Republican Andrew Roraback’s delicate dance with his party’s conservative wing took a sharp turn Thursday, when a well-known Connecticut tea party activist issued a scathing denunciation of the 5th congressional district candidate.
“ We have recently learned that Andrew Roraback’s first major move after winning the Republican nomination for the 5th district, was to launch a cease & desist action at 5th district TV stations, thus trying to explicitly distance himself from the Conservative Tea Party Movement,” wrote Bob MacGuffie of Fairfield, who produces the Right Principles blog and has been active in the tea party movement for more than two years.
“Message to Andy Roraback: your action doesn’t just distance yourself from the tea party or the Ryan budget – you’ve just disparaged and walked away from your Party’s base!” MacGuffie wrote.
“If you won’t fight for the solid principles of limited government, fiscal responsibility and free-market economics, just what are you doing in the Republican Party? These principles aren’t qualifications; they’re prerequisites. In other words they’re the founding principles of the Republican Party and the ones on which the candidates are supposed to run.”
Roraback, a state senator currently locked in a tough fight with Democrat Elizabeth Esty in the 5th Congressional district, said by email Thursday night that he has always been “faithful to the Republican party’s core principles of smaller government, individual responsibility and respect for the Constitution — and I have a long record to prove it.
“Breaking gridlock and finding solutions will require the ability to find common ground as Americans. That must be highest priority for all of us,” Roraback said.
Esty has branded Roraback a tea party Republican and has tried to align him with Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan and other national GOP leaders.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is running a television ad linking Roraback to tea party conservatives in such as Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann, and alleging that he backs Ryan’s plan to overhaul Medicare.
Roraback has threatened legal action against the DCCC. He identifies himself as a moderate New England Republican has repeatedly expressed his opposition to Ryan’s Medicare plan.
And that, according to MacGuffie, is the problem. “It’s clear you’re neither guided by conservative Republican principles, nor aligned with any of its major constituency blocks. A big part of a congressman’s job is to fight for your principles and the interests of the average citizen, even and especially when your opponent disparages and attacks them in TV advertising.”
MacGuffie concluded with some advice: “So Andy, reach out, close your eyes and take a few steps. Somewhere out there are Democrats, Liberals, Libertarians and others to whom you can pander and appease in a futile and desperate search for a constituency. Perhaps your outreach will touch one of them and you’ll find someone to whom you are relevant and with whom you can align…..because it’s certainly not the conservative grassroots base: You just walked out on us.”
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34 Responses to Tea Party Leader To Roraback: “You Just Walked Out On Us”
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As a Tea Party loyalist since day 1 I have to agree with Bob, Andrew could have worded the description of himself without knocking the Tea Party to the mat. Also worth mentioning many Tea Party members have become mainstreamed and volunteer on local boards and RTC’s in the CTGOP and are very reasonable patriotic citizens.
Ooooh…Oohh…fight! I’ll take some peanuts and a beer! The TEA party has taken over local government and some state offices as well and they are doing their best to effect the change. TEA party activist know power at the local level is stronger. The only poll that will matter is the poll in November. And make no mistake – the TEA Party will come out in droves as their only desire is to vote Obama out of office. Everyone interested in keeping Obama in the white house must make every effort they can to vote for Obama and a new House and Senate make-up in the Democratic version. Not Mitt or Paul – Not Romney or Ryan – Not now – Not ever!
It totally eludes me why ANYBODY would want to retain Barack Obama as our President. He has been more destructive to the American nation than any terrorist organization. If there was any doubt before….the fact that he went before the entire world and lied at the United Nations this week about the cause of the deaths of 4 US citizens in Libya is proof that he is unfit to serve another 4 years.
Though Sarah Palin would have made a wonderful President?
