Michael Steele | How to dig a giant political hole

This from John Dickerson at Slate regarding Maryland Republican Senate candidate Michael Steele's amusing confession's and backpedaling recently. He actually at one embarrasing moment was forced to call dubya his "Homeboy":









Steele Shovel
How to dig a giant political hole.

When in a hole, stop digging. This is good advice in life and crucial advice in politics. Unfortunately, no one seems to have shared it with Michael Steele, a Republican candidate for the Senate from Maryland. Steele's slogan appears to be: "More shovels!"
Steele, who is the leading Republican for his party's nomination, committed a gaffe, according to Slate founding editor Michael Kinsley's classic definition: He accidentally said something true in public. During a 90-minute lunch with Washington
reporters, Steele said the R for Republican next to his name was like a "scarlet
letter." He went on to say the GOP-controlled Congress should "just shut up and get something done," that the Iraq war "didn't work" and "we didn't prepare for the peace," that the response to Hurricane Katrina was "a monumental failure of government." He said having his party leader President Bush campaign for him would be a disadvantage. He said these things "on background," agreeing with reporters that he would not be quoted by name. Dana Milbank of the Washington Post attended the lunch and published the remarks, attributing
them to a "GOP Senate candidate."
The papers had barely landed in suburban driveways before even Starbucks baristas knew that Steele was the source. It was obvious the speaker wasn't in Congress, and there are only a handful of "competitive Senate races" from which a sleuth could divine the identity. Once outed, Steele produced a variety of responses, all of them bad. They have been so bad as to constitute a kind of minitutorial on what a candidate shouldn't do when caught telling a truth:

Continue: