Internal GOP Fight Over Next RNC Chair

UPDATE: Newt Gingrich denies reports of a fight and bows out of the race for RNC chair. Fox News reports:

Michael Steele, former lieutenant governor of Maryland, has decided to run for the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee and is in talks with Newt Gingrich to win the former House speaker's endorsement, FOX News learned Tuesday.

Steele declined to comment, but a source close to the situation said Steele would announce his candidacy as early as Thursday.

The source also contradicted a report in Tuesday's Washington Times that Steele and Gingrich were competing for the RNC post.

"There is no fight," the source said. "This tension between Michael Steele and Newt Gingrich is totally fabricated and, in fact, Gingrich and Steele are working together to create a new strategy for the direction of the GOP."

In a statement issued by the former House speaker, Gingrich said he was not interested in seeking the post of Republican Party chairman.

"A number of people have asked me to consider running for Republican National Committee chair. They have been very flattering, and I am very honored by their support," he said.

"However, my job as an American first is to develop a tri-partisan approach to developing solutions for the challenges we face. I use the word tri-partisan to designate the concept of attracting Democrats, Republicans, and independents to solutions that unify most Americans."

The Washington Times reports:

A behind-the-scenes battle to take the reins of the Republican National Committee is taking off between former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele.

Story continues below

advertisement

Neither man will acknowledge his interest in the post, but Republicans close to each are burning up the phone lines and firing off e-mails to fellow party members in an effort to oust RNC Chairman Mike Duncan in the wake of the second consecutive drubbing of Republican candidates at the polls.

The New York Times adds:

Mr. Duncan was installed by Mr. Bush, and the fight over his post reflects the effort by many party leaders to erase any remnant of the Bush legacy.

These struggles come as the party prepares for a broad ideological battle, in particular over how much to emphasize social issues like opposition to abortion rights and gay rights. Party leaders said the focus on those issues had constricted the party's appeal to moderate and independent voters more interested in jobs, health care, education and other issues that touch their lives in more concrete ways.

"We can't be obsessed with issues that are not the issues that are important to American voters," said Jim Greer, the Florida Republican chairman and a likely candidate for national party leader.

Across the party, Republicans described this period as one of the toughest in recent history, reflected by the scope of the losses last Tuesday but also by the recriminations that have gripped the party as it seeks to learn lessons from Mr. McCain's defeat and Mr. Bush's presidency.

...

The most important question for Republicans in both the House and the Senate -- and for the future Republican chairman -- is how forcefully to take on Mr. Obama once he becomes president. Richard N. Bond, a former Republican chairman, said he thought the Congressional Republicans would -- and should -- take on Mr. Obama aggressively. Mr. Bond suggested that Republicans should not be deterred by the enthusiasm inspired by Mr. Obama's election, which he argued would be transitory.

"When people wake up from their Bush hangovers, six months from now," Mr. Bond said, "it is my belief that they are not going to be buying into some of the things that Obama will potentially be doing. You have a real potential for these guys making a fundamental misjudgment of this election. They just didn't want George Bush anymore."

But Mr. Gingrich, a veteran of what turned out to be damaging Republican wars with President Bill Clinton in 1993 and 1994, cautioned against that, saying the party would be wiser to offer a broad idea of what it stood for and how it would lead the country, and pick its battles carefully.

Sam Stein wrote for the Huffington Post recently about the split within the Republican Party over how to work with President Obama.

Comments

[research]

The GOP is dead.

Their two great principles are Deregulation and privatization.

The cause crashes and depressions.

Not to mention: cronyism, bill of rights shredding, war mongering, and war crimes.

[ohiomark]

I would be happy with Gingrich or Steele in the top spot of the RNC. They both have the same goal and I believe the press reports of a "fight" for the position are, as usual, way overblown.

The GOP needs to be purged of all the RINO's and replaced with conservatives. Just like the Democrats have moved to the far left, the GOP needs to move away from the wishy washy middle and get back to the conservatism that Reagan gave us.

[Grousefeather]

Sure, sure, Newt Gingrich wants to be honest!

[CoulterIsASuccubus]

"However, my job as an American first is to develop a tri-partisan approach to developing solutions for the challenges we face. I use the word tri-partisan to designate the concept of attracting Democrats, Republicans, and independents to solutions that unify most Americans."

Fine. If the Republicans goal is to truly unify MOST Americans, then they need to look at the party that just won and catch a clue.
HINT: The answer is NOT moving farther to the right as Shammity and Limpblob suggest.

[purplepatriot]

Gingrich is all talk and ego. He and the House GOP spent years trying to destroy the Clintons instead of helping to solve real problems the country faced. He doesn't deserve another chance.
Richard Bond is probably typical of the GOP leadership. He wants to confront Obama "aggressively" before they even know the agenda. Who asked them to? What this country needs is for the Republicans to get out of the way so the damage they've done can be repaired.

[old lady]

He's Back....The election results were just in on the bright morning of 11/6 - and on that very Wednesday morning my phone rang and a very nice woman called to conduct a brief survey on "Behalf of Newt Gingrich"... I laughed for a moment, told her I was old enough to remember when Newt was a democrat then became a republican then became a radical fundamentalist conservative.. and I asked what he was bucking for now.. She did not have an ansswer, so I told her to tell Mr. Gingrich to go back under his rock for a few more years - he is not needed.

[eden4barack08]

Bravo!!! (Applause)!

[Sigger]

You may be older per your name, but you are sooooo much wiser. And that is what is important!!!!

