Signaling that the efforts of a few hard-line anti-immigration conservatives to derail President Bush's choice to head the Republican National Committee had failed, Mel Martinez took over as head of the organization yesterday and said that his first priority was to make Republicans feel good about themselves again. In an interview with today's Washington Post, Martinez said that his "first order of business" was "to try to rekindle a little bit of fire," though he offered few if any details on how this might be accomplished at a time when the Republican Party is badly split over Iraq and the Dems are well positioned for more gains in 2008.

Meanwhile, in yet another sign that Martinez faces an uphill struggle in his quest to rekindle the GOP's "fire," his outgoing predecessor, Ken Mehlman, said in a farewell speech yesterday that Republicans would suffer big losses again in 2008 unless they committed themselves to genuine reform and got serious about addressing the party's ongoing struggle to hew to basic governing ethics.