www.politiquebec.com

[Antiochus]

Voilà, ça devait arriver. Les républicains commencent leur petit conflit interne et tappe sur le Tea Party, que certains considère comme responsable pour l'incapacité du parti à prendre le sénat (même si on pourrait dire que c'est grâce à lui qu'ils ont si bien eu la chambre).

Jim DeMint Emerges As Conservative Superpower With His 'Disciples,' But Faces Big GOP Backlash

The Huffington Post | Elyse Siegel Posted: 11- 8-10 08:49 AM

South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint -- who has achieved superstar status among conservatives and emerged as a prominent face of the Tea Party movement -- remains at odds with some members of his own party in the aftermath of the midterm elections that culminated last week.

Over the course of the campaign season, DeMint waded into a handful of high-profile Senate contests and endorsed Tea Party-backed candidates, some of whom were facing off against GOP incumbent lawmakers and establishment picks in primary races. While the South Carolina Senator cruised to victory in his own reelection bid against unlikely Democratic contender Alvin Greene, it was his active involvement in the other races that seemed to make him both a winner and a loser on election night.

Within the GOP it has reportedly been suggested that the rise of some of the conservative Senate hopefuls -- who ran with strong support from DeMint, but ultimately failed to come out on top in their respective fights -- may have cost the Republicans a chance at retaking control of the Senate.

Amid the post-election blame game, South Carolina's senior senator, Republican Lindsey Graham, didn't mince words in addressing the issue as it relates to DeMint-backed candidate Christine O'Donnell, who lost her race in Delaware by a wide margin. Before the GOP hopeful's come-from-nowhere win in the state's primary, the seat formerly held by Vice President Joe Biden was widely expected to flip red.

"If you think what happened in Delaware is 'a win' for the Republican Party then we don't have a snowball's chance to win the White House," explained Graham to Politico. "If you think Delaware was a wake-up call for Republicans than we have shot at doing well for a long time."

On the heels of the remarks coming to light, along with similar criticism from other Republicans, DeMint told the National Journal that O'Donnell would have had a better shot at winning "had [she] not been so vilified by the Republican Party" at the beginning of her general election campaign.

"It's like you're on the five-yard line ready to score and the quarterback calls the play and some member of your team tackles one of your members and keeps you from scoring," said one unnamed Republican Senator to Politico. "We came tantalizingly close to a majority."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/08/jim-demint-tea-party-gop-criticism_n_780150.html