Republicans Need New Leadership in the Senate

I was disgusted to hear the whining of Senator Lindsey Graham and Trent Lott about the Tea Party candidates who lost on Tuesday. In Delaware and Nevada, we nominated candidates who were too conservative, they said. If we don’t moderate as a party, they were saying, we can forget about the 2012 presidential elections.

Like they have any credibility. These are the people who were backing Arlen Specter and Charlie Crist – democrats with an R attached to their name – for now. And now we’re supposed to believe that we need to nominate a Gerald Ford for President – a Ronald Reagan simply wouldn’t work. Give me a break!

Here’s what I think of you Senate Republicans. I think you undermined our party in this election. The story is trickling out how you pulled back from supporting these more conservative candidates and instead poured millions into the losing cause of Carly Fiorina in California. And then in Alaska, instead of supporting the party’s nominee, Joe Miller, the ads you bought didn’t promote Miller but rather attacked the Democrat in the race which ended up driving votes to Lisa Murkowski.

Had you taken the money you wasted on Fiorina, who lost by 9 points, and spent it promoting Ken Buck in Colorado, who lost by the slimmest of margins, and Dino Rossi in Washington, who will probably lose in another corrupt Democrat recount, and actually supported Joe Miller in Alaska rather than propping up Murkowski by allowing her to retain her committee positions and crafting ads that would redound to her favor, we may have had three additional solid conservatives in the Senate.

But no, your strategy is that you want your committee chairmanships. I’ll tell you my strategy – it is to rein in this bloated government, something we have learned we can’t count on the Murkowskis, the Grahams, the Specters, the Crists, and the McCains to help us accomplish.