Races. Or bronco games, whatever you like to do. Americans are not ideological which is, sadly, why ideological appeals dont always resonate with americans. If you in this room represented, if you are a firm representation of the american body politic, wed have no problems. Youre not, im very sorry to say, and neither am i. Ideology is about ideas, politics is about winning elections. And you only win elections in the aggregate as divorced from any individual election where anything can happen. But when you take a look at this great nation of ours with 435 congressional districts and 100 senate seats, in order to be a Majority Party you have to put together a majority coalition. This is a twoparty system. Its going to stay a twoparty system for a long time to come. No minor party is going to emerge and suddenly displace one of the two major parties, the democrats or republicans. Not in my judgment anytime soon. You remember ross perot. Ross perot lost that election, 1992, helping bill clinton get elected. And he got Something Like 20 of the popular vet. And vote. And he got zero Electoral College votes. Zero. Why . Because our constitution is biased in favor of a twoparty system. You have to win a state to get its Electoral College votes, and ross perot did not win one single state. And his party help me out, what was the name of the ross perot party . Reform. The reform party, thank you. The reform party sought to survive the failed ross perot president ial attempt and hung around for a while but, ultimately, dissipated. Theres an old expression what if you gave a party and nobody came . A more contemporary paraphrase might be what if you gave a tea party and less than a plurality came . And the answer would be that that plurality that did get more votes than any other party would be the governing party. And its all about being the governing party in this country of ours. I like so much of what ted cruz stands for. I like his courage, i like his principles. I dont like all of his tactics ask all of husband strategies. His strategies. And the holding obamas feet to the fire because any rational person would compromise on a continuing resolution, that strategy failed. Because obama is not a compromiser, and hes not politically rational. Hes obstinate. Hes not going to cave, and he certainly wasnt going to give away obamacare. His singular achievement. Talking about ted cruz, as i said, there are 435 separate congressional districts in the United States of america, each one with its own character, each one with its own demographics. In how many of those 435 congressional districts if ted cruz were running for a house seat and how many of those 435 congressional districts do you think he could win . Somebody throw out a number. [inaudible] how many . 230. 230. It would be a miracle if he could win in 60, in my judgment. Of those 435 congressional districts, maybe 50 of them are competitive. Maybe 50 of them are up for grabs. That means you have the other 385 districts will be voting solidly for either a democrat or a republican. And i dont mean either or. Theyre already committed to one party or the other. And that governing electoral heart in the majority in the u. S. House will be determined by which of the two major parties get which of those 50 swing districts. And if you want to be, if you aspire to be a Major Political party that governs in this country, you cannot be pure u. S. Or dogmatic. Purist or dog dogmatic. I wish that werent true. I wish a majority of americans shared my vision. I wont go so far as to say my dogmatism, but my fundamental principles. But they dont. The Republican Party is not a minor party, but its a Minority Party in the United States. With about 30 of americans calling themselves republicans. The Democratic Party is also a Minority Party. With a few more than 30 calling themself democrats. And then we have all of those independent, unaffiliated voters. Elections are determined on the basis of who can win the swing voters. You can win an election based on platitudes. Barack obama demonstrated that with his hope and change platitude. But you cant govern effectively on the basis of platitudes, and thats been demonstrated by this president who is perhaps the worst governing president in the history of the country. He has no concept of how to govern. [applause] george will yesterday toward the end of the program in answering a question along the lines of is there any hope for the country, and george said when he talked about the American Public, that the American Public still stands for those fundamental values, especially freedom. But invoking this collective notion of the American Public as so many people do from both parties, you hear some democrat stand up advocating this, that or the other thing and then invoking we, the people, believe that this should be. Well, can people . Which people . Even though barack obama won, he wasnt elected unanimously. An awful lot of people voted against him. And a republican will stand up in colorado and say we, the people of colorado, want such and such. Well, which people in colorado . Theres a majority of democrats in each house of colorados congress, the colorado legislature, that is, and a democrat president. Colorado is split. There is no such thing as we, the people. As if americans all agreed. Weve never all agreed. We didnt even agree at time of the revolution. There were plenty of loyalists to the king. When the constitution was crafted and when it needed to be ratified, you needed to get the consent of those 13 colonies