A Less Marginal Tea Party Spokesman

Hendrick Hertzberg: “This is the third year that the Republicans’ Tea Party faction has elbowed its way into the post-SOTU spotlight. Its previous spokespersons, Representative Michele Bachmann and Herman Cain, the pizza mini-mogul, were marginal cranks. Rand Paul, though a crank, is not so marginal: like Rubio, he is a member of the United States Senate, nominally subject to the disciplines of that august body’s Republican caucus.”