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Tea Partiers, At Least the Ohio Versions, Are All Hat and No Cattle

By The Pullins Group LLC

Here's exhibit number one as to why Dave Yost made the right decision to abandon the race for Attorney General and run for Auditor of State with the Ohio Republican Party's blessing.  He just filed his 2009 annual campaign finance report:

$47,621.14 raised

$51,174.85  spent
___________________________

$27,319.20 cash on hand

He'd be doing alright if he were running for state representative from a rural district.  Maybe.  The simple fact is that the Tea Party crowd, or whatever you want to call them, are simply All Hat and No Cattle.

They can't raise money, or they won't raise money, or they don't know how to raise money.  Take your pick.  Regardless, to paraphrase my old friend Morton Blackwell, they can't save the world because they simply can't pay the rent.

I've got nothing against the Tea Party folks.  I agree with probably 90% of what they stand for.  But being angry at Democrats and some Republicans and showing up at a rally every twenty years or so is not enough.  To paraphrase Morton again, "you owe it to your philosophy to study how to win."

Dave Yost didn't sell out the movement or hand his principles over to the liberals, he simply faced cold, hard political reality.  You can't beat someone in a statewide primary if you can't get your message out to voters.  With $27,000 in cash on hand he would not have been able to get any message out against Mike DeWine.

I ran into the same mentality the other day.  An articulate local business owner stopped by my office and talked to me about running against Margaret Ann Ruhl in the GOP primary for State Representative.  I asked him how much money he had raised so far.  He said none and that he would not accept donations in his race.  Fair enough then, how much do you plan to personally contribute I asked?

Nothing he said, I'm going run this campaign by word of mouth.  If you'll tell five people and they'll tell five people we'll win this thing for sure.

We owe it to our philosophy to study how to win.  It can't be repeated enough. 

Full post as published by The Pullins Report on January 26, 2010 (boomark / email).