Here Comes the Tea Party!

It was supposed to be a cinch for Delaware Republicans to nominate their candidate — Mike Castle, a moderate ex-governor — for the November elections to run for the Senate seat that in a small, rich U.S. state has always been occupied by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden. But it was Christine O’Donnell, driven by the tea party, who comfortably took the vote, to the astonishment of the establishment. This has been the largest stroke of the populist movement, but not the only one in the Republican primaries for candidates for Senate, the House of Representatives and various state governorships leading up to the midterm elections; this does not bode well for President Barack Obama.

If Obama and the Democratic Party are to lose at the hands of the Republican opposition in the House of Representatives and the Senate — something that is openly speculated in Washington — it will be in six weeks. The polls do not favor a president who, according to the majority opinion of his countrymen, cannot clear the economic horizon or reduce unemployment.

What can be calibrated at this point is the political impact of this purportedly regenerative movement, called the tea party, which is ultraconservative in its approach and which in the wake of the gospel preached by Sarah Palin hates Washington, with all of its pomp and workings, and who vote primarily elderly, white, wealthy … and Republican.

It is likely that Christine O’Donnell, too right for Delaware, will lose to her Democratic rival in November, and this undermines the possibility of gaining a Republican Senate. Other like-minded, novice politicians have also displaced consolidated Republican candidates in other states. This alarming phagocytosis from the right is forcing the historically conservative party to tilt even further into a political stunt that may end up alienating moderate voters. That is now the great hope for the Democrats.