DNC Chairman Tim Kaine enters the Limbaugh-Steele fray and takes a few shots at both of them. The most interesting thing in watching all of this is that Limbaugh and Kaine Steele effectively played right into the Democrats’ hands. The Democrats are going to get a lot of political mileage and talking points out of this episode.
As for Steele, I don’t know how effective he’ll be as a national party leader from here on out. I mentioned in a previous post that there is no media or political figure on the right or left who has the kind of muscle or influence that Limbaugh and his listeners do. The only national GOP figures who have criticized Limbaugh and avoided apology so far are Rep. Eric Cantor and Gov. Jon Huntsman. But if this becomes some sort of ideological litmus test for any Republican who has hopes for national exposure, then it will make for a very interesting set of election cycles in 2010 and 2012.
Update: Some very good observations from Greg Sargent:
The problem for Steele, of course, is that by hitting Rush — and provoking a response from the talk show host — he’s left himself in the unenviable position of having to answer Rush’s implicit demand that he say whether he’s With Rush Or Against Him when it comes to Rush’s desire for Obama to fail. It’s not a good position to be in: Either Steele distances himself from Rush and angers the base, or he throws in his lot with the GOP’s pro-failure brigade and makes it easier for Dems to paint the GOP as petulant, partisan obstructionists.
Amusingly, either choice would help Rush: The first gives him a potent rallying point, and the second demonstrates his power over the party. What’s more, all this underscores again the astonishing degree to which the interests of Rush and Democrats are aligned here, since both Rush and Democrats want Steele, and every other Republican, to publicly make exactly the same choice.
Eric Cantor, the second highest ranking Republican in the House of Representatives, distanced himself from Limbaugh’s comments yesterday.
Now, we’ll see if Michael Steele, the chairman of the Republican Party, is going to face the same kind of pressure to make amends with Limbaugh.
These episodes show just how large of a shadow Limbaugh and his audience casts on the Republican Party. I can’t think of anyone else in political or media circles on the right or left who has this much muscle that they can force a sitting member of Congress to issue a public apology. The question now is how far will he go with his rhetoric and how far is the Republican Party and the base willing to follow him?
“Why do you claim to lead the Republican Party when you seem obsessed with seeing to it President Obama succeeds?” Limbaugh addressed Steele.
“I frankly am stunned that the chairman of the Republican National Committee endorses such an agenda. I have to conclude that he does because he attacks me for wanting it to fail,” said Limbaugh.
Late last week, Steele told CNN’s D.L. Hughley that Limbaugh is an “entertainer” whose comments are “ugly.”
Also on his radio program Monday, Limbaugh said Steele is being used by the “liberal media.”
“Michael Steele has been around long enough to know that the liberal media will use him by twisting what I say or what others say,” he said. “He took the bait, he bit down hard on the bait, he launched an attack on me, even though the premise of what was said to him was false.”
Limbaugh said he’s not in charge of the Republican Party, but every time a Party leader or elected official has to kiss his ring every time they say or do something that annoys him, it just reinforces the Democrats’ message strategy that Limbaugh is the de facto leader of the GOP.
Louisiana chooses its governors in off years, which means Jindal, who has already announced plans to seek a second term, will likely have his name on a state ballot in November 2011. That’s just a few short months before Iowa caucusgoers will cast the first votes of the 2012 primaries. Other Republican candidates already will have spent months participating in a dizzying round of televised debates and town-hall forums. (Remember how Fred Thompson was widely panned for joining the 2008 race too late? He announced in September 2007.)
The prospect of Jindal seeking both offices in 2011 would require political contortions the likes of which even he would be hard-pressed to perform. Imagine him urging Louisiana voters, still recovering from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, to support his re-election so he can spend the next year as an absentee governor, traveling the country as a presidential candidate. He could deny charges, likely to come from all corners, that he’s using his re-election bid as a launching pad for the White House. But if he reverses course after November and runs for president, he would face the impossible task of assembling a last-minute national organization at the same time he’s suffering a fatal blow to his credibility.
Elsewhere, the Bobby Jindal/Kenneth the Page comparisons have gone viral. Check out this clip:
Jindal should consider himself fortunate that Jack McBrayer (the actor who plays Kenneth the Page on 30 Rock) doesn’t bear an uncanny physical resemblance to him. Otherwise, Jindal would be getting the full Tina Fey/Sarah Palin treatment. On the other hand, Ben Smith pointed out the new Facebook group calling for Kal Penn (of Harold and Kumar fame) to play Bobby Jindal on SNL.
Update: Andrew Sullivan nails it — “All that really happened here is that Jindal – stylistically and substantively – had the worst debut on national television of anyone since Palin’s encounter with Katie Couric.”
Louisiana governor and rumored 2012 presidential candidate Bobby Jindal was tapped to give the GOP rebuttal to Barack Obama’s first address to Congress. John Cole brutally explains the sacrificial lamb nature of this political tradition. It seems especially relevant this year considering Obama’s well known reputation as a public speaker. Anybody who would have to follow him would have an easier time taking the stage after the Rolling Stones or U2.
