What Republicans Have Gained Following the Shutdown

AP reports suggested that the TEA Party movement has crippled the crippling influence of Big Business over the Republican Party.

It's about time. No special interest, whether Big Business, or Big Labor, should be able to collude with Big Government and create big deficits. Of course, this analysis is not unique. Scott Rasmussen, the sponsor of Rassmussen Reports, (and a polling system which the Daily Kos has critically appraised as a Republican shill) reported that the disconnect between voters and Washington is much greater than the differences between Democrats and Republicans in Washington.

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Romney's "47%" remark triggered this disconnect inexorably. Yet the differences which Republican voters have with the national party was the greater, according to Rassmussen, because the party's base has tended to view the GOP as Pro-Business as opposed to Pro-Liberty, Free Markets, and Constitution. Corporate welfare, Medicare Part D, and a spending spree unending under George W. Bush have confirmed these unsightly perceptions about the national GOP. With the growing TEA Party movement within the Republican Party, voters have found a means of not just expressing their disaffection with Washington, but also to break the hold of Big Business on the GOP. This schism was inevitable, with its seeds rooted in George W. Bush's attempt at amnesty as opposed to enforcement in 2006-2007. The Republican Party could not hold onto a platform of limited government and individual liberty while playing the "pro-business" card and making government bigger. While the Republican caucus did not organize appropriately, while leaders in the House and the Senate refused to establish common ground for successful legislative tactics, the government shutdown has galvanized as opposed to discouraged the conservatives in Congress. President Obama has wasted what political capital by holding the line against defunding, then delaying Obamacare's individual mandate and refusing to repeal the medical device tax, which Republicans and Democrats in Congress oppose. Even Minnesota's US Senator Al Franken has sponsored a non-binding resolution to repeal the tax. President Obama may have "won" the shutdown fight in the short term, but he has not beaten down the anti-establishment rebellion in the House or the US Senate. President Obama entered his second term with slightly less political capital than George W. Bush in 2004. While Bush won slightly less of the popular vote, he took away more electoral votes than he had won in 2000. Bush stumped to privatize social security, and he failed; yet when he lost both chambers of Congress in 2006, he still managed to instigate a troop surge in 2007. President Obama is saddled with his own legacy, the Affordable Care Act, which even his own leader-colleagues have called "unacceptable" due to its poor rollout. Former Press Secretary John Gibbs also called the Obamacare Medicare exchanges for what they were: disastrous. While the media will portray Obama as the undivided winner, in the long run the Republican Party has asserted new muscle, taking its cues from its radical, grassroots origins. Instead of agreeing to spend $50 billion over budget as opposed to $100 billion, the TEA Party caucus has forced Washington legislators to cut spending. President Obama attempted to force pre-sequester spending back onto the Republicans, but the GOP allowed for a debt ceiling rise and continued funding, without ending the sequester cuts. The Democrats will never be able to restore that funding again. Not only that, but President Obama's second term is already winding down with a massive, historical repudiation awaiting him in 2014. Obamacare will roll out as planned, to his detriment. And Republicans will at least admit that they did what they could to stop the train wreck. Granted, Republicans in moderate to purple districts (as in California) will face a growing backlash, the red states gone redder will likely send more Republicans to Congress to reinforce the staunch, anti-spending, pro-capitalist, pro-liberty factions in Washington. And the media, for all its hype and suffrage, could not amass enough rage to pin the blame squarely on Republicans. President Obama has suffered the lowest approval ratings of his presidency following the shutdown showdown.