Steele must go

Ignore the rosy scenario of Rasmussen polls and Charlie Cook; ignore the “Happy Days Are Here Again” of the burlesque acts like Limbaugh and the cable channels. The RNC numbers are inarguable and damning, and there is only Steele to blame. When Steele was elected, the RNC had $22 million and no debt. At the end of November, it had less than $9 million, which is a pittance of what the RNC possessed going into the midterms of 2002 and 2006. This is the result of both dismal fundraising and a spendthrift decision to push large sums on consultants and other baubles in the off-year elections without a White House on your team to replenish the account…

Steele’s version of his job is to push himself to the front of the cable TV line to promote his cut-and-paste book Right Now, when these winter weeks are vital for the party to find momentum even in such unlikely races as Scott Brown’s David-like challenge of the Kennedy Goliath candidate of Martha Coakley in the Massachusetts special U.S. Senate election on January 19. Does Steele recognize this ground-shaking moment, with the freshest poll showing Brown closing to within the margin of victory? Another kind of leader would sit with phones, databanks and coffee for the next week to raise cash for Brown’s TV buys. Instead, Steele is the Soupy Sales of the right wing, debating with hand-puppet celebrities and taking a shaving-cream pie in the face for laughs on the cables.