We may not have Michael Steele to kick around much longer:
Conservatives on the 168-member Republican National Committee are pressing a reluctant RNC Chairman Michael S. Steele to call a party meeting that would focus criticism on President Obama's stimulus package and its backers -- including three Republican senators who voted for it.
In a conference call Wednesday with Ken McKay, Mr. Steele's newly named chief of staff, the conservative critics set a deadline of 5 p.m. Friday for Mr. Steele to agree to a special meeting of the full committee to be held next month.
The demand creates an awkward situation for Mr. Steele, who already is under fire from fellow Republicans for a string of shaky media interviews. Republican national chairmen have rarely, if ever, publicly criticized GOP lawmakers over policy differences.
Mr. Steele offered instead to sign onto a joint statement that would criticize the stimulus package and the Democrats who passed it, but drop the criticism of Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter and Maine Sens. Olympia J. Snowe and Susan Collins.
The conservatives, led by constitutional law attorney and Indiana RNC member James Bopp Jr., rejected Mr. Steele's offer. If he doesn't call the special meeting, they said, they have the requisite signatures of members from 16 states to force a full committee meeting May 20 at National Harbor outside Washington, where a smaller gathering of state party chairmen is already scheduled.
Imminent ouster or public neutering? You make the call.