Tea Party's Obamacare Threat Could Harm GOP Election Chances, Republicans Warn

Long-serving Republicans aren't engaged in an increasingly public smackdown of their tea party colleagues because they disagree with them -- it's more that they don't want a few hotheads to blow their party's best chance in years to retake control of the United States Senate.

Several tea party-powered senators have laid down a gauntlet of late, saying the GOP should refuse to pass a bill to fund the government in September unless all funding for the implementation of the health care reform law is cut.

It's a message -- championed...