Hoping the rest of the world wouldn't notice, today RNC Chair Mikey Steele hooked up with Rightwad Crazies in the political Men’s Room for a brief, degrading “Tory Hole” assignation.

Oops.

Tea partiers get audience with RNC chairman but not a shared public stage

By Dana Milbank
Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele treated tea party leaders like an ugly date Tuesday afternoon: They were good enough to take upstairs, but not good enough to be seen with in public.

Steele invited leaders of the conservative movement over to the GOP's Capitol Hill headquarters (to the adjacent National Republican Club, technically) for a private meeting on the third floor. But Republican leaders, probably wary of TV footage showing a tea party takeover of RNC headquarters, denied the activists' request to use the facility for the news conference they had planned for afterward.
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The Money Quote:

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The moment encapsulated well the Republican Party's dilemma as it tries to harness the considerable energy of the tea party movement. Steele's task is essentially to co-opt its leaders, keeping them from electoral challenges that could hurt the GOP's chances. Yet at the same time, he can't appear to the rest of the country to be embracing a movement known for extremist words and deeds.
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Even as he roasts in the depths of Hell, at this moment Lee Atwater is laughing hard enough to lactate bile.