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New RNC Chair, Michael Steele, Was Paid by the GOP to Run for Lt. Governor of Maryland. He Received a Party Salary to Run.

Submitted by BuzzFlash on Sat, 01/31/2009 - 8:57am.

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When the newly elected RNC Chair, Michael Steele, ran for Lt. Governor of Maryland in 2002, he was paid a salary -- "consulting fees" -- by the Republican Party to do so.

BuzzFlash first reported this back in 2002. (Steele served as Lt. Governor of Maryland from 2003-2007. He lost a 2006 U.S. Senate bid.)

Eventually, the Baltimore Sun wrote an article on the rather unusual "pay to run" arrangement:

The Maryland Republican Party is paying Michael S. Steele $5,000 a month in consulting fees under an arrangement that began shortly after his selection as gubernatorial candidate Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.'s running mate.

Although the payments appear legal, Democrats said the GOP's contract with Steele raises ethical questions and suggests the party might be subsidizing the living expenses of a candidate for statewide office.

"It looks to me like they've hired themselves a candidate," said David Paulson, a spokesman for the state Democratic Party.

Steele - who held the unpaid position of Republican Party chairman when he was tapped to run for lieutenant governor - defended the consulting arrangement yesterday, saying he negotiated the deal as a way to continue working on party issues while he campaigns. The contract was not a condition of his candidacy, he said.

"I have a consulting business. I have consulting clients. I have to take care of my family," he said. "The state is paying (the salary of Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend) while she is running for governor. So what's the difference?"

But Paulson said "there's something obscene" about the arrangement. "They are paying a guy to be on this ticket whose very presence is being used by Ehrlich and Republicans as a show of diversity," he said of Steele, who is black. "They are the ones who call it the 'opportunity ticket.' We just didn't know how much of an opportunity it was."

Ehrlich announced July 1 that Steele, 43, would be his running mate, and Steele promptly took a leave of absence as party chairman. Campaign finance records show that he received his first $5,000 consulting payment from the GOP on July 26.

Maybe now that Michael Steele is RNC Chair, he'll get a year-end "Wall Street" bonus from the GOP!

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Steele-ing the chairmanship

Submitted by Hutchbilly on Sun, 02/01/2009 - 1:59pm.

Another J. C. Watts redo? Watts was the 4th in line in the House, but was never invited to the important meetings...it seems the invite list stopped at 3. 15% of the electorate said they could not vote for a black for president, and they all reside in the GOP....the GOP is also highly southern, meaning they would rather be wrong and take the whole country down with them that deal with those "liberals" called teh Democratic Party, which is not as monolithic as the GOP would have you think. Steele is window dressing for bad policies....ask Colin Powell after his WMD presentation before the UN. He will not be given real power, and if he is there to attract minorities, remember he lost the minority vote running for the Maryland Senate. He is also the guy who wrote a book saying Obama could not win. J C Watt's father said it best....no self respecting black man can be a member of the GOP. ONly 36 delegates to the National convention, and no black congressmen or senators from the GOP says it all.

M. Steele is a political hitman

Submitted by chattle on Sun, 02/01/2009 - 9:13am.

I believe there are film documentaries available that show M. Steele's attending high-level meetings in Haiti just before the fall of Aristede in Haiti. The reason(s) for Steele's presence among the U.S. contingent was never fully explained officially by the U.S. government but as a person of color he could move more freely about the country.

Uncle tom in charge.

Submitted by kichigai_usagi on Sat, 01/31/2009 - 4:15pm.

Leave it to the Confederates to go digging in their back alleyways to find this bozo. Now that we have an African American President ( rednecks crying in their beer ) these losers suddenly find that they are very tolerant of minorities and elect this guy to run the big top circus called the RNC. This is the last act of a very ugly and hateful show, the sooner the repugs become a footnote in history, the better!

Pay to Play - Pay to run - Selling a political office

Submitted by ERW on Sat, 01/31/2009 - 10:50am.

Didn't Illinois just impeach a Governor for something akin to "allegedly wanting to "sell" a political office?" If there is a difference in paying somebody to run for office --- and offering to sell and office --- somebody explain it to me. Mr. Steele, for good, bad, or indifferent --- is the new leader of the Republican Party. Sounds like business as usual. Ya reckon they paid him to run for the Chair?

Thats the kind of ethics,

Submitted by Atmost11 on Sat, 01/31/2009 - 10:22am.

Thats the kind of ethics, that you get with the RNC. Paying their affirmative action poster-boy to go against the 95 percent of black Americans who support the Commander in Chief Barack Obama. Saying here black person, take this money - now you dont have to do anything to earn this money - except sell out the Union to the Confederates. These Confederates who want the Union to fail, have the audacity to accuse good patriotic Democrats, of voting for Barack Obama simply because he is black.

The RNC "Vote"

Submitted by hterrya on Sat, 01/31/2009 - 10:19am.

Three observations: 1. Until the final vote, Steele was NOT a member of RNC. They had to go outside the dismal leadership to find him, and he would NOT have been elected without the endorsement of the Ohio electoral fraud-enabler. 2. Even now Steele couldn't be elected for ANY position in the NAACP, because his basic philosopy is so ANTI-people of color. He could only be elected by the RNC, which is dominated by the segregationist Democrats-turned-Repulicans in the South. 3. Steele was elected using paper ballots because the RNC knew they could not trust GOP-designed Diebold voting machines.

This just goes to show

Submitted by willymack on Sat, 01/31/2009 - 1:34pm.

How the gang of criminals who've co-opted the republican party name have poisoned every facet of American politics, from official federal policy, to the public discourse, and, now, putting forth a charlatan in an attempt to bamboozle minorities. Sounds about right for them.

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