Remember Election Night 2009? The big takeaway from the 23rd District of New York -- where Democrat Bill Owens prevailed as the first Democrat to win that Congressional seat since the Ice Age -- was that conservatives were at war with each other. Brother against brother! Establishment against fringe! Well, as it turns out, that battle is being waged most bloodily inside the Imaginarium Of Michael Steele.
Yesterday, Michael Steele was defending Delicate Flower of Center-Right Moderation Olympia Snowe from the stern rhetoric of Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, telling the Morning Joe coffee-klatsch:
"I say, Welcome. Welcome. Each member of this party has a unique footprint. And it's different from region to region. I can't win in the Northeast with a candidate best suited for the South and vice-versa."
But that was yesterday, when the largest looming concern was the NY23-FAIL. Today, Capitol Hill is ramped up into Bachmann Tea Party Overdrive, and Michael Steele is suddenly drawing down on anyone who thinks they're gonna bring their "unique footprint" into his "big tent":
"So candidates who live in moderate to slightly liberal districts have got to walk a little bit carefully here, because you do not want to put yourself in a position where you're crossing that line on conservative principles, fiscal principles, because we'll come after you," Steele continued.
"You're gonna find yourself in a very tough hole if you're arguing for the president's stimulus plan or Nancy Pelosi's health plan. There's no justification for growing the size of government the way this administration and this Congress wants to do it."
So there you have it: Michael Steele is sort of riding a wave of confusing emotions.
UPDATE: Wow. Michael Steele is just spinning like a pinwheel, trying to decide what sort of Republicans he likes and what sort he doesn't. Via Sam Stein:
Hours after Michael Steele warned moderate Republicans that they woud be targeted if they didn't support conservative principles, the RNC Chairman called discussion of intra-party feuding "stupid" and insisted that the GOP would lose if "we play politics amongst our own."
RELATED:
Meet The New, Very Violent Michael Steele [Wonkette]
Hitching Wagon to Tea Partiers, Steele Threatens to 'Come After' GOP Moderates [The Washington Independent]
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