Social Conservatives Spar With Tea Party, Gay GOP Groups

[sufrommich]

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Email Comments 794 Social conservatives are hitting back Tuesday at a recently released letter by a coalition of Tea Party and gay Republican groups encouraging incoming Republican legislators to forgo a lofty social agenda in place of one focused on fiscal conservatism.

"Social issues should be at the very top of the list of priorities for the new Congress, along with sensible fiscal policies," Concerned Women for America leader Penny Nance responded in her own letter. "I'd like to know which one -- support for the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, eliminating taxpayer dollars from funding embryonic stem cell research, or defunding Planned Parenthood -- the signers of the GOProud letter have a problem with."

On Monday, a letter signed by the leaders of 16 Tea Party groups and GOProud was sent to incoming Republican leaders asking them to announce a cease fire on their pursuit of social and cultural issues.

"On behalf of limited-government conservatives everywhere, we write to urge you and your colleagues in Washington to put forward a legislative agenda in the next Congress that reflects the principles of the tea party movement," the letter read. "This election was not a mandate for the Republican Party, nor was it a mandate to act on any social issue, nor should it be interpreted as a political blank check... Already, there are Washington insiders and special interest groups that hope to co-opt the Tea Party's message and use it to push their own agenda - particularly as it relates to social issues."

But the pro-life contingent of the GOP doesn't appear to agree with this interpretation of the elections.

"Americans voted overwhelmingly for both social and fiscal conservatives, and it would be unwise to throw social policies to the wayside and snub the voters who sent a strong message to the new Congress that they want both pro-life and fiscally conservative policies. In our post-election poll, when asked to name the biggest issue facing future generations, 62 percent of voters said it is the moral decline of our nation," Nance wrote, referring to an internal poll. "There was a net 52-seat pro-life gain in the House of Representatives, an unprecedented statement that voters reject taxpayer-funded abortion and want a more conservative, pro-life legislature moving forward. Now is not the time for Republicans to back away from their own party's foundational social issues."

More reporting from the frontlines of the GOP civil war:




http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/16/social-conservatives-tea-party-agenda_n_784139.html:smoke:

[alanquatermass]

1. Confused: I always thought the Tea Party's fiscal agenda was basically a smokescreen...

-- for, y'know, racism.

In other words, I always thought the TP was actually ANIMATED by a twisted social agenda... but now here they are mixing it up with conservatives who are advocating a stronger...

social agenda.

Huh???

WTF?

[sufrommich]

2. Nothing confusing about it really. The Tea Party was an

astro turf creation bought and paid for by GOP power brokers who quickly lost control of it's direction. The people who signed the letter are the lackeys of the power brokers. The socially conservative teabaggers just realized that they have been had.

[alanquatermass]

3. Got it -- but the question THEN becomes...

-- if GOP power brokers did indeed, as you say, "quickly lose control of the tea party's direction," doesn't that suggest that the Tea Party movement quickly took on a life of its own?

In other words, the Tea Party movement quickly became something IT WASN'T INTENDED TO BE.

Which would suggest that for the majority of Tea Partiers it really WAS all about fiscal reform (for better or for worse) and NOT bigotry and racism.

And if THAT part is true...

Then weren't we, the progressives and centrists of this country, perhaps not a wee bit INACCURATE in our assessment of them as just a bunch of racists and goons?

Because I was one of the people calling them that (and sometimes at the top of my voice -- just ask my neighbors, LOL!)

[sufrommich]

4. Where does anything I posted suggest that this would be

"proof" that the teabaggers were really a fiscal movement? Did you see the signs from those rallies? Were they concerned about the deficit before Obama was elected? The republicans tried to astro turf a movement created to check any financial or health reforms from the Obama administration, instead they got crowds of social conservatives and racists showing up.

[alanquatermass]

5. Sorry for misunderstanding... but I suppose what I meant to ask was...

-- if as you say, the Repubs were originally trying to form a group intended to check any financial or health reforms, but "instead they got crowds of social conservatives and racists showing up" -- and if those social conservatives became what we now call the Tea Party...

That of course means that the Tea Party consists of many, many Social Conservatives.

So if THAT'S the case...

Help me make sense of your headline SOCIAL CONSERVATIVES SPAR WITH TEA PARTY.

Why on earth are social conservatives sparring with a group of... social conservatives?