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The Republican Committee may have elected Michael Steele as its new chair, but you can't tell if you've paid any attention at all to the headlines. This isn't due to the left's incessant attempts to portray Rush Limbaugh as the real head of the party - more on this in a bit; rather, it's due to a continuous power vacuum and Steele's hesitance to embrace conservative ideology for fear of sacrificing his "big tent" pseudo-popularity.
I listen to Rush Limbaugh. I'm not reluctant to admit such; regardless your opinion of him, the man is a brilliant talk radio host and as a talk radio host, I appreciate the skill that goes into driving a daily, four-hour long program with nothing in the room but you, a mic, and maybe an engineer. The names that pop up on the call screen are the only proof that you are still connected to the outside world, the only proof that you're having a conversation. (Emails, et al., are an indication too, but not nearly as organic.) Limbaugh is theatrical; an impresario in the sphere of politics; as good a strategist as Newt Gingrich; as sharp on the uptake as Ronald Reagan; and every bit as vain as any entertainer with his influence.
I regularly find Limbaugh's analysis clever and his ability to hold the GOP's feet to the fire impressive. I'm not going to bash Limbaugh - that's a weak tactic employed by "Republicans" who think the quickest way to earning relevancy is to bash the talk giant (or their own) as a cheap way to appear "bipartisan." I am, however, going to be honest.
I watched some of the CPAC coverage, the big conservative conference in Washington D.C., over the weekend. That same weekend nearly 150,000 people gathered in Las Vegas for Nascar's Sprint Cup Series. I bet if you polled the audience not more than half of them would have been able to even define what CPAC was and why it was being held or who was holding it. So instead of getting out there, holding free meetings with the average American citizen at a time when Americans feel the most under-represented - so much so that they've taken to protesting in the streets and dumping tea in the rivers as a revival of the 1773 aesthetic just to get their voices heard - Republicans holed up at a conference and talked about the technology that many of them still aren't using adequately (the conservative citizens who took to the streets? Another story) and discussed their identity.
Ugh. The Republican party is going through one of those annoying, angsty, and self-imposed "I have to find myself" phases. It seems offensively overindulgent.
I say this because we have a group of policy-makers and wonks sitting around in dark lecture halls wondering what conservative really means, man. And out of all of them, a 13-year-old got it the best: conservatism is conservatism. It is what it is. There is no modification, no redefining. Limbaugh made this point as well, in between grandstanding for the cameras.
I'm not criticizing those who did attend CPAC; I think it's a relatively good idea; but it seemed most of the focus was redundant considering we know what conservatism is. The problem isn't recognition: the problem is that most Republicans are too chicken to embrace it.
When Limbaugh took to the podium he was only supposed to speak for 20 minutes but instead went on for an hour-and-a-half. If you are in the business of talking and thinking out loud, this is not problem. Normally I enjoy Limbaugh's speeches. This time though, I thought that he'd gone over the top.
After the speech the media assailed, quipping, writing that Limbaugh is the head of the GOP and the RNC are nothing but yes men. Michael Steele appeared on D.L. Hughleys CNN show and all but cowered when Hughley compared the GOP to the Nazi Party. Steele overlooked the comment and allowed a truly incendiary comment to be made - to say nothing of the feelings of countless Jewish Republicans, many of whom are among my acquaintance.
Steele went for the bait and allowed himself to be compromised when he clumsily defended himself. ( I do like how he corrected Hughley on the latter's statement that Limbaugh was the "de facto leader of the Republican Party." That's about it,
