Actually, it's Rush Limbaugh's delusion that they're going to launch a third party - hey, it could happen - and that the third party would represent a majority of Americans:
I think what everybody misunderstands about this Tea Party business -- and I think it's one of the reasons why it's resented, and I think one of the reasons that the intelligentsia on both sides has problems with Palin ('cause she's associated with it) -- is that the Tea Party doesn't have a leader. It's not of Washington. It's not of Yale. It's not of Harvard. It is not of Brown or Temple or Trinity or any of these other places. It's right out there in good, old-fashioned grassroots -- and if you want to kill the Tea Party, there's no one person to go to the kill it. You gotta kill principles. You've gotta wipe out total ideas. That constitutes a threat.
So there's no real getting rid of the Tea Party when you boil it all down. So the Tea Party is... I mean, they do have some fundraising arms. I know this because I get the spam e-mail from 'em (and I say that with great affection) but look at Wisconsin. They haven't slackened off, their passion hasn't wavered. Their expectations are just as high as ever, and if they're not met, they have come to life and organized on the basis of real events and real principle. They have not been talked into anything. They don't exist because some rabble-rouser has gotten 'em all worked up. The Tea Party people, that whole organization (as it's defined) is the epitome of genuine. So third party. Who knows where they'll go, if that's what they think it takes to effect the outcome that they want, especially they know that they're the majority of thinking in the country, too? They know that they represent the majority of thinking of the people in this country.
It's as though Limbaugh is reacting to the increasing disdain shown him by establishment Republicans by dreaming up an alternative party that he could lead.