November 23, 2010 02:17 AM UTC

Scott Tipton in the Lion's Den

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• by: Colorado Pols

It’s been a long road to Congress for pottery maker and “Tea Party” darling Scott Tipton–but as the Wall Street Journal reports today, grownup choices await him and his incoming majority:

Minority Leader John Boehner (R., Ohio), who is set to become House speaker in January, said last week he has been talking to Republican freshmen about the need to raise the federal debt ceiling to meet the country’s obligations.

“We’re going to have to deal with it as adults,” Mr. Boehner said. “Whether we like it or not, the federal government has obligations, and we have obligations on our part.” [Pols emphasis]

…During this year’s Congressional campaign, many of the GOP newcomers attacked their Democratic opponents as spendthrifts for past votes to raise the debt limit. Wisconsin Republican Reid Ribble, for example, who eventually defeated incumbent Democratic Rep. Steve Kagen, blasted Mr. Kagen for voting to increase the ceiling in February, calling the debt “unconscionable” and “insane.” Mr. Ribble couldn’t be reached to comment.

In Colorado, Rep.-elect Scott Tipton ran a TV spot against Democratic Rep. John Salazar saying, “He voted to increase the debt limit to a staggering $14 trillion, even with Colorado’s skyrocketing unemployment.”

Raising the “debt limit”–an event that could have been predicted long before Tipton was elected, indeed predicted before Barack Obama was ever elected President–is just the first in a long line of inevitable responsibilities Tipton will be forced to choose between upholding as a responsible lawmaker, or tossing aside in a crowd-pleasing but ultimately destructive fit of ideological pique.

The Aspen Daily News reported a couple of weeks ago about uncertainty regarding a $24 million grant sought for the Roaring Fork Transit Authority, a grant that outgoing Rep. John Salazar supported…but nobody knows what to expect from Tipton. Tipton’s spokesman tells locals not to “panic,” but isn’t this the same guy who pledged to cut the federal government “in half?”

What reason has he given them not to panic? And if Tipton does the responsible thing as CD-3’s representative, and works to get the RFTA its grant–RFTA’s CEO told the Glenwood Springs paper the loss of which would be “devastating”–what does that say about the “Tea Party” promises he made to get elected?

For all the talk of how Democrats let their base down between 2008 and this year, we submit to you that “Tea Party” candidates who promised to shake the federal government to its foundations, and now face the reality of what they promised, and the local consequences, have much farther to fall. Either that or the whole country does, starting with the Roaring Fork Transit Authority.