Really, RNC?
Irony alert: the party that covered for Mark Foley is going after Democrats on Eric Massa
A new ad from the Republican National Committee brings new meaning to the word “chutzpah.” The ad attacks Nancy Pelosi, trying to blame her for the troubles of Charlie Rangel and of all people, Eric Massa, both of whom Pelosi’s team set aside. Meanwhile, Republicans have hung on to every one of their ethically challenged members, from David Vitter (prostitution) to Larry Craig (Massa-like behavior in an airport men’s room) to John Ensign, about whom the New York Times has a new report, detailing his attempts to find a job for his lover’s husband (after his parents’ pay-off to the hubby failed to sufficiently make nice,) just this morning. Here’s the ad:
Message: let’s bring the Abramoff crowd back to power. That’ll fix everything … Read more
Earth to wingers: the GOP thinks you’re nuts (and they’re living large off your money)
So this past Friday, I had the craziest conversation, with a right wing tea party/9-12 movement guy from Miami. He called me after I emailed a few tea party people in South and Central Florida to get their reactions to the now-infamous RNC memo screeching about “socialism” and separating Republican donors into two categories: fear-based, “reactionary” small donors, and ego-driven, tchotchke-mad big givers. (If you still haven’t read the presentation, here it is.) The tea party guy, who I won’t name to keep from embarrassing him, really didn’t answer my question (the question being: “what’s your reaction to the RNC presentation…?”) but instead launched into about a 30 minute debate with me, during which he asserted that: Read more
The RNC’s juvenile fundraising plan: victory through fear and “Tchotchkes”!
Somebody at the Republican National Committee is getting paid to copy snarky/Obama derangement blog comments about “socialism” and paste them into a Powerpoint presentation for use with donors? Clearly, I’m in the wrong line of work … Meanwhile, a spokesman attempts to distance Michael Steele from the Powerpoint, since of course we all assumed something that lamebrained had to have come from him … (telltale sign it wasn’t a Steele special? No hip-hop references or tired, 1980s black slang.) Read more
Michael Steele plays the race card
Michael Steele with an RNC intern. What up!
The RNC chair, who isn’t above trolling in racial stereotypes in order to be loved by his fellow Republicans (actually, they’re just laughing at you, bro — or cringing …) now wonders if the reactions to him (by the press? By his fellow GOPers???) might be racist. Read more
Operation: Ignore Michael Steele
U.S. News & World Report’s Washington Whispers blog has a sneak peek at the GOP’s new strategy to contain the hip-hop-o-matic chairman of the RNC: just pretend he isn’t there, the way D.C. Democrats effectively marginalized then DNC chair Howard Dean back in the day:
“It’s going to be out of sight, out of mind,” says one aide. And firing him won’t work. “That would just expedite the talk show where he bashes us all the time,” he says.
Meanwhile, could Mitch McConnell already have gotten the ball rolling with his total contradiction of Steele’s take on Harry Reid?
Heck of a job, Mikey (in defense of Michael Steele)
Now this is going to be unusual for me … I’m going to spend the next few minutes defending Michael Steele. Mr. Hip Hop Republican. Mr. Rush Reversal. And the alternately goofy and overly combative and testy Chairman of the Republican National Committee.
UPDATE: Did Steele lie about when he wrote his book?
Steele is, at this point, so unpopular with Republicans on Capitol Hill, they’ve taken to begging his staff to please shut him up. His latest gaffe: committing an act of “truthiness” by admitting that Republicans won’t win back the House this year (they won’t. Even Charlie Cook doesn’t think so and he’s usually pretty bullish on Republicans,) and then telling his detractors in the party to either fire him, or shut up and get a life. (Be careful what you ask for…) Steele’s other transgressions include taking too long to staff up when he first got the post, spending too much money gussying up the office, spending too much money period, while not raising enough, and generally making a mockery of both himself and Black Republicanism with such gems as his promise to give the GOP an “off the hook” hip-hop makeover by applying conservative principles to “urban-suburban hip-hop settings…” you know, the stuff the kids are digging … and calling his column on the RNC homepage “What UP!?” (He was later forced to change that.)
Besides appealing to the worst stereotypes about Black people in order to make being a Republican seem cool, Steele has also done other things GOPers aren’t comfortable with. And now comes the part where I defend the guy. (I know it doesn’t seem like it, but I’m getting there.) Principal among these very bad things in the minds of Republicans is Steele’s tendency to tell the uncomfortable truth about his party — although he usually winds up quickly taking them back. Read more
The GOP establishment vs. the Rogues
The Republican Party has two, mutually exclusive, strategies for picking up seats (and governorships) in 2010. One the one hand, they have the Palin/teabagger strategy, which is being pushed by the media wing of the party — people like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, the winger netroots and Fox news. That strategy involves blowing up government itself, and even the Republican Party, in order to whip the jihadi base into an anti-Obama frenzy. You see it in the signs depicting healthcare as the Holocaust, the president as Adolf Hitler, and Michelle Bachman as sane. Glenn Beck is apparently preparing to formalize his “plan” for his faithful robots soon and very soon (and he’s got this weird movie out, which was premiered to a stunned silence before the “Twilight” movie I took my kids and their friends to yesterday, but that’s another post…)
On the other side, are the pragmatists: people who actually run Republican bureaucracies, and who see the model for victory in the newly elected New Jersey and Virginia governors. In short: run moderate, and avoid the jihadis at all costs. Read more
But does it cover Viagra?
In the latest stumble for Michael Steele’s Rizzle Nizzle (What up!?) Commizzle, the RedState jihadis are fuming over the discovery of abortion coverage in the official health package. Oh my!
A RedState blogger demands the RNC names name and fire people involved in designing (long before Steele assumed his post) its health care plan, and opting in to abortion coverage: Read more
Michael Steele’s latest: ’some white Republicans are afraid of me’
Would it be it too forward to ask Michael Steele to stay RNC chair forever??? From Raw Story, news that the RNC chairman’s “off the hook” public relations campaign to appeal to blacks and Hispanics in “urban-suburban hip-hop settings” is going just great! (fo shizzle):
During a weekend interview, Michael Steele told TV One’s Roland Martin that he has experienced fear from other selected members of his party because of the color of his skin.
MARTIN: How do you — granted, a popular president got 95% of the black vote — you got any shot at getting black voters and if so what are the two issues that speaks to black voters for Republican have a shot at them?
STEELE: Education and the economy. Education and jobs. Education and small business.
MARTIN: But your candidates got to talk to them. One of the criticisms I’ve always had is Republicans — white Republicans — have been scared of black folks.
STEELE: You’re absolutely right. I mean I’ve been in the room and they’ve been scared of me. I’m like, “I’m on your side” and so I can imagine going out there and talking to someone like you, you know, [you're like,] “I’ll listen.” And they’re like “Well.” Let me tell you. You saw in Christie and you saw in McDonnell a door open because they went in and engaged. McDonnell was very deliberate about spending –
And he was all, like: “I’m listening, baby!” And the white people were all like … “whoa, we’re like, so scared of you, dude!” And he was like “no way…” Meanwhile, the Hot Airians are not amused (including by Allahpundit linking to RawStlory.) A commenter named Mr. Scribbler captures the mood:
Is this a political party or a Saturday Night Live skit?
Michael Steele’s unified theory of television unpleasantness
Does RNC chair Michael Steele actually believe that the more unpleasant he is on television, the more people will be drawn to his hip-hop-hooray version of the GOP? I really just don’t get it. Don’t they have a budget for television coaches on that side? Watch Steele on “This Week” today with the much more pleasant Tim Kaine… and cringe …
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