RNC

An ally of RNC chairman Michael Steele is claiming the new RNC purity test is an attempt to “stick it” to Steele:

An ally of Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele claimed Tuesday that the so-called "purity test" being circulated by some RNC members is a publicity stunt designed to "stick it" to Steele after he defeated other candidates for the chairmanship in last January's election.

"You've got a few backbenchers who are unhappy," said Shawn Steel, an RNC member from California and one of the chairman's top supporters on the committee. "They don't have the power they once had under the previous chairman, and that's what motivating this. This is an attempt to stick it to Chairman Steele by the losers."

If this is the case then we are seeing a much bigger problem inside the RNC than we first imagined. Essentially the party is willing to shrink the size of their tent and lock out more moderate members simply because they don’t like the chairman. It’s kind of like cutting of your nose to spite your face.

Last night Keith Olbermann pointed out that according to the new ‘conservative litmus test’ being floated around the RNC that Reagan would fail it – rather interesting since the resolution is title “Proposed RNC Resolution on Reagan’s Unity Principle for Support of Candidates”.

Here is the criteria to being a conservative according to the RNC and you must meet at least eight of these points to be considered for RNC support should the measure pass.

(1) Smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes by opposing bills like Obama’s “stimulus” bill
(2) Market-based health care reform and oppose Obama-style government run healthcare;
(3) Market-based energy reforms by opposing cap and trade legislation;
(4) Workers’ right to secret ballot by opposing card check
(5) Legal immigration and assimilation into American society by opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants;
(6) Victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges;
(7) Containment of Iran and North Korea, particularly effective action to eliminate their nuclear weapons threat
(8) Retention of the Defense of Marriage Act;
(9) Protecting the lives of vulnerable persons by opposing health care rationing and denial of health care and government funding of abortion; and
(10) The right to keep and bear arms by opposing government restrictions on gun ownership

Here is Keith explaining how Reagan would fail six of those points:

It really is telling when the RNC doesn’t even know their own idol and what he actually stood for.

A familiar face from CNN has a new gig with the RNC:

Alex Castellanos, a Republican media consultant, will take over as a senior communications adviser to RNC Chairman Michael Steele, according to a source familiar with the move. The announcement of Castellanos' role comes hours after communications director Trevor Francis announced he was leaving the committee. But, Castellanos is taking on the strategic role on a permanent -- not interim -- basis, according to the source.

This follows the news that Trevor Francis is vacating the post, a kind of odd departure mid-cycle. I just hope CNN informs their viewers of Alex’s position every time they have him on.

Image via Wikipedia

What a way to really shrink the size of the RNC tent:

First Read has obtained a resoultion being e-mailed around to Republican National Committee members for comments that proposes a conservative litmus test of sorts.

This comes on the heels of a rift in the party that was exposed in the once-obscure special election in Upstate New York's 23rd Congressional District, in which national conservative leaders, including Sarah Palin, clashed with national establishment Republicans. The so-called GOP civil war threatens to derail moderate Republican candidacies in heated 2010 Republican primaries already underway. Florida's Senate race is perhaps the best and most prominent example.

The "Resolution on Reagan’s Unity Principle for Support of Candidates" outlines 10 conservative principles the group of signees wants potential candidates to abide by. The principles include support for:

This will certainly push more candidates and supporters to either the Democrat or Independent columns.

It turns out that abortion wasn’t the only thing covered in the RNC health insurance. Take a look at what Think Progress found out:

But ThinkProgress has noticed that Cigna, the RNC’s health insurance provider, also urges beneficiaries to think about end-of-life services. Cigna’s website has a page called “Care at the End of Life,” which covers topics such as how to talk with “loved ones” about “end-of-life choices” and whether to stop life-prolonging treatment:

Again – this is “bad” for you, but perfectly fine for employees of the RNC. This shows that every argument Republicans have made against healthcare reform were fake. If they were serious about abortion or end of life counseling they they wouldn’t cover those things in their parties insurance policies.

You got to love it when people play politics while thousands upon thousands of American citizens suffer and die. How can the Republicans even claim to be the “party of life” after they have been exposed for these hypocrisies this week?