Anderson: Picking Palin was a huge mistake by the R’s – she should have been vetted properly and thoroughy. That being said, McCain in the White House with Palin as his VP would have been better than to have an America-hater in the White House. At least patriots would have been in office and I doubt Palin could do worse than Obama when it comes to maintaining US integrity and respect throughout the world.
those who live on the government dole, such as undeserving welfare recipients and public sector unions, as well as 95% of the black voting popultation, all want Obama to win. They won’t admit to it but their motto should be that of Jeremiah Wright: America be damned – as long as I get mine. And they complain about the greed of others – such hypocrisy
Andrew these are not ordinary times. The country is being taken over from within and if you don’t get it then your doomed for defeat. When have you seen the democrats compromise on anything in the past 6 years?
The TEA party has it right when it comes to government policy.
Bravo Bob!
Conservatives will not go along with Roraback simply because he has an R attached to his name. Roraback will not win because his party’s base will not be there for him. The CT GOP must learn that they can not nominate liberals and expect the base to get in line simply because someone has an R attached to their name.
The system that allows a Republican for whom 67% of his own party voted against in a primary to now represent that party as its congressional candidate is pure lunacy. Other states have provisions for two-way runoffs if no candidate receives less than 50% of the primary vote. Why is the Connecticut GOP so far out of touch and out of tune with the sweet sound of conservative victory being played all over America?
In a word? Control.
And remote control by the likes of… hacks (looking for a civil word for the POS, so I’ll use his own) like Chris Healy.
Message to Andy Roraback: your action doesn’t just distance yourself from the tea party or the Ryan budget – you’ve just disparaged and walked away from your Party’s base!” MacGuffie wrote.
So…..I guess Bob will be holding his nose and voting for Esty….she’s the better alternative???? Better think twice about what you really want….
Tea Party is Barack Obama’s best friend. It is why he will win.
Obama’s agenda was bitch-slapped BIG time in 2010! Why do you think he will fare better in 2012? Huh?
Palin: he’ll fare better because of his ‘coalition of the working poor’. He caters to recipients and promises more handouts, while promising to make the successful pay. And if you think by successful, he means only millionnaires, I’ve got a bridge for sale.
He caters to public sector unions, the beneficiaries of his ‘stimulus’ package.
The votes are starting to add up. Recipients plus public sector workers, PLUS 95% of blacks according to recent polls (speaking of racism), and the possibility of his winning a second term go up.
Maybe context would be good in the reporting here. What exactly did Andrew Roraback do regarding the cease and desist that has so offended the “Tea Party” (read: Koch Brothers) wing of the GOP?
Too bad the pipsqueaks don’t follow the news.
["I guess Bob will be holding his nose and voting for Esty….she’s the better alternative????"]
YES!!!!! Firstly it would be easier to beat an incumbent Esty in the 2014 general than to beat an incumbent Roraback in a 2014 GOP primary. Secondly if conservatives vote for Esty it will send a loud message to the GOP establishment that they can not nominate liberals and expect conservatives to fall in line simply because someone has an R attached to their name.
Esty does not compromise the Republican brand of being a conservative party – Roraback does. It is not worth damaging our brand to win one out of 435 seats. Many conservatives and Tea Partiers will be voting for Esty. That is the only way the GOP will listen to us. Even if only 5% of conservatives and Tea Partiers vote for Esty that will be enough to deny Roraback a victory.
A TRUE Republican would have commented to this video question: http://youtu.be/SobQpDUxD2A
in the following manner:
I’ve never attended a Tea Party rally but I agree with the principles of limited government, free markets and lower taxes. It’s the traditional Republican values. I’m a traditional Republican.
The word, “reasonable” may become Roraback’s Waterloo. And this guy’s a lawyer? Come on …puhleeeeeze!!!
So – Once again conservative Republicans have to take AIM to decide in WHICH FOOT to shoot themselves?
Unlike Obama and his dysfunctional administration on the terrorist attack in Benghazi, right? They apparently can’t even see the barn, let alone hit it.
Wouldn’t want to admit just prior to election, that your foreign affairs strategy is as harmful as your economic policies. After all, this IS the most transparent administration in history, right?
