Voters by and large are not looking for "adults who understand how to manage the system properly" right now. Voters by and large know that the system is broken, not merely mismanaged. It will take more than simple competency to fix what ails us now, and voters intuitively know it. It will take inspiration, it will will take a sharp rejection of the status quo, and it will take raw emotion to move voters in large numbers, because America needs to be on war time footing right now.

We need to rally to reverse a tide that is sweeping America toward a secondary status and a future for our children far worse than the life that their parents have led. The American dream has shifted into reverse and we all feel it, and we expect more from our leaders now than some tinkering with the engine after the transmission has slipped into the wrong gear.

Obama ran and won as an inspirational leader but he has governed more as a technocrat The Tea party types aren't bothering with the details of governance, they are out in the streets ringing alarm bells and screaming. Their shouts may be incoherent, but they still stand out against the gray false calm of technocrats fiddling with the same old knobs.