Tea party folks,locally and nationally, are over the line

Editor:

I was amused recently at the speed with which an underhanded campaign approach by national ultra-conservative tea partiers affected local campaigns. It's as if local tea party candidates can't think for themselves but can only copy national trends.

Rick Santorum, the "conservative" candidate who voted for 51 big-spending bills while serving in the U.S. Senate, recently set a new campaign low by claiming that President Obama is "pushing a 'phony theology'" that is not based on the Bible and is "imposing his secular values on the church." Santorum's comment flies in the face of a well-known historian's evaluation that "Obama may be the most explicitly Christian President in American history."

Santorum's next move was even more outrageous, claiming our crumbling financial systems are akin to the time "Adolf Hitler gained power in the 1940s."

Robert Gibbs' mild comment that Santorum is "well over the line" with his comments is, if anything, considerably understated.

So what happens at our local Republican dinner? Following the lead of her national tea party models, our local Republican Rep. Wendy Warburton makes repeated references to Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer as Governor B.S. Nice work, Wendy! That's really a wonderful and meaningless political slur that goes even farther over the line of unreasonable campaign remarks than the reprehensible comments of Rick Santorum.

So where do we go from here? Do we make up slogans based on all the candidates initials? Wily Wendy would be a good example. Or my preference might be doing Without Wendy.

Bill Thackeray

Havre