As the 112th Congress opened today, the statistics showed that 43 Tea Party favorites were elected to the House of Representatives, and five to the Senate.
That means about 10 percent of the House and 5 percent of the Senate is affected by the Tea Party Movement.
While it sounds impressive, is it really so? Only if the GOP leadership in both houses chooses to let the extremists in this movement gain control, and it seems highly unlikely in reality.
It is much more likely that there will be “civil war” in the GOP, and it will affect the 2012 Presidential Election, and weaken the Republican ability to keep the House of Representatives, and gain control of the Senate and the White House.
Will Rand Paul of Kentucky, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, Marco Rubio of Florida, and Mike Lee of Utah gain a lot of influence and affect the direction of the GOP in the Senate? That will be one of the most interesting trends to follow in the new Senate!
At the same time, we also have more freshmen legislators than at any time since the late 1940s, with 87 new Republicans and 9 new Democrats in the House of Representatives, and 13 new Republicans and 3 new Democrats in the Senate.
There has never been so many new Republicans and so few new Democrats in a Congress since the 1920s! So this 112th Congress will be watched closely for the impact of the 20 percent new membership (108 out of 535)!