to ratify the constitution, the 13 new states. And they were split right up the middle on slavery. Southern states, the slave states and the northern states. So the compromise was the constitution was a compromise on slavery because it couldnt be resolved. It was later resolved, oh, 80 years from then from that point during the civil war as a consequence of that. But if those members of the Continental Congress werent able to get together and compromise on the issue of slavery by kicking the can down the road, wed have never ratified the constitution. The Republican Party, as i said earlier, is a Minority Party, but a major Minority Party. And the tea party element is a minority of the republican coalition. And within that tea party element, theyre not monolithic. Theyve talk talked ive talo dozens, hundreds of Tea Party People who disagree with other Tea Party People. As well it should with. But on dozens of other thicks, we things we agree on the vast majority of principles. Its the politics and the strategy where we disagree. Ayn rand once said if youve got a fundamental conflict, you and someone else, the first thing you should do is check your premises. Well, whats the fundamental premise that this topic, as i see it, is based on . What will be a successful strategy for winning . And that premise is where does the American Public sit . Is the hearn public ready to the American Public ready to embrace uncompromised Tea Party Principles . And im sorry to say, no. Donald rumsfeld said you go to war with the army you have. Well, you go to the election with the American Public that we have. And the American Public is not ideological, and theyre soft. I like to believe theyre a rightcenter country, but were not as rightcenter a country, in my view, as we were when Ronald Reagan was elected. That was a wonderful time. But reagan was elected on the heels of a failed presidency, jimmy carter. With americans held hostage in iran, with the soviet union on a roll, with doubledigit inflation and interest rates. It was time for change, and thats why people were willing to change with Ronald Reagan. Ironically, barack obama was elected on the heels of what the public perceived to be a failed presidency. And a great damage to the republican brand. This business about the republican establishment is a great overstatement. Theres no such thing as a republican establishment, an only only nip tent republican establishment. Those states have different characters and 435 different congressional districts. In many of those congressional tickets, a rock solid reaganite conservative can win, and thats great. But in some of those congressional districts and in some of those states only a more compromising, softer republican can possibly win. Im sorely hoping that mike coffman is able to win, carry that sixth district, get reelected in november. [applause] i think the world of mike. Im very familiar with his voting record. Its solidly conservative. I should note, however, that mike coffman is a traitor, a traitor to the United States. Thats what something called the Tea Party Leadership fund has said. Theyve branded mike coffman as a traitor because mike coffman voted to jettison that losing republican strategy about a government shutdown. Other traitors, names youll recognize because theyre in this room. Congressman scott tipton from colorado was a traitor. Corey gardener was a traitor according to the Tea Party Leadership fund. Theyre not traitors, that was a wad strategy. We can agree or disagree about the meritses of the strategy, but its not traitorous. This kind of language is destructive. Its selfdestructive. In order to be a Majority Party, we have to recognize that you fight each battle based on the rules of the battlefield in those congressional districts in those states. And in some places you have to pull your punches, because thats what politics is all about. William rusher, former publisher of national review, a solid conservative, a longtime friend of mine who died several years ago, he said politicians will always disappoint. Of course they will. Republican party is an imperfect party as far as im concerned ideologically. But im a partisan republican because i believe in limited government, constitutionalism, individual liberty, many other things that most republicans agree on. But i also recognize that in some races identify got to support ive got to support a republican whos not up to by standards because if i were to run in some of those races, i couldnt win either. Thats the reality of politics, and thats why its essential that the tea party recognize its limitations. And pull together to form a majority coalition. Now, the Republican Party has already been pulled to the right by the tea party, and im flighted to observe that im delighted to observe that. Take you back to 2006. Bush was still president. In that last Midterm Election in his second term, republicans got murdered. We lost our majority control of the United States congress. We did because a lot of socalled blue dog democrats won in districts that had elected republicans, in swing districts. Blue dog democrats. More conservative democrats. Even though theres a leftwing element to the Democratic Party, moveon. Org, that crowd, they learned their lesson from the 2000 president ial election when Something Like 6 of the people in florida voted for ralph nader for president. Giving george bush be enough Electoral College votes to carry florida. A lot fewer people voted for Green Party Candidates on the left side. After 2000 they learned