworks and Americans for Prosperity are both multi-issue organizations that have expanded their battles to include other policies they see as threats to the free market principles they claim to defend, namely fighting health care reform and regulations on global warming pollution. The report’s warning about overseas expansion efforts by Freedomworks should therefore also be heeded by groups in the health and environment arenas.

Finally, this report might serve as a wake-up call to some people in the Tea Party itself, who would find it a little disturbing that the “grassroots” movement they are so emotionally attached to, is in fact a pawn created by billionaires and large corporations with little interest in fighting for the rights of the common person, but instead using the common person to fight for their own unfettered profits.

And for clarification:

Freedomworks and Americans for Prosperity were once a single organization called Citizens for a Sound Economy (CSE). CSE was founded in 1984 by the infamous Koch Brothers, David and Charles Koch….

@jerv Yes, the talk radio extreme propaganda machine is what gets heard and equated to the right side of the isle. For everyday folks who lean right there is no correlation between their antics and reality.

@rojo that could very well be, it would not surprise me in the slightest.

THey formed a group of people wanting change & acted on it. Success is arbitrary based on your pov.

Tea Partyer’s are, by and large, the members of the Hippie Generation that never once allowed themselves to ‘taste the forbidden fruit.’ No drugs. No sex. No rock-n-roll. They said “NO!” then, and now they are using their clout as retiring, wealthy, privileged whites to say “NO!” again.

They are exercising their parental rights, and the country is grounded. Finally, those hedonistic hippies (and ‘people of color’) are under their collective thumbs.

They have largely succeeded.

They have achieved the impossible and moved America further to the right. Personally I would throw them all overboard and keep the tea.

@KNOWITALL Bite me doughgirl. They have moved things to the right though.

@ARE_you_kidding_me Everyday folks who lean right are considered Liberals and therefore not allowed in the GOP. They’ve had their Republican Party membership revoked. Does that purging of moderate elements within the ranks count as a Tea Party success?

I wouldn’t say that’s true in the literal sense but it’s a proven tactic to undercut political competition by labeling them as a RHINO. They would take offense at being called a liberal. If it was the tea parties goal to fracture the republican party they did it. You now have the extreme right and then everyone else. Most right leaning centrists are not the type to go to a tea party rally anyway and could care less (This is perhaps 50% of the right leaning). There is no structure to the “right wing” anymore. I do admire the cohesion that the left has but I can’t say I know exactly what their long-term vision is either, except for maintaining control of the executive branch and then capturing the Judicial. Slogans about hope and other political bullshit sell corporate pet projects that are better served through veil of left wing politics because they have been bought too. Not much actual problem solving going on these days. Their reign has been a disaster also and the special interests just keep on keeping on. I’ll never really understand the drive that so many people have to choose arbitrary sides and tow the line they are handed. It sure keeps us all in check though. I don’t have patience for folks who are adamant defenders of “their” party these days regardless of what they think they will do for you or this country. We just need to get decent, ethical people in office if there are any left willing to put up with it.

Voting for someone based on their ethnicity is considered racist, right?

@cheebdragon yup

And would it be considered racist to assume that one ethnic group was less capable of doing something than another?

@cheebdragon yup

Seems to be some pretty blatant racism coming from the left.

@ARE_you_kidding_me Will Rogers is still correct when he said, “I don’t belong to an organized political party; I’m a Democrat!”. Before the Tea Party, conservatives had the advantage of greater party unity and organization, but lost it when the Tea Party split the right between moderate “leaners” and fanatical zealots. This wouldn’t be a problem if we had a coalition government like many other nations, but it cripples our two-party society as we are accustomed to only Rs and Ds on our ballots, and often vote by party affiliation rather than a candidate’s merits.