J.C. Watts (who also was a fan of Huckabee) also has some nice things to say about Mike Steele.
http://www.lvrj.com/opinion/39279207.htmlJ.C. WATTS: New RNC chairman has an opportunityThere is an old saying that goes, "The game isn't over until the fat lady sings." In the race for chairman of the Republican National Committee late last month, the old girl was humming.
It took Michael Steele six ballots to prevail over five opponents, but the happy news for Republicans across the fruited plain is that the former Maryland Republican chairman, lieutenant governor and my successor as chairman of the Republican GOPAC is today addressed as Mr. Chairman.
As I monitored the race by e-mail and text messages, I wondered if the chairmanship would slip away from Michael Steele and whether at the end of the day, Mr. Status Quo would be doing somersaults and giving high fives.
When you have establishment types running in races like this, the winner often prevails because the infrastructure of the establishment -- the consultants, pollsters, vendors and analysts who do business with the RNC -- want the incumbent to win.
However, as Maggie Thatcher once said, "Win the argument, you'll win the vote." Michael Steele won the argument and at the end of the day, he won the vote.
The argument was that we live in an extremely diverse society, and Republicans were chipping away at reducing ourselves to being a regional party, almost to the point of irrelevancy. Our party seemingly refused to recognize that there are people outside of the South who believe in fewer taxes and cutting out waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government.
I suspect the Washington establishment is saddened today because the majority of the 168 members of the RNC ultimately chose not to protect their deal.
Now that the die has been cast on who the new RNC chairman will be, we're hearing the standard line that Michael Steele won the race because he's black and because the leader of the Democratic Party is an American of African descent.
I predicted that's the argument that would be made by the status quo crowd. But Steele played by the same rules as his opponents and got more votes.
While I agree that Michael Steele can help establish a deeper relationship with the black community, it didn't matter who the Democrat president was -- Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden or Dennis Kucinich -- Steele needed to be elected chair of the RNC this year.
I'm afraid if John McCain had been elected president, Michael Steele would likely not be the chair of the RNC today, because McCain's lieutenants would have wanted one of the good old boys occupying that office.
Michael is thoughtful and he has good bandwidth with the red, yellow, brown, black and white community. He was lieutenant governor and state party chairman in a very blue state, and I never once saw Michael Steele compromise his core Republican principles.
In spite of his sterling credentials, President Bush and Karl Rove had an opportunity to appoint Steele as RNC chairman three years ago, yet they chose status quo.
Steele has said he will bring in fresh ideas and start down the track of rebuilding the party. While Steele isn't a cure-all for our party, he is a good first step in putting together the building blocks to get there. He has said he will work to establish deeper relationships with the black and Hispanic communities.
He will work to create opportunity for all.
Steele also understands that Republicans can't continue making it look like "we hate government," then ask the voters to "let us manage it." I don't hate my government; I just love my freedoms more.
A government that is bloated, expensive, inefficient, wasteful and riddled with fraud is not the kind of government we want.
Many Republicans along with many Democrats believe we can do better as well.
Chairman Steele is an enthusiastic and effective communicator. When you combine communication skills with conviction, you've got a formula for success.
Good, bad or indifferent, 2009 politics and the politics of the 21st century demands good communicators. I think we've all seen how difficult it is to govern if you can't communicate (see Bush, George W.), or how successfully good communicators can govern (see Reagan, Ronald W.).
With the Democratic majority in Congress now offering a $780 billion stimulus package that's half stimulus and half skunk, Mr. Steele will get an early test of his communication skills.
J.C. Watts (JCWatts01@jcwatts.com), chairman of J.C. Watts Companies, a business consulting group, is former chairman of the Republican Conference of the U.S. House, where he served as an Oklahoma representative from 1995 to 2002. He writes every other week for the Review-Journal.