Sandy Hook

Sandy Hook

Friday, January 08, 2010

Steele's comments irking GOP congressional leaders

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael S. Steele is about as popular as Joe Lieberman with GOP congressional leaders.  "Their aides said they told Steele's handlers to 'get him to stop.'"  I guess this is a gag order of sorts.

Steele told Fox News on Monday that he didn't think Republicans could win back their congressional majorities in 2010. "Not this year."

Believing that Steele's off-the-cuff remarks threaten to damage the party's brand -- at the very time when Republicans are trying to capitalize on a national political environment that may hurt Democrats -- senior aides to top Republican leaders confronted Steele's staff on a conference call Wednesday.

"You really just have to get him to stop. It's too much," a top congressional aide said on the call, according to others on the call, adding that Steele was hurting morale among Republican members of Congress and candidates.

The call turned into "a bickering match," aides said Thursday, as one top congressional staffer accused Steele of launching "a Republican apology tour at the exact wrong time." Another congressional aide said Steele was appearing on television "unprepared and unknowledgeable."

The call came as discontent with Steele seems to be spreading among some major GOP donors, who have publicly questioned whether the party chairman is focusing more on his own image -- delivering paid speeches and promoting his book, "Right Now: A 12-Step Program for Defeating the Obama Agenda" -- than on rebuilding the party and helping its candidates. The Washington Times reported Thursday that some prominent party fundraisers are withholding donations from the RNC because of unhappiness with Steele.

In an interview Thursday, Steele lashed back at his Republican critics by telling them to "shut up."

"I tell them to get a life," Steele told ABC News Radio. "I'm looking them in the eye and say, 'I've had enough of it. If you don't want me in the job, fire me. But until then, shut up. Get with the program or get out of the way.' "

Democrats have seized on Steele's statements. The Democratic National Committee circulated an e-mail to reporters late Thursday titled, "Spiraling OUT-OF-CONTROL!!" And DNC spokesman Brad Woodhouse called Steele "the gift that keeps on giving."

12 comments:

  1. I called Steele the same thing. :-) Isn't it wonderful?

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  2. Frodo notes support for Steele emananting from the adulterous reptile, Newt Gingrich. He who once shut down the government stated yesterday that he shares the substance, if not the periphery, of Steele's commentaries. As one who has had the distinct honor of casting votes against the author of the "Contract on America" on three separate occasions, Frodo warns all his friends to closely observe the land mines which this true terrorist plants in front of the body politic.

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  3. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  4. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  5. Prediction: Steele will be gone by the end of the month and then the GOP will have to look for a Hispanic woman.

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  6. The GOP can't possibly be the party to have the first Hispanic Party Leader.
    It will not be tolerated as we saw with The AG.

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  7. Blue: I deleted your previous comment not because of your childish insult but because you don't appear to have a real blog and because you had nothing of substance to say.

    My ex would be surprised to learn that after all those years of marriage and two chilren that I am in reality a guy.

    I wasn't being sarcastic.

    Lisa: Because you've become a mascot of sorts, I'm going to ignore your comment.

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  8. The Republicans would have a hard time finding anyone else as entertaining as Steele.

    I do wonder if they're perhaps a little nervous about getting rid of him. He does seem to buck the party when he feels like it, and if he were fired he'd no longer have anything to lose.

    He may know a fair amount of embarrassing stuff about important people.

    Maybe enough for another book.

    Just a thought.

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  9. Good points, Infidel - as always. I hadn't even thought of any of that. I bet there is a little squirming going on.

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