By JAMES OLIPHANT
Chicago Tribune
WASHINGTON | This hasn’t been the smoothest rollout for Michael Steele, the new chairman of the beleaguered Republican Party. As debuts go, it may rank right up there with New Coke and the movie “Waterworld.”
A man of constantly colliding analogies, he compares Republicans to drunks in need of a 12-step program and to the mentally ill. He has insulted Rush Limbaugh and moderate Republican senators alike, and he has promised a “hip-hop makeover” that would attract even “one-armed midgets” to his party.
Steele is the party’s first African-American chairman, his election a response to a history-making Democratic president. But for a party that is looking for fresh guidance, Steele’s first weeks have left more than a few GOP faithful wondering if their promised new direction might head them straight off a cliff.
Supporters say Steele has undertaken a monumental challenge and needs to be given sufficient time to accomplish his work.
Steele, a former lieutenant governor of Maryland and an unsuccessful Senate candidate, has the task of rebuilding the Republican brand from the ground up.
Polls show there is ample work to do. A New York Times/CBS News survey released last week showed that Americans identifying themselves as Democrats outnumber those who said they were Republicans by 10 percentage points, the largest gap in 24 years.
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