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Levin: Tea Party Has Taken Over The Republican Party

LANSING (WWJ) - Democratic Senator Carl Levin Tuesday ... talking about the Tea Party with WWJ Lansing Bureau Chief Tim Skubick.

Levin says the Tea Party has taken over the Republican party and the extreme and radical voices are not what the country needs.

Levin was not willing to call the Tea Party members, bizarro or hobbits as McCain had, as he read from a Wall Street Journal editorial on the Senate floor in July.

"I agree with John McCain on a lot of things but I don't want to use any label on anybody," said Levin. "I think they have, kind of, taken over the Republican party and that's too bad for the Republican party and the country, because those are some extreme voices, radical voices and we just moderate solutions and bi-partisan solutions."

Skubick noted that the Tea Party members have a legitimate role in the political process to which Levin replied: "Of course they do, but I think they've now had such dominance in the Republican party, that it's going to produce a nominee that is far-out," said Levin.

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