Directly after RNC head Michael Steele gave his stirring call to arms for the GOP, former Connecticut congressmen Chris Shays gave his own unintentionally hilarious take on how the republicans will regain power: by becoming the party of ideas again. Don't laugh, he was serious. But Michael Steele didn't appear to get the memo yet, as Andrea Mitchell of MSNBC asked Shays what new ideas Steele proposed:

SHAYS: "I didn't hear any new ideas. But that's the point -- I mean, we need to be talking about ideas."

Another example of why Shays got tossed last November and why House Republicans are an extinct species in New England. The GOP is the party of ideas all right. The party of very bad ideas.