The Delaware GOP Vs. Christine O'Donnell

The Delaware GOP does not like Christine O'Donnell.

Christine O'Donnell has surfaced as a credible challenger to the longtime frontrunner in the Senate race, Congressman Mike Castle, and the Delaware GOP is not happy about it. O'Donnell has been buoyed by an endorsement from Tea Party Express, which will try to spend about $250,000 on her behalf, and, just like that, the GOP's safe candidate is now considered to face a credible threat.

Since that endorsement on Monday, the Delaware GOP hasn't had such nice things to say about her. "By no stretch of the imagination is Christine O'Donnell somebody that has the standing to ever be considered to serve in the United States Senate," a source in the Delaware GOP told me yesterday.

Now comes an actual, physical conflict--or at least something like that--between the O'Donnell campaign and the Delaware GOP. A state GOP staffer was filming an O'Donnell speech, and the party released this video today of an O'Donnell staffer shoving his hand in the cameraman's...camera. Not very intense, but the state party is promoting it, along with this YouTube video entitled "O'Donnell Thugs Intimidate Onlookers," showing what looks to be the same staffer blatantly harassing people and generally acting like a jerk at the Glenn Beck rally in Washington, DC.

From a Delaware GOP press release today:

Speaking from State GOP Headquarters, Chairman Tom Ross raised concern over the new tactics employed by the O'Donnell campaign. "I am shocked at the conduct of the O'Donnell campaign and its threats. Delaware Republicans conduct our campaigns with dignity and respect for our opponents and would expect no less from Ms. O'Donnell."

UPDATE: It probably bears mentioning that Castle is the party-endorsed candidate, and the Delaware GOP has been supporting him since the convention in May. For more on O'Donnell and this race, see this post. The Wilmington News Journal outlined some of O'Donnell's financial problems in this story (reproduced on an anti-O'Donnell website), which outlines some of the chief complaints voiced by her critics. O'Donnell's responses to some of them are here.