Posted on 07/25/2006 2:24:33 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
Senate GOP candidate slams party By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer Published: Tuesday, July 25, 2006 Updated: Tuesday, July 25, 2006
WASHINGTON (AP) - A Republican in a competitive Senate race called his party affiliation "an impediment," said he'd "probably not" want President Bush to campaign for him and the GOP-controlled Congress should "just shut up and get something done."
Michael Steele's campaign confirmed Tuesday that the Maryland lieutenant governor was the Senate candidate who made the comments a day earlier on the condition reporters not identify him. However, the campaign said his remarks were only a sampling of the wide-ranging, 90-minute interview that it said also included praise for the president.
"It's an impediment. It's a hurdle I have to overcome," Steele, who is running in a Democratic-leaning state, said of his GOP label, according to Tuesday's edition of The Washington Post. "I've got an 'R' here, a scarlet letter."
(Excerpt) Read more at pressofatlanticcity.com ...
Sure did - no more from me. What the HELL was he thinking?
Last week, Thune stepped in it, now Steele. These guys must be drinking with Democrats.
Hmmmmmmm, interesting. How does a candidate, a conservative candidate at that, make such comments???
He is right about this.
"You don't go to Congress to become the party that you've been fighting for 40 years," he said, lamenting "the spending, the finger-pointing, not getting the bills passed" and counseled: "just shut up and get something done."
bye bye michael...
and no.. the pussyfooting excuses RUSH tried to float today "everybody does it (sells out Bush)" and "it works both ways... Bush didn't support Harris" don't fly with me.
I am a MD resident.
Things don't get done because the dems and MSM know they can peal a different one, or two, or three (r)epublican's off to sabatage our majority.
Happens on Gitmo, happens on ANWAR, happens on Bolton, happens everywhere.
Sounds like Michael is more of the same and he isn't even in office yet.
No thank you.
I was sure the senate candidate was Tom Kean, Jr. of NJ.
Disappointing...mainly because it gives the press something to run with.
Maybe, but if he wins, he will find himself drooled over by Snowe, Collins, Spector and a whole bunch of other liberals.
He speaks the truth! Republicans needs to shake a leg!
I'm not sure I want to hear any more...
Adios Mr. Steele. What was competitive will be no longer.
Im with you. I love the my CINC but, the congress and especially the senate...and STFU!!! They are the most overpaid do nothings Ive seen.
Unfortunately, Steele and Ehrlich have no chance in one party state Maryland.
You might sneak one by them every once in awhile but we will go back to our one Party tyranny very soon.
Frankly, other than protecting our nation and its borders, I can't think of a thing I'd like Congress to "get done."
I'd prefer them to shut up and go home ... and let Americans live their lives.
Oh c'mon.. mabye a few quotes from the original story now that we know who the coward is.
On the Iraq war: "It didn't work. . . . We didn't prepare for the peace."
On the response to Hurricane Katrina: "A monumental failure of government."
On the national mood: "There's a palpable frustration right now in the country."
"Well, you know, I don't know," the candidate said when asked if he wanted President Bush to campaign for him. Noting Bush's low standing in his home state, he finally added: "To be honest with you, probably not."
he source of the candidate's anger -- and his anxiety -- is the Iraq war, which he called "the single thread that is weaving through every issue," including high gas prices and the violence in Lebanon. "People want an honest assessment from the administration, and they want to hear the administration admit we thought this, and it didn't happen that way, and -- guess what -- it didn't work, so we're going to try a Plan B." He continued: "Let's call it what it is. We thought this was going to be a different kind of engagement."
He seemed less agitated by the policy failure than by Bush's unwillingness to admit failure. "I don't know why the people around him don't see that," he said. "It is a frustration, to say the least. I think it is a lost opportunity to bring the American people along on a mission that is incredibly important."
"In 2001, we were attacked and the president is on the ground, on a mound with his arm around the fireman, symbol of America," he said, between bites of hanger steak and risotto. "In Katrina, the president is at 30,000 feet in an airplane looking down at people dying, living on a bridge. And that disconnect, I think, sums up, for me at least, the frustration that Americans feel."
The response to Katrina was "a monumental failure," he continued. "We became so powerful in our ivory towers, in our gated communities. We forgot that there are poor people." The detachment remained after the storm, he said. "I could see that they weren't getting it, they weren't necessarily clued in. . . . For me, the seminal moment was the [Dubai] port decision."
He spoke of his party affiliation as though it were a congenital defect rather than a choice. "It's an impediment. It's a hurdle I have to overcome," he said. "I've got an 'R' here, a scarlet letter."
That left the candidate in a difficult spot. "For me to pretend I'm not a Republican would be a lie," he reasoned. But to run as a proud Republican? "That's going to be tough, it's going to be tough to do," he said. "If this race is about Republicans and Democrats, I lose."
Why would he throw away this race like this? Did he think it would be easy for him to win the Senate? Maryland is a blue state, with lots of 1) blacks and 2) government employees. Republicans are always going to have to work harder to win MD voters over. But no one will want to vote for someone who is a coward or someone who misrepresents who he is.
And running from GWB when the dog days of Iraq are here is no way to win my confidence.
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