Posted on 06/18/2011 8:41:56 PM PDT by Steelfish
Michele Bachmann: the Tea Party Crusader Electrifying The US Right Congresswoman will come under scrutiny about hardline politics. But will she be able to reach beyond her Tea Party base?
Paul Harris, Stillwater, Minnesota Saturday 18 June 2011
Michele Bachmann addresses an Americans for Prosperity 'Cut Spending Now' rally on Capitol Hil. Photograph: Alex Brandon/AP Mary Cecconi is the only Democrat to have beaten Michele Bachmann, the rising star of the Republican right, in a popular election. "It's my claim to fame!" she laughs.
Her victory came in a race in 1999 for a seat on the school board of Stillwater, Minnesota, a tiny, picturesque river town on the banks of the Mississippi. Bachmann – then known locally as a conservative education activist – had unexpectedly run as part of a slate of rightwing Republicans. The move politicised what had previously been a non-partisan affair. It failed. Cecconi, the incumbent, held her position.
It was a minuscule electoral footnote yet it saw the political birth of a woman who just 12 years later is running for president and electrifying the radical right wing of the party.
Bachmann, who announced her White House run last week, and then shone in the first major Republican debate, is eclipsing Sarah Palin as the new darling of the Tea Party. She is an evangelical whose husband runs a controversial Christian counselling service. She is a Minnesota congresswoman who has vowed to repeal healthcare reform and lambasts Barack Obama as a socialist. Like Palin, she makes political capital of her role as a mother to a large family: five children of her own and more than 20 foster kids. She is also a glamorous woman in a party that is frequently dominated by older white men.
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
Between her wanting to keep picking my pockets for big corn and Rove’s glowing praise, I’m not feeling “electrifyed” with her at all.
I like Michell Bachmann, but unless and until Sarah Palin says she will not run, my switch remains off.
Nice title.
How ironic, coming from a British rag!
Stillwater is on the banks, not of Mississippi River, but St. Croix river...but it is picturesque, and beautiful.
Would you be if she pushed for an tax increase on oil companies or had supported TARP?
There no perfect candidates. Not Bachmann. Not Cain. Not even Palin.
I MUST HAVE..........PWS..*G*
Shuuush!..let the real world catch up...its just starting now...
Is it a sign of the end that a far leftist Brit rag is telling its readers I’m “electrified”—???
And they know this because....
I don’t feel electrified by her either. More like - blah.
born April 6, 1956 in Waterloo, IA (Meets the Jus Soli Requirement)
Parents were
David John Amble, born in MN
Jean Johnson, born in IA
Both parents were US Citizens at the time of her birth (Meets the Jus sanguinis Requirement)
Michele Bachmann is a NATURAL BORN CITIZEN
Barry Soetoro aka Barack Hussein Obama ISN'T!
Why is it that lefties, here and abroad, are pushing MB ?
From reading FR today, I've gathered that supporters believe it to be some sudden, widespread and inexplicable onset of reverse psychology to make FReepers dislike her, lol.
Me, I just think they see in Bachmann all the caricatures and stereotypes they've been trying and failing to pin on Palin, and are touting her because she can be so readily damaged by her own words. They're in the process of creating the media equivalent of a straw man that they will later gleefully knock down. You know, what they always do with a Republican they want to see win the nomination.
You may be right, but there’s something going on, besides, that as well, I think. I just can’t quite put my finger on it.
That’s a bingo.
Trying to suck enough wind out of the sails, of any decision to run or not run by the woman of whom Bachmann is a virtual clone, that that woman throws up her hands and says to heck with it, or so they hope?
Yes, that IS more of what I am thinking they have in mind.
Republican congressmen are younger than their Democrat counterparts on average.
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