THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Republican National Committee identifies ten (10) key public policy positions for the 2010 election cycle, which the Republican National Committee expects its public officials and candidates to support:

(1) We support smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes by opposing bills like Obama’s “stimulus” bill;

(2) We support market-based health care reform and oppose Obama-style government run healthcare;

(3) We support market-based energy reforms by opposing cap and trade legislation;

(4) We support workers’ right to secret ballot by opposing card check;

(5) We support legal immigration and assimilation into American society by opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants;

(6) We support victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges;

(7) We support containment of Iran and North Korea, particularly effective action to eliminate their nuclear weapons threat;

(8) We support retention of the Defense of Marriage Act;

(9) We support protecting the lives of vulnerable persons by opposing health care rationing and denial of health care and government funding of abortion; and

(10) We support the right to keep and bear arms by opposing government restrictions on gun ownership; and be further

RESOLVED, that a candidate who disagrees with three or more of the above stated public policy position of the Republican National Committee, as identified by the voting record, public statements and/or signed questionnaire of the candidate, shall not be eligible for financial support and endorsement by the Republican National Committee.

“I find it hard to believe,” said Kilburn. “It’s terrible.” He compared the RNC’s plan unfavorably to what he’d done in Ohio, paying individual claims for employees, preventing them or the state from buying into plans that covered abortion.

Still, while Schmidt has taken money from the RNC to finance some tough re-election battles, Kilburn passed on a chance to criticize her. “She’s been a very faithful pro-life vote,” he said. “She’s a principled supporter of the right to life. Hopefully this is just an anomaly that slid through the cracks.”

Here, meanwhile, is an example of the data not quite matching the spin.

New Jersey is not part of D.C., of course.

Here’s the whole survey.

It goes like this. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), the RNC reminds us (three times!) once said that he voted for $87 billion in Iraq War funding before he voted against it. This, says the RNC, is exactly what Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) would be doing if he failed to join a Republican filibuster of health care reform and instead voted to move the bill to the floor–where everyone expects him to vote against it.

One problem with this is that it’s not technically true. In 2003, Kerry voted for a bill that would have appropriated the $87 billion in funding for Iraq while repealing some Bush tax cuts. He voted against the final bill which didn’t repeal the tax cuts. In this case, the GOP is defining “moving a bill to the floor” as “supporting it.” If that’s flip-flopping, then every Republican member of the Senate has flip-flopped–they allow bills to go to the floor, then vote against them, all the time.

Again, this is largely an academic discussion, as this video won’t be widely viewed outside a base of political junkies and partisan activists. But it demonstrates real progress for this myth of the Senate as a supermajority-driven institution, instead of one where the filibuster has been wildly, flagrantly abused beyond all recogniition.

President Obama promised jobs during his campaign for president, and the elections in Virginia and New Jersey on Tuesday were a clear referendum on his failure to deliver on this promise.

Bit of a change from Tuesday, when Steele said the election was not “so much a referendum on the president.” Clearly, the new spin is the wiser spin, even if the rhetoric about Obama having the power to “create jobs” rings hollow to a conservative.

“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.”

It’s not surprising that Steele and the Republican Party would try to harness the Tea Party movement for an electoral advantage, but the events in the NY-23 special election should make clear that’s a risky proposition. In a moderate Republican district in upstate New York that had not elected a Democrat since the 1870s, a Tea Party-backed, Club for Growth-funded conservative succeeded in forcing a moderate Republican out of the race, only to lose to a moderate Democrat.

It’s no secret that Republicans representing “moderate to slightly liberal districts” tend to be moderate because in many cases a hard-line conservative running in the district would lose to a moderate Democrat. And once elected, moderates in these districts need to continue to appeal to moderate voters in order to get reelected, often by occasionally working with the other party. Granted, the number of moderate Republicans in Congress who Steele is talking about “coming after” — presumably through primary challenges from the right — is small. But the effect of a strategy like the one Steele is threatening would very likely be to drive remaining moderates out of the party — either through primary losses or party-switching à la Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) — and thereby shrink the GOP caucus even further in the name of ideological purity.

It’s particularly noteworthy since TWI asked Steele about this very issue yesterday, and he responded that winning is more important than maintaining ideological purity. “I don’t see a victory in losing seats,” he said. “I’m not in the business of division and subtraction. I’m in the business of multiplication and addition. I want more Republicans going to Congress.”