their election they learned their lesson. And they also demonstrated that in 2006 when they supported blue dog democrats. Not leftwig democrats leftwing democrats who were able to give the democrats the majority in the house. After that devastating loss in 2006, another loss in 2008 with obama, republicans made a comeback in 2010. Tea Party Candidates won in those same swing districts where blue dog democrats had won. I was delighted to see that. But tea Party Candidates cant win in every district. So the tea party has succeeded in shifting the Republican Party to the right and congress, this is not your fathers olds mobile or congress, this is a much more conservative congress than we had during the Bush Administration thanks to the tea party. But that Perfect Tea Party candidate is not the perfect candidate for every congressional district. Thank you. [applause] thank you, mike. All right. Thank you, mike, and thanks to our panel. Im going to start off with a question, and if you could all take a couple minutes or pass if the answer has been provided by someone else, in your opinion. The tea party is discussed as a noun as though it is an entity that one may be, may join and be a member. Many candidates, i know i often get asked, im not a candidate, but i get asked all the time are you a member of the tea party, and for the life of me, i wouldnt know where to sign up to be one if i wanted to which raises the question, can that be defined . Is it just a general statement about a movement if and what concerns ought there be about who gets to define i mean, mike, you read a memo from an organization that uses tea party in its organizational title. There are several of those. There are dozens of those. And the, you know, the difficulty is, you know, some Renegade Group could take the Tea Party Man r banner, i supposes, and say we represent the essence of the tea party and malign it. The medias always looking at the big rally. Theyre trying to find the one guy whos got the racist statement to put on national news. So my question is what exactly is this group . Is it a movement . And if its some big, nebulous theme, is it capable or possible of putting forward actual strategies, actual proposals . I take a crack at that . Ill take a crack at that as probably the closest thing on this stage to a cardcarrying member of the tea party. And its always frustrated me, the media at some point was trying to figure out what to call this thing, and they started calling it capital t, Capital Party as if it was a party. I think it does a disservice. Its not, its not a partisanaffiliated thing. Its a social movement. And its a social Movement Based on a simple set of values. You wade into any tea party crowd at any event, and they will tell you that theyre for individual freedom, constitutionallylimited government and fiscal responsibility. And no one told them to do that, thats just how they selforganized. I think today the tea partys probably morphing into something else. It started off as a protest movement. We became a get out the Vote Movement in 2010, and its much broader today. Here in colorado, as you guys would know, its the liberty movement. And its a mashup of, you know, old school conservatives, ron Paul Millennials and tea partiers and all of these things. And they agree on a couple things that really matter. They disagree on a lot of other stuff. But i think that what the Tea Party Really is, is the tip of the spear on a fundamental shift in american politics. Its no longer really it no longer is really a twoparty system. Its not the dnc and the rnc, its something that is more empowering of individuals. People have better information. They dont rely on the New York Times anymore. Or i know tea party moms in f who have in florida who have larger facebook pages than the local gop. Think about the marginal cost of organizing now and how that changes everything, and i would also argue that those values are not, theyre not far right. A lot of tea partiers are staunchly in that growing class of independents that are sort of fed up with the partisanship on both sides. You can say its not a twoparty system anymore, and that might be your vision for the future, but it is a twoparty system. After the last election, we were governed by either republicans or democrats. In some states we were governed by republicans. After the next election, we will be governed by democrats or republicans. And ideological groups like the tea party, if they want to have an influence in governing, they will adhere themselves to one of those two parties, because well be governed by one of those two parties. And if the tea party were to break off and form a party of it own, it would be marginalized. It might get more support than the between party or the american constitutionalist party, but be it has no prospect of being, in my view, a Majority Party because, im sorry to say, that the vast majority of americans arent up to the rigors of libertarianism or tea partyism. Well, what let me address that for just a second. I think that if you look at the Majority Party today, its independents, not democrats or republicans. But we are in the process [applause] i would argue that the Republican Party is actually ours, small r republican. Were not leaving the party. Those values are ours x its the people that have abandoned those basic principles that need to either find a better home or rediscover what it is they believe. Well, and thats the point ive been making. [applause] when, this is about revitalizing the Republican Party. When