Defending Michael Steele

RNC Chairman Michael Steele is under fire.

I am firing back.

Somebody has to defend this good and decent man, and I am happy to do it.

If Michael Steele goes down, it will not be the fault of leftists, liberals, President Obama, the Pelosiraptor, or any of the usual suspects screwing up virtually everything else in America.

If Michael Steele goes down, it will be Republicans and conservatives who will deservedly get the blame.

I have met Chairman Steele on three separate occasions. I met him at the 2008 GOP Convention in Minneapolis, and at a Republican Jewish Coalition event in South Florida. I recently did an event with him in Idaho.

On all three occasions, the same thing occurred. Michael Steele lit up the crowd.

I like the man. Actually, let me be more clear. I love the man. He is the right man at the right time for a Republican Party that desperately needs to expand its reach.

He was not an affirmative action hire. He is proof that one can be a minority and still have substance, without exploiting minorities while lining his own pockets like several liberal black “reverends.”

He is not out spreading hate speech like his DNC counterpart Howard Screaming Dean.

(Dean apparently has been banned from speaking. When one is too crazy for liberals, that says a ton.)

I totally disagree with the notion that the Afghanistan war is unwinnable. Yet Steele was completely correct when he said that the war was “Obama’s war.”

This is a true statement. The war started under Mr. Obama’s predecessor, but he made a conscious decision to send more troops (after plenty of dithering and poll testing and focus groups). Despite the fact that Mr. Obama refuses to take responsibility for anything (unless it is positive, where he takes full credit), he owns this war now. If the war ends up being a debacle, it will not be his predecessor’s fault. He could pull all the troops out tomorrow, but likes keeping his own job.

One thing Chairman Steele has going against him is that Ron Paul defended him. That is not Chairman Steele’s fault, although getting support from Ron Paul is one step above getting support from Don King.

Michael Steele has made controversial comments (although again nothing compared to Howard Dean). However, he should be judged by only one criteria, and that is substance. Forget what he says. Look at what he has done.

His job is to build the party. He is doing that. He is a phenomenal fundraiser. He is a great speaker who inspires people.
(Unlike a president, a party leader speaking well is sufficient.)
He also has won every major race since his election as GOP leader. Republicans swept the governorships in New Jersey and Virginia, in addition to other vital races.

Some say we would have won those races anyway, but those armchair quarterbacks are just that. The 2010 elections are coming upon us, and Chairman Steele should be judged by those results.

I am tired of weak-kneed Republicans who have spent their lives caving in to the Democrats telling me who my Republican leader should be. These same Republicans run against Democrats and lose.

(More than one commentator I deeply respect also favors his removal. I respectfully but fiercely disagree with them. Not all of Steele’s Republican critics are spineless sissies, but enough of them are.)
Until Howard Dean is fired, Michael Steele should be left alone. Better yet, have Steele step down the moment Joe Biden stops being given a free pass for a lifetime of verbal idiocy and is dismissed.

If I hear “aww, that’s just Joe being Joe” one more time I am going to hit the roof.

Republicans have to stop eating their own. Democrats support each other. We throw each other under the bus. The Democrats allow a bigot to be the DNC Chair, and Republicans are not allowed to have a guy that occasionally misspeaks?

Do Republicans remember what happened when we threw Newt Gingrich under the bus? We became drunken sailor spendthrift Democrats with no vision. Republicans complained that Gingrich made dumb comments that could have cost the GOP its majority. It was Gingrich who got them the majority to begin with.
We are about to make the same mistake again by cannibalizing a Republican who had the nerve to speak off the cuff and was recorded without his permission.

(Republicans need to remember that the microphone is always on. Trent Lott was butchered for harmless comments. He failed to understand that only liberals have free speech.)

Republicans get nervous when the media shows us exit polls, even though those polls are often wrong. They love stories of GOP divisions.
We are a big tent party and a family. Divisions are healthy. It is the Democrats who ban dissenting opinions.

If we throw Michael Steele to the wolves, we will only have ourselves to blame when the Democrats and their media friends gleefully run stories of GOP turmoil up until November.

The goal is to demoralize Republicans and depress turnout in 2010, and prevent what should be a GOP electoral tidal wave. In 1994 we held firm. We need to do so again.

The GOP is energized right now, and it is totally unfair to deny Steele credit for a portion of that energy.

He is a good Republican and a good leader. Stand by him.

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Eric Golub is the author of The Tygrrrr Express. His book, Ideological Bigotry is available now.