(Via Ben Smith)

“I don’t think it’s a referendum on Obama,” the Republican lawmaker said in a conference call with reporters. “I think it’s a — it’s a referendum on some of his programs — not that his programs are not well-intentioned, but are they working and, in some instances, are they going too far?”

Of course, Republicans fared very well in high-profile statewide elections in New Jersey and Virginia, but the GOP’s favored candidates lost both federal special elections in New York’s 23rd Congressional District and California’s 10th. One can only wonder what prominent Republicans would be saying if they had won either or both of those House seats.

He praised the volunteer efforts to get Bob McDonnell and Chris Christie elected as governors in Virginia and New Jersey, respectively, saying, “Our folks are fired up.” Yet he expressed some misgivings about the process that led to Democrat Bill Owens’ victory in New York’s 23rd Congressional District.

“There should have been, in New York 23, a primary process,” he said.

I asked him about the view among some conservatives that the NY-23 result was a victory, since it emboldened the conservative wing of the Republican party.

“I don’t see a victory in losing seats,” he responded, adding, “Winning’s a lot sweeter, and if you don’t think last night was sweet, you need to see a doctor.”

He also disputed the notion that the results were a referendum on President Obama, saying, “I don’t think this is so much a referendum on the president. I think it’s a checkpoint on the policies.”

We’ll have video of the event shortly.

Update: Watch video of the Michael Steele press conference here.

Mr. McDonnell defeated the Democratic candidate, R. Creigh Deeds, an 18-year state senator from rural Bath County in western Virginia.

Republicans cited the victory as a repudiation of the Obama administration and the national Democratic Party’s agenda, especially that of outgoing Gov. Tim Kaine, who serves as the chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Nonetheless, exit polls conducted by Edison Research on Tuesday showed that support for Mr. Obama had changed little in the state since his victory here in 2008. The polls suggested that many of Mr. Obama’s voters stayed home on Tuesday, allowing Mr. McDonnell to win on strong support among white men and independents and among voters who say they are very worried about the direction of the nation’s economy.

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele dances in the end zone with this statement:

“Tonight, Republicans made history in Virginia.  In a state that had been in the Democrats’ column after the 2008 election – and in DNC Chairman Tim Kaine’s own backyard – Republicans swept all three top state offices in Virginia for the first time since 1997.  These significant victories speak to the fantastic campaigns run by Republicans across the Commonwealth and the voters’ clear rejection of liberal tax and spend policies that Washington Democrats are trying to force on Americans.

“Governor-elect Bob McDonnell’s common-sense conservative message of less spending, lower taxes and more responsible government clearly resonated with voters. His opposition to the Democrats’ plans for higher taxes, government-run health care and a job-killing ‘cap and trade’ bill was rewarded by Virginia voters with a victory tonight. [...]

“The Republican Party’s overwhelming victory in Virginia is a blow to President Obama and the Democrat Party.  It sends a clear signal that voters have had enough of the president’s liberal agenda.  The Republican Party and our grassroots supporters have renewed strength in Virginia, and I look forward to working with Governor-elect McDonnell and Republicans across the state to build on our momentum.”

“The NRCC and the RNC are doing whatever they can for us,” said Ryan. “I just finished a conference call with them about what we’re doing–they had people on the ground today, working out of our headquarters.”

The call, organized by the American Conservative Union’s political action committee, brought together a bevy of key conservative bloggers, including John Hawkins of Right Wing News, Ed Morrissey of HotAir.com, Moe Lane of RedState.com and two reporter/bloggers for The Washington Times, Kerry Picket and Amanda Carpenter. After Ryan and Burns asked for support, conservative reporter Robert Stacy McCain gave bloggers a rundown of the district and the campaign so far.

One notable aspect of the call: a heavy focus on ACORN and labor unions. “We’re afraid of ACORN coming in, unions coming in, MoveOn.org coming in,” said Ryan. When I asked about the impact of unions switching their support and get-out-the-vote efforts from Scozzafava to Democratic candidate Bill Owens, Ryan said that the unions were reverting to type now that they didn’t owe Scozzafava’s union organizer husband anything. Anita Moncrief, a former ACORN worker who now talks to conservatives about the organization’s scandals, asked what evidence Ryan had of ACORN messing around in the race — Ryan didn’t present any, but left the possibility out there.

Meanwhile, Mayor Jeff Graham of Watertown — the biggest city in the district, with less than 30,000 people — has endorsed Hoffman.