Republican Follies

Remember when NRSC Chair John Ensign went panhandling to the RNC for money? Well, I think the RNC might have some trouble helping the NRSC out given recent developments:

The Republican National Committee, "hit by a grass-roots donors' rebellion over President Bush's immigration policy, has fired all 65 of its telephone solicitors," reports the Washington Times.

"Faced with an estimated 40 percent fall-off in small-donor contributions and aging phone-bank equipment that the RNC said would cost too much to update, Anne Hathaway, the committee's chief of staff, summoned the solicitations staff last week and told them they were out of work, effective immediately."

The RNC is primarily a fundraising operation, and they didn't just scale back on staff a little - they fired all of their telephone fundraisers (and with no notice, apparently)! That's like Toys R' Us closing down its video game aisle or Safeway shutting down its dairy and baked goods sections. Impressively bad.

Alaska: The indispensible TPM has the latest details oozing out of Ted Stevens' RenovationGate. The paper trail is becoming more lucid. While there is already the appearance of impropriety given VECO Corp.'s recemt record, if there is anything concretely indictable, it should become public in the next few weeks.

Colorado & New Hampshire: With the ideological hard-liners at the Club for Growth having just endorsed Sprintin' John Sununu and Bob Schaffer, the DSCC looks at CfG-endorsees' atrocious electoral record.