"Teapublican" is a term...

...I encountered for the first time today in a front-page article in the New York Times. Teapublicans are Tea Party activists who are trying to take over the Republican Party. According to the piece:

Across the country, [Tea Party activists] are signing up to be Republican precinct leaders, a position so low-level that it often remains vacant, but which comes with the ability to vote for the party executives who endorse candidates, approve platforms and decide where the party spends money.

A new group called the National Precinct Alliance says it has a coordinator in nearly every state to recruit Tea Party activists to fill the positions and has already swelled the number of like-minded members in Republican Party committees in Arizona and Nevada. Its mantra is this: take the precinct, take the state, take the party — and force it to nominate conservatives rather than people they see as liberals in Republican clothing.
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Republican leaders have been trying to harness the Tea Party energy. Michael Steele, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, recently [said] “It’s important for our party to appreciate and understand [the movement] so we can move toward it, and embrace it.”

Not all Republicans agree. Some say the party needs to broaden its reach, not cater to the fringe.

I agree with this last statement. Ideological purity will only make for a smaller and less influential Republican Party.

Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina, a Tea Party sympathizer, recently said, “I would rather have 30 Republicans in the Senate who really believe in principles of limited government, free markets, free people, than to have 60 that don’t have a set of beliefs.”

In response, I would paraphrase Tom Friedman, "Good luck with that, Mr. DeMint." How can Tea Partiers like DeMint expect to have any impact in the Senate with only 30 members?

For a more realistic take on the Republican Party, check out David Frum's blog, FrumForum.com.