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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: bentway who wrote (550974)	2/19/2010 1:52:51 AM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1575064

Oops! Sen. Hatch Gets Teabagger Treatment At Town Hall Meeting by Steve Singiser Thu Feb 18, 2010 at 11:22:04 AM PST Senator Orrin Hatch returned home during the recess this week to Utah to hold a town hall. He returned home with a message for the teabaggers in his home state. Apparently, they had a little message for the Senator, as well (emphasis mine): Sen. Orrin Hatch has a message for the Tea Party movement: Work with the GOP or see conservatives lose more ground. "If we fractionalize the Republican Party, we are going to see more liberals elected," Hatch warned a crowd of 300 at a town meeting at American Fork Junior High School on Wednesday night, amid jeers from Tea Party supporters. One begins to wonder if this is going to be the next phase of the "tea party" movement. Having spent last August excoriating Democrats in town hall meetings around the country, are Republicans the next victims of organized teabagger wrath? It is easy to imagine that Hatch will not be alone in enduring the scorn of the teabaggers. It must be said, however, that Hatch was not necessarily in a conciliatory mood with the teabagger contingent. In fact, Hatch blamed them for the defeat of Oregon Senator Gordon Smith in 2008, thus placing the man he called "the most liberal man in the Senate" (Jeff Merkley) into office. Indeed, a Constitution Party candidate did seize 5.2% of the vote, allowing Merkley to win with just 49% of the vote. Of course, it is worth noting that the 2008 cycle did predate the bulk of the organized tea party movement, as well. It is also worth noting that Hatch's entreaties appeared to fall on mostly deaf ears: Hatch's critics said he was not interested in listening to them. "I think you guys are as out of touch as you can get," said Sarah Beeson, of American Fork. Hatch, she said, appeared more interested in raising money for candidates than listening to what the people had to say. Beeson had been a state GOP delegate, but is now disaffected from the Republican Party and considers herself an independent. We have already seen teabagger wrath deny the Republicans a winnable Congressional race, when their advocacy for Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman eventually handed the ancestrally Republican New York 23rd to Democrat Bill Owens last November. Is it possible that we will see repeats of NY-23 all over the Election 2010 map? Few in the traditional media seem to be laying odds on this outcome, but Wednesday night's Hatch town hall tells us that teabagger fealty to the GOP can hardly be considered a given.