Ask bin Laden if they can hit anything.
so Obama has one signature achievement – giving the order to kill Obama (reluctantly, if the reports are accuarte) – and he’s worthy of a second term? Desperation is dripping from the liberal posts
A well deserved nut-shot.
Good luck, Andrew.
Don’t forget the support you got from Jerry. Maybe he can make it all good.
THANK GOD that there is a REAL Tea Party congressional candidate running in the 3rd district! Wayne Winsley is proof that the American dream is alive and well. If you don’t know Wayne, I urge you to google “Who is Wayne Winsley”. You will be thrilled with what you see.
Hundreds of Tea Party folk from all over Connecticut have alread rallied to Winsley’s support. His slogan, We All Win With Winsley, is as true as it is catchy.
Message to Bob MacGuffie and the CT Tea Party movement. The Tea Party is not and has never been the base of the Republican faction of the socialist Republicrat regime. Moderate socialism is the Republican base. Morevoer the Ryan budget is unconstitutional. It supports keeping medicare on the federal level. Doing so is unconstitutional considering it is a regulation of healthcare. Regulating healthcare is not an enumerated power granted to Congress in Article I Section VIII of the Constitution. It is therefore a power reserved to the states or to the people per the 10th Amendment and is consequently unconstitutional on the federal level. Ryan’s plan only continues the usurpation of the people’s Constitutional rights. It’s truly astounding how obsessed the CT Tea Party movement is with candidates, solely because there is an “R” after their names, including Roraback and Linda McMahon, who have never shown any support for the Tea party movement. It’s the political version of battered wife syndrome. The Tea party movement will be best served by disassociating themselves from Republicans as they have Democrats by uniting as unaffiliated Constitutionalists.
More of you jump on the bandwagon every day.
When do we hear the big announcement about the new third party?
That is the point of your message, right?
There’s a third choice when voting, and that’s to vote for no one. Esty would leave the country to go bankrupt rather than buck her party’s orthodoxy and actually stand to reform Medicare and Social Security, and Roraback would rather flip-off the 68% of primary voters who chose to support another candidate so as not to be associated wit th tea party. Both lack the foresight necessary to qualify them to represent CT-5 in congress. As for Paul Ryan’s Plan? It was meant to be a starting point, to begin a conversation. Rather than converse, the Democrats choose to disrupt the class and do nothing. That’s very juvenile, but that’s who we are dealing with in Washington and Hartford, just a bunch of ill-behaved brats with no discipline.
Bravo for Roraback, a real republican.Forget that Tea Party nonsense about small government, free markets blah,blah,blah.What they don’t believe in is deliberative democratic government and until we rid Washington of every single one of them and elect Republicans with some backbone like Roraback we will continue to see this endless stonewalling.
“[...] until we rid Washington of every single one of them and elect Republicans [Democrats] with some backbone like Roraback [...]”
Democrats. You want Democrats. Just say you want Democrats.
If you want to distance yourself from fiscal conservatism as Andrew does, if you want to spend like a Democrat, just tell us to elect Democrats.
Now I’m going to plagiarize myself, but I’m not running for congress so it won’t be an issue.
This reminds me of a scene from that great Gary Cooper classic. “Sergeant York”. Alvin York was torn between his religious faith – “Thou shall not kill”, and his civil obligation to fight for his country. He took the Bible and an American history book up into the hills to do some serious thinking.
He resolved to temporarily set aside his religious convictions for the good of the nation. Perhaps we have a similar predicament here. What’s good for America at this moment in time? Let us set our sights on the real enemies – Democrats, and do what we must to eliminate them from the face of the Congress.
As much as I was personally insulted by Roraback’s statements, I don’t hold grudges. If he wins I’ll be applauding, but in 2014 we may primary him. If he loses and blames the Tea Party, well that’s a another movie for another night.
Well said.
My sentiments as well.
Let’s not forget that circa 1998 Este responded to a question about high property taxes that those who were complaining about the likelihood of having to sell their homes could simply ‘move to another state’.
This is the Democratic-liberal philosophy in a nutshell.