Yesterday we found out that employees of the Republican National Committee were able to have abortions and it was covered on their employee healthcare plan. This latest case of extreme hypocrisy from the right has sparked a new civil war. The following was posted on the popular right-wing website RedState:

Let’s keep this simple.  Word got out today via Politico that the RNC’s health care package for their employees covers abortions. At the risk of belaboring the obvious, if you at any time have donated to the RNC since 1991 (when this policy apparently took place), some incremental portion of your donation went to the administrative costs of running the RNC, including employee salaries and benefits packages. Part of “benefits packages” in this context is apparently a health care package that pays for abortions.

For thirty years, we have fought tooth and nail to prevent our tax money from being used to pay for abortions. Turns out, we were apparently doing it through donating to the political party that was ostensibly on our side.  This betrayal is so fundamental to the majority of people who donate to the RNC that it’s almost unspeakable.  I have no doubt that many of the staffers there will miss the point, so allow me to make it clearly: you have caused every person who donated to support your livelihood to become involved in what they perceive to be a grave moral evil.

The RNC’s defense thus far seems to be excusable negligence; blaming it on some (surely departed) staffer who checked a box almost 20 years ago, and whoops, we weren’t careful enough. So sorry. It won’t happen again.

The post then finishes with:

IF YOU HAVE DONATED TO THE RNC AT ANY TIME SINCE 1991 CALL THEM AT (202) 863-8500. GET NAMES. DEMAND REFUNDS UNLESS THE PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE ARE HELD ACCOUNTABLE. IF THEY DON’T HEAR DIRECTLY FROM YOU THEY WILL DO NOTHING.

Then on the other side of the firing lines you have people like Allahpundit from HotAir putting on his tinfoil hat to spin this great big of conspiracy theory goodness:

I wonder how this story happened. Did a couple of lefty insurance agents at Cigna leak it to Politico unbidden or did Politico go calling around at Cigna until it found a pair of lefty insurance agents willing to leak?

Even if that did happen, isn’t it a good thing? I mean the Republican Party has stood on the side of opposing abortion for decades. You would think at right winger like Allahpundit would be thrilled that this was exposed to that the RNC can be pressured into actually “valuing life”. Instead he doesn’t complain about the RNC doing it, just that it was found out. Apparently Allahpundit is a pro-choicer.

This is another fun war to watch, and I hope the talking heads question some of the higher ups in the RNC, past and present, about this. Simply ask them how they could provide abortion coverage to their employees while campaigning on the issue of opposition to abortion. I’m sure that would happen if the tables were turned and it was leaked out that the DNC was helping to support pro-life causes, so let’s keep the playing field level and question these individuals.

My God you can’t say hypocrite loud enough when reading this:

The Republican National Committee’s health insurance plan covers elective abortion – a procedure the party’s own platform calls “a fundamental assault on innocent human life.”

Federal Election Commission Records show the RNC purchases its insurance from Cigna. Two sales agents for the company said that the RNC’s policy covers elective abortion.

So the only way a woman can have abortion covered by insurance is to go work for the RNC? If we ever had a reason to strip that awful Stupak amendment, this is it. Any Republican that opposes also needs to be called out on it.

From the lips of Michael Steele:

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, [say] “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.

I think Steele might be a little confused here. What they are most likely scared of is Steele’s mouth and what might come out of it when it opens. You know an  “oh fuck – what will he say now?” type deal. As a matter of fact they were probably asking that very question after this interview.

This morning Michael Steele was quick to seize on any chance of slamming President Obama’s winning of the Nobel Peace Prize and even used it to drudge up a very old meme – the celebrity mantra:

“The real question Americans are asking is, ‘What has President Obama actually accomplished?’ It is unfortunate that the president’s star power has outshined tireless advocates who have made real achievements working towards peace and human rights. One thing is certain -– President Obama won’t be receiving any awards from Americans for job creation, fiscal responsibility, or backing up rhetoric with concrete action.”

