Michael Steele is in TROUBLE

by Michael Tomasky Friday 2 July 2010

I thought this was pretty big when I read it this morning, when Michael Steele said the war in Afghanistan was "a war of Obama's choosing" to a Republican group in Connecticut. The Republican National Committee spokesman stepped in quickly to try to clean this poo off the sidewalk, saying the following (via Ben Smith, and if you click through, note Smith's droll headline):

The Chairman clearly supports our troops but believes that success of the war effort in Afghanistan requires the ongoing support of the American people.

The responsibility for building and maintaining that strategy falls squarely on the shoulders of the President. Like so many Americans, Chairman Steele wants to hear an explanation from President Obama on what his strategy is for winning the war in Afghanistan. The Petraeus hearings were an opportunity - a missed opportunity - to do that. Instead, all we hear from the President is criticism of his predecessor for doing exactly the same thing.

But now, TPM is reporting that Bill Kristol is calling on Steele to step down, and other conservatives and Republicans are on the way:

Republicans are furious with RNC Chairman Michael Steele, who was caught on camera saying that the war in Afghanistan is a doomed effort launched by President Obama. Steele has no shortage of enemies in the GOP and many of them sense an opportunity here. In fact, several, both privately and publicly, are saying this is the last straw: Steele should resign...

...In an interview this afternoon, a livid, top GOP operative put it more bluntly. "This is the height of stupidity and epitomizes the problem that is Michael Steele."

A separate GOP operative passed along a comment Steele issued late last year when President Obama agreed -- as Republicans were pressuring -- to send additional troops to Afghanistan.

I'm told that more high profile Republicans -- operatives and electeds -- will come forward shortly with condemnations, and even demands of resignation, later today. Stay tuned.

A long time ago, I thought Steele had crossed the line of forgiveness with some ambiguous remarks he made about abortion. I thought if anything constitutes a bridge too far in the GOP, it's that. But now we learn that the real line in the sand is warmaking.

It's kind of impossible to imagine a party chairman getting fired within four months of an election. There's so much machinery built around the person of the chairman that rejiggering all that could produce chaos (which is why you're going to see the Democrats, if they're smart, try to talk about Steele all weekend).

In addition to that, we all know that Steele got the job only because he's black, and the GOP wanted a black chairman to be able to talk smack on the black president. Obama is still president, and he's still black, facts that probably give Steele the cushion he needs to survive.

But what a dope. Nothing to do with ideology. He's just a second-rater. Still, I'm a little surprised at the degree of anger here. Is it substantive, that he's knocking a (mostly) GOP-conceived invasion and war? Is it that he's implicitly knocking Bush? Is it that it's an implicit knock on the neocons? Is it that he sounds like he's been reading Chomsky? All of the above?

Speaking of folk music, someone should write The Ballad of Michael Steele.