Michael Steele’s gratuitous slap at Rush Limbaugh (Politico has it here) isn’t much of a surprise. Here he is last summer in Kansas lambasting a reporter who had the temerity to ask him how he felt about the RINOs (Republican in name only) who hold the balance of power in Kansas politics.
At the time, Steele was campaigning for Nick Jordan, a Republican who was beaten Rep. Dennis Moore, a Democrat whose campaigns are funded and supported by a group called “Republicans for Moore” and who include the sort of Kansas political types who switch parties to become Democrats when the strategy suits them. The current Lt. Governor is such a creature. I wrote a comment on Steele’s remarks at the time.
Limbaugh’s right. Steele’s not what the Republicans need. Back when he was being promoted to the job he has now, I made a Corner post that somehow got stuck in a box and put in the attic. It’s more apt now than then, even. Here is it:
According to a recent Rasmussen Report, Republicans aren’t feeling well-disposed toward all those “centrists” that help lose elections:
Coming off a shellacking at the polls in November, the plurality of GOP voters (43%) say their party has been too moderate over the past eight years, and 55% think it should become more like Alaska Governor Sarah Palin in the future, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.
I’m not much of a Palin fan at all, but I never really liked Lincoln Chafee much, either.
As for Michael Steele, he’s a big-tent kind of guy.