Progress Michigan: Why does the Tea Party want America to fail?

Michigan Republicans aka Tea Party activists were out at the state Capitol yesterday trying to polish the ick of defeat on health care repeal at a press conference marked mostly by an incredibly sycophantic news media who let the larger story of political partisanship blow right by them.

While Tea Party activist Wendy Day was there to provide non-partisan bona fides to the press, it was two Republican lawmakers who did most of the talking and made it clear that the failed drive to put health care on the November ballot was mostly about partisan politics.

Day’s volunteers fell way short of the 381,000 signatures needed to place the health care repeal measure on the November ballot even though they had the official support of the Michigan Republican Party, which provided petition gathering locations at local party offices.

But for Republicans like state Sen. Wayne Kuipers and State Rep. Tom McMillan-Days’ featured speakers at the presser-constitutional democracy was beside the point and the five-month effort was well worth the effort. “It’s an election year,” McMillan told reporters. “We have 150,000 to 175,000 people we can leverage.”

Leverage for what? Well, to defeat Democrats, of course, and make sure America’s health care reform fails by any means necessary.

Kuipers, who is running to replace the retiring Vern Ehlers in Congress Rep. Pete Hoekstra, revealed the kind of very un-Ehlers like partisanship that he hopes to bring to Washington, DC in the next Congress. It looks familiar to anyone witnessing the gridlock we already see from Senate Republicans. Kuipers indicated we can expect more of if the GOP takes control of the U.S. House. He admitted repealing health care was unlikely in the next Congress. But Kuipers outlined for reporters how he expects Republicans to overcome the legal obstacles—by refusing to fund health care reform and starving it to death despite it being the law of the land.

The Tea Party calls this a “war”. And for once they have it right. It’s a war against American democracy. But where are the war correspondents?

Fight for democracy over at www.progressmichigan.org

CORRECTION: The blog has been corrected to note that the seat Wayne Kuipers is running for is currently held by Pete Hoekstra. Thanks to the eagle-eyed Madison for catching the mistake.