Michael Steele = Poochie

Watching Michael Steele in action is simply fascinating. This guy seems to be exactly what some Democrats feared Obama might be like (and never turned out to be), a guy that seems to be trying way too hard to try to change the packaging on the party, and not so interested in actually presenting a coherent platform that one can feel comfortable voting for. I think during the nomination process in 2008 what Democrats were most afraid of when considering supporting Obama was the thought of nominating a dud that would turn out to be all flash and no substance, so watching Steele in action is kind of like watching an alternate universe where Barack Obama was actually the candidate that everyone feared he might be. Just take a look at some of his recent statements. Here's one:

RNC chair Michael Steele says he is "open to that baby" when it comes to supporting primary challengers against the three GOP senators who voted in favor of the stimulus package.

"Oh, yes, I'm always open to everything, baby, absolutely" Steele said yesterday on Fox News' 'Your World with Neil Cavuto'.

another:

“We want to convey that the modern-day GOP looks like the conservative party that stands on principles. But we want to apply them to urban-surburban hip-hop settings.”

He added, jokingly, that “we need to uptick our image with everyone, including one-armed midgets...I don't do 'cutting-edge,’” he said. “That's what Democrats are doing. We're going beyond cutting-edge.”

Uptick the image with one-armed midgets - that's beyond cutting-edge!

and another one today:

“Tonight, we tell America: we know the past, we know we did wrong. My bad. But we go forward in appreciation of the values that brought us to this point.”

even Michelle Bachman is getting into the spirit:

As Steele concluded his remarks, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann — the event's moderator — told Steele he was “da man.”

“Michael Steele! You be da man! You be da man,” she said.

Michael Steele seemed a lot like something I had seen on tv before, and then I realized what it was - Michael Steele is Poochie from the Simpsons. In case you're one of the few people that doesn't watch Simpsons, Poochie was a character created for one episode when executives decided that Itchy and Scratchy needed some pizazz, and that the way to do that would be with a rapping dog with sunglasses and a surfboard. Needless to say, his appearance didn't do anything for the show's popularity, everybody hated the new character and they got rid of him as soon as possible. Here's the audio of him making his first appearance:

(BTW let me know if you're able to upload a video showing the actual Poochie in action during this scene and I'll change it)

Michael Steele is trying way too hard to be cool, before even working on a reason for people to even vote GOP in the next election. I'm reminded of a great quote from last year by Andrew Sullivan where he wrote:

Some readers seem to think my description of Obama as boring is meant as a criticism. Subjectively, maybe it doesn't give me a Lowry. But objectively, it's brilliant. The first black president will only get there by boring a lot of white people. And haven't we had enough drama in the last eight years? Boring is fucking awesome after Bush.

This is true with everybody - all people want a bit of boring out of their politicians. Unplanned coolness here and there is great of course ("Barack Obama is a fan of The Wire?" "Hey, he collects comic books!" "He uses a Blackberry all the time!" etc.), but people want to discover this on their own, and they don't want to see a kind of unholy meshing of politics and individual coolness. If Barack Obama had run as a super cool "I-understand-young-people-'cos-I-like-The-Wire-and-comic-books-and-technology-y'all" candidate he would have lost. The situation at the moment is too serious and people just aren't in the mood for games.



Edit: Stephen Colbert seems to be thinking much the same thing (except for the actual reference to Poochie). Here's a video from the Colbert Report today:

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Stephen Challenges Michael Steele

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Edit a few hours later: wow, I just did a search for Michael Steele Poochie and it looks like I'm not the first to notice the connection - here, here, and here. Looks like a few other people have noticed the similarity.