Extra Credit: Many Republicans misunderstand tea party's aims

By now, people should be beyond surprise when a tea-party candidate upsets an establishment Democrat or Republican - either in a primary or regular election. After all, they've had a year to get used to it.

Nevertheless, the tidal wave of tea-party candidate victories continues to surprise - and upset - many media pundits and, even more so, establishment politicians. Every possible attempt has been made to marginalize the tea-party people as extremists, but I think it's safe to say that that's a battle that was over a long time ago - and the losers were the hatemongering left and disbelievers on the establishment right.

But now we've crossed into a danger zone. Trent Lott says that "As soon as (newly elected tea-party people) get here, we need to co-opt them." And, once again displaying the Republican-In-Name-Only willingness to compromise principles, House Republican Leader John Boehner said, on "Face the Nation," that he would vote for tax cuts for people making under $250,000 a year (leaving out those with incomes higher than $250,000) if that's his "only option."

Finally, the shocker: The ever-astute Karl Rove, who has been a strong tea-party supporter, allowed a bit of establishment bias to surface when he lambasted the tea party's newest star, Christine O'Donnell. I have no doubts that Rove sincerely believes that establishment candidate Mike Castle, a nine-term congressman, had a much better chance of winning Joe Biden's old Senate seat in Delaware than O'Donnell.

But that misses the point. In fact, in an unintended way, the great non-entity David Gergen - of CNN non-fame - made the best case against Castle by lamenting, "O'Donnell's opponent knew how to work with Democrats." How's that for an endorsement?

The question is, what do establishment Republicans think they would have gained by Castle's election to the Senate? The notion that the Republicans' main goal should be to get majorities in both the House and Senate is badly flawed. Having a majority doesn't mean anything if a significant number of that majority repeatedly backs socialist bills offered up by Democrats. They may just as well be Democrats.

So long as Republicans in the Senate include constitutionally subversive progressives like John McCain, Richard Lugar, Orrin Hatch, Susan Collins, Lindsey Graham, and Olympia Snowe - to name but a handful of examples - having a "majority" is meaningless.

What a large number of Republicans cannot seem to come to grips with is that tea-party people are simply everyday Americans. In fact, most tea-party people have never gone to a tea-party rally, but feel just as strongly about what is happening to America as those who are actively involved in the movement.

If there is any hope for the Republican Party to survive, the word "compromise" must be eradicated from the minds of philosophically confused "conservatives" in their ranks. You cannot compromise between right and wrong. You cannot compromise between freedom and slavery. You cannot comprise between stealing and res

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