The reaction to \u201cthe hug\u201d was delayed.\u00a0 At the time it was considered ritualistic, appropriate, and understandable.\u00a0 But as the Tea Party movement gained momentum, Crist became a target of right-wing Republicans.\u00a0 The fact that he would support the stimulus program; would appear on stage with the president of the United States, and would not resist a tepid hug was more than Sarah Palin, Tea Party members, and many other Republicans could take.\u00a0 Crist went from the short-list of potential GOP nominees for president in 2012 to an outcast.<\/p>\n

Concurrently, Crist\u2019s main opponent for the Republican nomination, former Florida House speaker Marco Rubio, began showing the video as a means of questioning Crist\u2019s GOP credentials \u00a0\u00a0It\u2019s all been downhill for Crist since then, at least within the Republican Party.\u00a0 His 30% lead over Rubio evaporated; Rubio then had his own double-digit lead, and Crist was constantly on the defensive.\u00a0 His promising political career was potentially doomed.<\/p>\n

However, Crist saw that being unpopular with the GOP did not mean being unpopular with the broader electorate.\u00a0 He had plenty of support; just not necessarily in the Republican Party.\u00a0 So, on the last day of April, the governor threw off the shackles of the Republican Party and announced that he was running for the Senate as an independent.<\/p>\n

No sooner did he do so than he was once again in the lead in the polls.\u00a0 Actually, he had not personally become more popular, rather the group that was being polled was the wide base of Florida voters, rather than just those who were likely voters in the GOP primary.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Perhaps Crist will recover from the Tea Party attacks.\u00a0 But the shadow of Sarah Palin now looms over her \u201cqueen-maker,\u201d John McCain.\u00a0 He too faces opposition in his race to retain the Republican nomination for the Senate in Arizona.\u00a0 The one-time self-styled maverick went into chameleon mode.\u00a0 He no longer wanted to move beyond \u201cdon\u2019t ask-don\u2019t tell;\u201d he opposed meaningful federal immigration reform; he reversed himself as the leader of GOP bi-partisanship by calling the concept dead, even as President Obama reached further tothe accommodate Republicans.\u00a0 Finally, he attempted to re-write history by declaring that he never was a maverick.<\/p>\n

In the case of Florida, the remaining moderate Republicans may get the last laugh as they join independents in electing Charlie Crist in November.\u00a0 But Arizona is more ominous; either the state will get a retro-McCain who may finally win Rush Limbaugh\u2019s approval, or the Republicans will nominate someone even further to the right.<\/p>\n

The Tea Party is barely a year old and like all third parties, it is paving its own path.\u00a0 Third parties have never won a presidential election, but they have wreaked havoc for other candidates up and down both parties\u2019 tickets.\u00a0 Predicting what the impact of the Tea Party will be in 2010 and beyond is dicey.\u00a0 They could successfully take over the Republican Party and win some key elections, positioning them to dictate who the GOP presidential candidate will be in 2012.\u00a0 On the other hand, they could be trounced by millions of Americans who dislike extreme politics of any sort.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the good news in this for progressives?\u00a0 It\u2019s that we can continue to be ourselves and let the internecine fighting among Republicans or former Republicans continue.\u00a0 We sound reasonable and moderate by comparison.\u00a0 We have a president who still has long coat tails and some outstanding members of Congress.\u00a0 Let\u2019s go about our business and slowly but surely advance our agenda.\u00a0 Generally noise in politics is bad; the Republican Party is leading the decibel race; let\u2019s keep it that way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On April 30, Florida governor Charlie Crist, a candidate for the U.S. Senate, changed his political affiliation from Republican to Independent.\u00a0 This move is<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2489,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[162,16],"tags":[425,426,326],"yoast_head":"\n