Suddenly, British Conservatives Face Their Own Tea Party-Like Challenge

CHICAGO - March 14, 2013 - PRLog -- Since 2010, the Tea Party has been wrought havoc with the Republican Party in the United States. Now, British conservatives are getting a taste of that strong tea as they, like their American mainstream Republican counterparts, suddenly are confronted with their own new—and successful—opposition from the far right.

“Tea Party candidates have beaten mainstream Republican candidates in primaries, have pushed mainstream Republicans farther right than they wanted to go, and—worst of all for the Republicans—have lost elections for the Republicans that the GOP should have won,” said political pundit William S. Bike, author of Winning Political Campaigns: A Comprehensive Guide to Electoral Success.

“British conservatives could look across the pond and laugh at the fratricide of their American counterparts—until they suddenly and unexpectedly were confronted with the very same situation,” Bike continued.

“On March 1, the Conservative Party suffered a surprise in Britain’s bi-elections when the right-wing United Kingdom Independence Party swept onto the scene, tallying surprisingly large vote numbers,” Bike said. “British politicos immediately saw this as a big problem for the Conservatives in the upcoming nationwide general election of 2015.”

For example, Bike said, in Eastleigh, a suburb of Southampton, the Independence Party polled 28 percent of the votes to the Conservatives’ 25 percent. “The Liberal Democratic Party polled 32 percent to come out on top, with the rightist vote split between the two parties. Put the Independence and Conservative votes together for one set of candidates, and 53 percent wins easily. Instead, the Liberals came out on top.”

What’s so important about Eastleigh? “The Conservatives have never won a general election without carrying Eastleigh since the district was established in the mid-1950s,” Bike explained. “As Eastleigh goes, so goes the kingdom.”

The American Republican Party, Bike noted, could not figure out how to deal with the Tea Party between its emergence in 2010 and the 2012 elections, and that may have cost the GOP the Presidency.

“Tea Party candidates caused GOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney to move to the right to gain the nomination in primaries where Tea Partiers were a force,” Bike explained. “But Romney’s new extremism turned off voters in the general election and President Barack Obama won more easily than anyone expected.

“With the United Kingdom coming up on a big election in 2015 that will determine which party controls Parliament, British Conservatives find themselves in the same dilemma as their American counterparts,” Bike noted. “Do they continue to promote center-right policies that push rightist voters to cast ballots for the Independence Party, or do they go right, pushing centrist voters to cast ballots for leftists? Either way, the Conservatives lose.”

Polls show the Conservatives 12 percentage points behind Labour in national polls—ground that will be tough to make up with the Independence Party splitting the rightist vote.

“British Prime Minister David Cameron is looking as befuddled as American House Speaker John Boehner in trying to figure out how to govern with new rightist opponents nipping at their heels,” Bike said. “On both sides of the ocean, rightist fratricide is giving leftists unexpected opportunities at the voting booth.”

Candidates from all ends of the political spectrum would do well to follow political strategies that can be found in Winning Political Campaigns: A Comprehensive Guide to Electoral Success, a how-to e-book providing information on everything a candidate, campaign worker, or activist needs to know to conduct a political race.

Winning Political Campaigns was written by William S. Bike, an award winning journalist, public relations professional, and political pundit who has appeared on many radio and television broadcasts, including CNN. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhZYkyRx-C4.



Winning Political Campaigns is available on Smashwords at http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/149191 and Amazon.com at http://www.amazon.com/Winning-Political-Campaigns-Comprehensive-ebook/dp/B007U7C31K/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1334443628&sr=8-2.

The two previous Denali Press print editions of Winning Political Campaigns were highly acclaimed. “From a practical, political operations standpoint, it is the best book out, yet,” said reviewer Hank Landa of Political Book Reviews.

Winning Political Campaigns “provides essential tools, practical pointers, and valuable advice about running campaigns successfully,” writes Fran Ulmer, former Lieutenant Governor of Alaska.

Covering everything from advertising to building alliances, proper business practices, campaign literature, candidate behavior, media, voter contact, debating, fundraising, strategy, and more, Winning Political Campaigns is extremely thorough and detailed, yet easy to use. Real-life examples are drawn not only form the political world, but from the worlds of sport, higher education, history, and more.

Innovations by the Obama and Tea Party campaigns, the Citizens United Supreme Court decision on fundraising, the Lisa Murkowski write-in campaign for U.S. Senator, new uses for social media and digital advertising in campaigns, and much more state-of-the-science information and campaign innovations that have become part of the scene since the last edition, are included. They make the third edition of Winning Political Campaigns a must for candidates and staff for campaigns at any level.

Particularly useful are appendices including a sample itinerary for a political event, an event planning checklist, resource organizations expert on various issues, media terms, a sample news release and direct mail piece, and more.

One reason the book is so comprehensive is because few other authors can combine Bike’s background of having been a candidate, officeholder, political worker and volunteer, journalist, historian, public relations officer, publications director, government employee, fundraiser, and budget director.

Previous editions of Winning Political Campaigns have not only been used by campaigns, but as textbooks for college and university courses at Harvard University and other institutions of higher learning.

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