Republican Party

Mike Duncan, the current Republican National Committee chairman who is campaigning to keep his job, was surprisingly apologetic about the George W. Bush years in Monday’s RNC chair debate. I’m going to assume that someone—Fred Barnes, maybe?—unleashed some haXX0r skillz and broke into Duncan’s email to send this RNC fundraising letter out.
For the last eight [...]

Less than 48 hours after a Republican National Committee chairman candidates’ debate, during which contenders sang the praises of high tech and Twitter, the RNC held a meeting that was closed to non-members and electronic media.
GOP tech guru Patrick Ruffini tried to enter right after giving a presentation on his organization, Rebuild the Party. He [...]

While younger Republicans are hard at work trying to figure out how to make their party viable in a post-Bush political landscape, some older members of the conservative establishment prefer the introspective equivalent of placing their hands over their ears and yelling, “LA LA LA LA LA LA…”
From CNN:

While much of the Republican establishment bloviates about the injustice of President-elect Barack Obama’s selection of Rep. Rahm Emanuel for his chief of staff, the younger, smarter elements within the GOP are getting to work. Their mission: modernizing the Republican Party by eliminating the structural and technological deficiencies that benefited the Democrats.
At RebuildTheParty.com, a coalition [...]

No one likes to lose. But losing represents a chance to start again, to build something out of lessons learned and mistakes made. It provides the opportunity for new people to begin to mold the Republican Party in ways that senior leadership had resisted.

GOP officials in Ohio, Florida and Indiana –- in addition to Michigan, where the Obama campaign sued -– have acknowledged plans to challenge voters on Election Day based on foreclosure lists.
According to local media in counties in each of these states — in Columbus, Ohio, Marion County, Ind., and Volusia County, Fla. — GOP operatives [...]

After weeks of escalating Republican attacks on the Assn. of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, for alleged voter registration fraud, it turns out the McCain campaign has its own fraud charges to respond to.
The Huffington Post reports that McCain has paid $175,000 to Lincoln Strategy Group, a political consulting group based in Arizona [...]

In California GOP circles, it just keeps getting worse.
Yesterday, news broke that the Sacramento County Republican Party website was encouraging readers to “waterboard Barack Obama” and comparing him to Osama bin Laden.
Today, we move from inappropriate to racist.

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — I arrived moments ago at the McCain-Palin rally at the Virginia Beach Convention Center. The section designated for the national traveling press is nearly empty, since most of the press has not yet arrived.
Soon after I sat down, a McCain campaign volunteer handed me this note from an audience member:

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — I arrived here in the late evening Sunday, in advance of a scheduled McCain-Palin rally this morning at the Virginia Beach Convention Center. A very informal survey of local businesses reveals this town embodies Sen. John McCain’s problems in this state.
My hotel, next door to the convention center, was adorned with [...]