Business groups ready to do battle with tea party

The 2014 elections are starting look, more and more, like a showdown with the GOP, with the tea partiers eager to take control and business groups determined to stop them in their tracks.
Today’s elections will offer the first dose of bad news for the tea party folks as ultraconservative Republican Ken Cuccinelli is likely to go down to defeat in his gubernatorial bid in a Purple State, Virginia, and moderate GOP Gov. Chris Christie is probably going to score a landslide win in a Blue State, New Jersey.
The Viriginia race has shaped up as a disaster for Republicans as Cuccinelli’s fundraising was a bust and the contest has demonstrated the GOP’s glaring lack of campaign trail surrogates who can appeal to all factions of the party.

Susan Demas, the new editor of Inside Michigan Politics, has written a column for MLive that outlines the intra-party feud and how it is about to explode into a big-bucks, high-stakes drama in next year's GOP primary elections.

In her piece, Dumas writes:

“The establishment has a new group backed by business interests, Defending Main Street, ready to raise millionsto defeat tea party candidates. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is playing in an Alabama GOP U.S. House primary, something the establishment has resisted.

“Of course, the time to start doing this was in 2006, back when there were still moderates left in the GOP like Michigan former U.S. Rep. Joe Schwarz. Years before the advent of the Tea Party, anti-tax groups like Club for Growthsuccessfully knocked out establishment Republicans …

“In the primary process, money often can't trump passion. That's why longtime Indiana U.S. Sen. Dick Lugar last year was trounced by a tea partier -- who promptly fell to a Democrat in the general election.

“Now the establishment is sick of losing elections and wants to wrest back control of the party. They used the tea party's passion when it was convenient, but now see it as a destructive force.”