The DNC is quick on their toes today firing back with this stern reaction:

The Republican Party has thrown in its lot with the terrorists — the Taliban and Hamas this morning — in criticizing the President for receiving the Nobel Peace prize. Republicans cheered when America failed to land the Olympics and now they are criticizing the President of the United States for receiving the Nobel Peace prize — an award he did not seek but that is nonetheless an honor in which every American can take great pride — unless of course you are the Republican Party. The 2009 version of the Republican Party has no boundaries, has no shame and has proved that they will put politics above patriotism at every turn. It’s no wonder only 20 percent of Americans admit to being Republicans anymore – it’s an embarrassing label to claim.

Associating the Republican reactions with those of terrorists organizations! This is the kind of hard hitting response the RNC used to hold sole proprietorship on. Not anymore.

Who ever thought the head of the RNC would be such a rogue?

(audio only)

Think Progress points this out:

It’s ironic that Steele insisted he was “not backing down,” because directly following Steele’s original statement regarding primary challenges, the RNC walked back his statement in a message to Politico’s Ben Smith, insisting it “has no interest in getting involved in primaries.”

So the head of the RNC is saying one thing and the actual RNC is saying another? Wow do they have a problem.

Michael Steele has asked all the top staffers at the RNC to resign. Maybe he wants to give jobs to the old Bush White House staff?

  The party of old white Christian men does it again:

RNC candidate Chip Saltsman’s Christmas greeting to committee members includes a music CD with lyrics from a song called “Barack the Magic Negro,” first played on Rush Limbaugh’s popular radio show.

Saltsman, a personal friend of conservative satirist Paul Shanklin, sent a 41-track CD along with a note to national committee members.

“I look forward to working together in the New Year,” Saltsman wrote. “Please enjoy the enclosed CD by my friend Paul Shanklin of the Rush Limbaugh Show.”

The CD, called “We Hate the USA,” lampoons liberals with such songs as “John Edwards’ Poverty Tour,” “Wright place, wrong pastor,” “Love Client #9,” “Ivory and Ebony” and “The Star Spanglish banner.”

Several of the track titles, including “Barack the Magic Negro,” are written in bold font.

Saltsman, the former campaign manager for Mike Huckabee, has even been endorsed by his former boss and Bill Frist. Maybe someone in the media should ask the pastor or doctor how they feel about this.

There is one guarantee if Saltsman becomes the new RNC chair – they will remain in the minority for years to come. This kind of idiotic, hate-filled divisiveness is what has been destroying the GOP.

The Republicans have been planning all along to use this bailout as an issue against Democrats, despite the fact that it is a bill by a Republican administration. They were so intent on using it that the RNC already had made attack ads and sent them to key states:

The Republican National Committee's new advertisement critical of the the Wall Street "bailout" was produced and sent to television stations in key states before the package failed, officials at two stations said.

"Wall Street Squanders our money. And Washington is forced to bail them out with -- you guessed it -- our money. Can it get any worse?" asks the ad's narrator, as the words "BAILOUT WITH OUR MONEY" cross the screen. (The answer: Obama's plans would make it worse.)

Absolutely amazing. The Democrats should say they aren't bringing the bill backup until the Republicans stop holding the American people hostage. We saw what this did to Wall Street and America's 401k yesterday. They always put party before country. Will John McCain stand up and denounce the RNC for this? Will the media even ask him about it?

They put out this little video of how an Obama ad might look in Germany:

So an ad with a bunch of racist innuendos and exhibiting typical RNC hatred is funny? I guess so coming from the party of closeted homosexuals, criminals and pedophiles.

But do they mean it?

The Republican National Committee this afternoon scolded the Tennessee Republican Party over their use of "Barack Hussein Obama" in an official press release and warned the state party that they will be denounced by the national committee if they use the Democrat's middle name again, said a GOP official close to the RNC.

"The RNC has notified the Tennessee GOP that they do not support or agree with their approach," said this source, requesting anonymity to discuss the private conversation between a staffer in the national committee's political department and a top aide at the state party. "If they don't refrain from doing so again, they will be publicly repudiated by the Republican National Committee."

Maybe they should also scold the Tennessee GOP for hiring a total dumb ass to be their mouthpiece.