Texas, Florida Conservative Grassroots Fight GOP Elite Over Crist Endorsement

The grassroots revolt went viral yesterday, the Florida GOP Chairman was forced to back down from his Senate endorsement for Charlie Crist, and now the fire spreads to NRSC Chairman John Cornyn's Texas:

Key Republicans in Texas are alarmed by Sen. John Cornyn's decision, as chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, to endorse Florida Gov. Charlie Crist in a contested Senate race 15 months before the GOP primary.
"If they're going to do it in Florida, what's to stop them from doing it everywhere?" a Texas Republican source told me late Wednesday. "It's absurd that the NRSC is doing this. It's an insult to the base."

Read the whole thing. Meanwhile, for your amusement, I had a little personal score to settle:

When a Georgia boy with a degree from Jacksonville (Ala.) State University comes to Washington as a journalist, he becomes accustomed to a steady diet of insults from the snobs of the Beltway media elite.
Some insults rankle worse than others, however. So it was impossible to resist the impulse to rub that insult back into an arrogant Ivy Leaguer’s face: "Of course, conservative bloggers never do reporting because, as liberal blogger Matthew Yglesias says, 'What the right lacks are people with the skill to do the job'' And since Yglesias went to Harvard, he knows everything."

Read that whole thing, too. 'Cause I'm the King of Rock 'n' Roll. Thankyuhvurrrmuch.

BTW, I just realized I've been working continuously since 7 a.m. Wednesday morning. After 24 hours, I figure I could use three or four hours sleep, don't you?

UPDATE 12:50 p.m. ET: Now a Memeorandum thread, as Erick Erickson reacts to Greer's walkback, saying the Florida chairman ""is glossing over the fact that he tried to use party rules to get Rubio knocked off the ballot. He is also ignoring the fact that he made clear at the RNC meeting that the Republican Party of Florida would be supporting only Crist in the Senate race and only McCollum in the gubernatorial race."

UPDATE 1 p.m.: John Hawkins analyzes why GOP leaders are so freaking clueless:

[T]he leadership of the Republican Party keeps saying we need to get back to our principles and talks about how important it is to attract more young voters and Hispanic Americans. Then, we get a viable young conservative Hispanic candidate like Marco Rubio running for the Senate in Florida and they arrogantly try to shove him aside to make way for a better-connected, moderate pol who's more acceptable to the GOP establishment.
Our party leadership goes on "listening tours" where they don't talk about hot-button issues, say the base needs to get over Reagan, and don't seem do any real listening.
We get "moderate" Republicans who provide the crucial votes for the Democrats on every key issue. . . .
What it all comes down to is that the Republican establishment is out of touch, doesn't respect the people who put them in office, and has no principle they wouldn’t compromise for little more than a few kind words from the media.

Read the whole thing.