Now, in fairness, the responses are always awful. Every year (with the exception of Jim Webb) someone is trotted out and forced to give the response, and it is at this point the political equivalent of throwing a virgin into a volcano. It is beyond time for them to end. However, there was something just especially awful this year, and already the comparison to Kenneth from 30 Rock is sweeping across the intertubes.
Jindal’s speech is being panned left, right, and center, with some of the harshest and most surprising criticism coming from his own party.
This was not a good national coming out party for Jindal, especially if he has presidential ambitions in 2012. However, one bad national speech does not mean it’s the end of your aspirations for higher office. Remember Bill Clinton’s much panned speech during the 1988 Democratic National Convention? He went on to bigger and better things four short years later.
“The helicopter I have now seems perfectly adequate to me. Of course, I’ve never had a helicopter before. You know? Maybe — maybe I’ve been deprived and i didn’t know it.”
– President Barack Obama
The Hill’s Aaron Blake looks at the short and long-term political implications of the stimulus bill, with an eye on 2010.
The stimulus package has emerged as the first major campaign issue of the 2010 election cycle, and a Republican Party eyeing a return to the majority is going all-in.
The near-universal GOP opposition to the stimulus means that, for 2010 at least, Democrats own the result. Republicans, meanwhile, are in the awkward position of banking on it, at least electorally, to fail.
…
In the end, only three Republicans voted for the stimulus package — all in the Senate — while 11 Democrats voted against it — all in the House.
The only senator who is up in 2010 to break party ranks was Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), who is in the unenviable position of dealing with both a blue-trending state and a conservative backlash over the vote.
Potential primary opponents like former Rep. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) and businessman Glen Meakem bristled at Specter’s vote and now have new motivation to challenge him next year.
“I really thought he was trying to avoid a primary challenge, and it’s very clear to me from this vote that he is really not anymore,” Meakem said, adding: “I think leading conservatives are going to coalesce around a candidate here in the next month or two.”
Another candidate with plenty riding on the vote is potential Senate candidate Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.), who has taken to criticizing Democratic leaders over their conduct.
Shuler drew a sharp rebuke from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) after he said Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) “failed” to make the package bipartisan.
Shuler is considered a top potential challenger to Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) in 2010. And even if Shuler stays in the House, he could face a tough race in a very conservative district.
Unlike Shuler, many of those breaking ranks on the stimulus vote are safe, including several Blue Dog Democrats and Republican Maine Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins.
Blue Dog member Allen Boyd (D-Fla.) is facing a primary challenge from state Sen. Al Lawson, meaning his vote could be a liability. In announcing his intentions Wednesday, Lawson signaled that the vote would be front-and-center in the race.
The Republicans’ strategy is clear: they want the Democrats to own this bill if it fails. But if the economy is in recovery by Election Day, the whole thing will blow up in their face, and the Democrats can label them as obstructionists who voted against the economic recovery. We’ll see who gets the last laugh in about 19 months from now.
They are all good and memorable scandals which will be talked about for years, although I would beg to differ. Take Hillary Clinton’s Bosnia sniper fire story off the list and replace it with Sarah Palin’s $180,000 wardrobe funded by the Republican National Committee. One was a case of Walter Mitty-style fabulism which provided for a moment of humor once the reality of the story was verified and little else. The other raised profound questions about judgment and management of campaign funds, and by extension the potential decisions John McCain and Sarah Palin would have made in the White House if they had been elected.
With a new administration, an expanded Democratic majority in Congress, and a full blown financial crisis, expect 2009 to be another bombshell and scandal-rich year for the press to investigate.
Basically the story, as reported by the blog Not Larry Sabato, goes like this. Democrats currently control the Virginia State Senate, 21-19. But Virginia’s Lieutenant Governor is Bill Bolling, a Republican, and he would be a tie-breaking vote in the event of a 20-20 split. Today, one of the Democratic State Senators, Ralph Northam, agreed to switch sides, a move that would give the Republicans in the Senate a much greater share of power.
And they would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn’t been for this moron, Jeff Frederick, who is the Republican Party Chairman of Virginia and the owner of a shiny Twitter account! Frederick, upon hearing the news, tweeted the following:
What King of the Dimwits Jeff Frederick failed to take into consideration is that, by tweeting this information, he was tipping off the Senate Democrats about this bit of parliamentary prestidigitation. And once they found out, Majority Leader Dick Saslaw adjourned the session so that it couldn’t happen. And then, the Senate Democrats gathered together and promptly browbeat the ever-loving daylights out of Northam.
If they had pulled it off, this would have been a HUGE political coup for the Virginia GOP in the same year that the people of the state are going to elect a new governor. Incumbent Tim Kaine is term-limited and will move on to running the DNC full time after he leaves office. There’s a three-way race for the Democratic nomination, while the Republican candidate is running unopposed. Republicans had an opportunity to reboot with a narrow Senate majority in a state that has elected two consecutive Democrats to the governor’s mansion and voted for a Democratic president for the first time in more than four decades.
Something tells me that Jeff Frederick won’t be privvy to sensitive internal deliberations or strategizing from now on.
Icepicks and Nukes 