Party Chairman

Three months after a disappointing election showing for Maryland's Republican Party, Alex X. Mooney is stepping down as chairman. The former Frederick County state senator announced his plans Saturday in a leter to the state party's central committee. Mooney said "it is time for me to pursue other ventures. " The anouncement comes after a grueling election year in which Maryland Republicans -- in addition to absorbing an expected shellacking in the presidential race -- lost one of their two remaining congressional seats and saw three party-supported referendum efforts go down to defeat.

How would you like to be chairman of the Republican Party?It pays well. You get a company car. The president calls you by your first name. And every morning, you get to walk Millie.So how come nobody wants the job?When George Bush was elected president just a little more than two years ago, the GOP looked unbeatable in the foreseeable future.Yet today, the party is in disarray. It is floundering, leaderless, adrift.Part of the problem is the illness of Lee Atwater. Atwater was an ideal party chairman.

The provocative lobbying company that joined Democratic gambling opponents this week with the promise of bringing lawmakers "to their knees" with reams of anti-slots faxes had previously told state Republicans of its plans and said it would work for the other side, for the right price. "I would consider it basically blackmail," said state Republican Party Executive Director Eric Sutton. State Republican Party officials said they left a mid-January meeting with the company Laptoplobbyist.

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Indonesia's most prominent political opposition figure, Megawati Sukarnoputri, was ousted yesterday from her party's leadership by rival members, leaving her supporters uncertain over their next move.With the blessing of the Indonesian government, the rival members reinstated Megawati's predecessor as party chairman at a meeting in the city of Medan, setting the stage for a possible confrontation with her supporters, who continued to occupy the party headquarters in Jakarta.

WASHINGTON -- Bill Brock, a former Republican national chairman and onetime senator from Tennessee, is considering a campaign for governor of Maryland next year."

The head of the state's Republican party announced Tuesday he will not run for Congress in Maryland's competitive 6th congressional district and instead will support the GOP incumbent, Rep. Roscoe G. Bartlett. Alex Mooney said he made his decision based on recent signs of life from Bartlett's campaign. “It is now apparent to me that Roscoe Bartlett not only intends to seek re-election to Congress, but that he also plans to work hard to put a team in place and have the financial resources to beat the Democrats,” Mooney said in an e-mail to supporters.

WASHINGTON - Former Montana Gov. Marc Racicot, slated to be elected chairman of the Republican National Committee when it meets in Austin next week, has suddenly experienced an improvement in his eyesight. He says he can now see that continuing to be a paid lobbyist for clients who have business before the federal government might conceivably be viewed as a conflict of interest. His solution is to vow that "I will not represent the interests of clients before the Congress or the administration."

After the sound drubbing Maryland Republicans received at the ballot box this month, a faction in the state GOP is calling for the resignation of state party Chairman Alex Mooney. The effort follows a race in which the state party not only saw most of its candidates go down to lopsided defeats but one in which the ballot questions most Republicans opposed were all approved. Whether Mooney can be forced out in the middle of his four-year term is doubtful, but GOP activists on both sides agree that unhappiness with his performance is likely to lead to a contentious Republican state convention Nov. 30 and Dec. 1 in Howard County.

Washington - The most heated political campaign at the moment may be the one for Republican national chairman, but it's no ordinary contest. How could it be, when one of the biggest campaign events is supposedly a Christmas party at Vice President Dick Cheney's official residence? When it takes only 85 votes to win? Or that, with the election just over a month away, the field of candidates is still murky? At least a half-dozen Republicans have been eyeing the job, which pays about $200,000 a year.

GREENBELT -- Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton told an audience of political insiders here last night that "radical change" will be necessary to save the "American Dream" and that the Democratic Party must become the party of "personal responsibility."Traveling the nation for the last five months as he decides whether to run for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, Mr. Clinton said he finds Americans "profoundly worried about the direction of the country.""Most people don't expect miracles," he said.