[keepemhonest]

Newt has NEVER been honest about anything. "Honest" to Newt means, crafting lies when Newt is busted doing ILLEGAL things.

For instance,
1. The audio tape of Newt, his lawyers & other top Republicans CRAFTING lies to tell when Newt was busted for illegally funneling money to GOPAC.

2. How honest was Newt during his 12 year adulterist relationship?

3. How about the tax laws Newt BROKE when he formed the shell company so he could illegally funnel money through that?

4. How about the tax laws Newt BROKE when he was earning $$$ at a university and not declaring the income?

Yeah, Newt & his honesty ... that & a nickle will get you a NICKLE.

[essbird]

Part 2:

Trouble is, these folks with grievances against progressives aren't necessarily very nice people. Slave owners, racists, greedy industrialists, religious ideologues, sexists... and they have to put a lot of lipstick on that pig to make it attractive enough to vote for. Fear is one of the best tools: "They're coming for you next!" Inherently, a loosely federated group of people with unrelated grivances can't stand FOR anything, only against it. So what we have are progressives and anti-progressives. And as the preacher says, "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." They will fail in the end, if they don't scorch the earth too much and take us all with them.

[essbird]

At age 57, I finally understand what this has been about. Progressives believe in a better world, and from time to time get enough power to try stuff: a democrative republic, personal liberty, no slaves, women voting, the Bill of Rights, wage and hour laws, social security, no trusts/monopolies, birth control, end to segregation, progressive taxation, labor unions, market regulation, environmental protection, water fluoridation, etc, even gay marriage. Over the last 90 years or so they've achieved a lot. Not everything works, but hey, that's life, try something else. Every time they are successful, they leave behind someone who lost something and has a grievance. Every time they fail, they leave a failure someone can point to and say "See, I told you so!"

Conservatives naturally sweep all those people up into a coalition that longs in disparate ways for the good old days and hates whoever wronged them. My mother, rest in peace, hated labor unions because her grandfather wouldn't join one and lost carpentry work, so she was a life-long Republican even though she was the soul of charity.

Part 2 coming...

[eden4barack08]

Franklin D Roosevelt summed up your point perfectly: " A conservative, is a man with two perfectly good legs, who, however, has never learned how to walk forward."

[kadene]

As long as the rabid religious reich continues to be the source of inspiration for GOP ideals, the party will remain fossilized,left behind in the 20th century. The oft repeated claim that Sarah Palin "energized the base" holds the key to the party's loss of stature, for if to accomplish this feat Palin had to resort to employing red meat bait tactics, incendiary language and divisive rhetoric, then the base needs to be educated and set free from its painful and ugly past., and not be the standard bearers for the party. What was most unattractive to many voters in the recent election was that the party pandered to the lowest common denominator, and no matter how perverse or convoluted their beliefs seemed to adopt them as its own.

The party became a symbol of "real America" where primal fears, hatred and ignorance were celebrated and new technology ignored. Suddenly it was not chic to be Republican anymore, so the opposite to the "Bradley effect" occured.

If the opponent was someone other than an African American, we may never have seen this ugliness surface. But it was almost cathartic, because people were allowed to voice their fears. Of course the bitterness and resentment still seethes, an indication that all that is noble about this great country exists alongside its dementors, a hotde of bigots afraid of tomorrow and ready to suck the life out of progress.

[kid5rivers2]

"Steele to run"?

"Running to steal" would be more a more apt caption.

[CaDeb]

"Mr. Bond said, "it is my belief that they are not going to be buying into some of the things that Obama will potentially be doing. You have a real potential for these guys making a fundamental misjudgment of this election. They just didn't want George Bush anymore."

These republicans are just simply too arrogant for their own good. They think they know why Obama was voted in? Sure, the public wanted change - people in general gravitate and vote to those who most represents themselves.

The voting public is not a bunch of bungling idiots as Mr. Bond implies - he really believes, we'll wake up one day down the road and come home crying to daddy? What a load of cr$p.

AND, that is a prime example of why the GOP is in such disarray.

[Oldtimer]

Newt, it is laughably way way way too late.
And by the way Newt, the partisanship that helped push these massive failures started
with you and Tom Delay so F U. Please go away Newt.

[eden4barack08]

Thank you, that was my comment too. It all started in 1994 with Newt's Speakership.
And if the Reps who want to "reconstitute" don't recognize that, well then, they're dumber than they look.

[CactusWren]

Ha,Ha, Ha-what a joke. Newt is the one who drove me out of the Republican party after having been an officer in our local Women's club and a lifetime Republican. His "contract with America" was the worst thing that ever happened to the gullible Republicans. They deserve to go down and away!

[munki]

One thing can be said... private issues should be step aside for all any and decisions...
As much as I am unhappy with GOP today... GOP need to evaluate the changing time!
Respect the difference like our governor in California regarding Prop 8. I am happy with whatever individuals are happy with their lives, but when it come to public and our lives... it is different...

Separate private life and do the BEST for the people and the country...
We need to ensure all America and Americans are on the same page...
so... what is the solution?

I am not angry with local RP chair or president trashing me... but I am angry that they were trying to force their personal value to me... anything outside of personal private value... stay away... thank you

[majorteddy]

Too partisan for Newt Gingrich ????? That's like too much money for Donald Trump, too sexy for Paris Hilton ! Now you know the GOP has gone off the tracks. there are going to be some knock down, dragout fights in the GOP over the next four years.