Progress Illinois

According to The Hill, Rep. Rahm Emanuel dropped in on a closed-door meeting of House Republicans last week:

The unusual appearance of the partisan Democrat was triggered when Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.) passed out fliers to GOP members on the House floor about the meeting.

“He said, ‘I’m going to come to this thing,’ ” Kingston said, noting that he and Emanuel have a good rapport. “And he showed up.”

Kingston said the Illinois Democrat was well-received by the group and even offered some advice: that President Bush and the GOP’s lack of an agenda would continue to haunt the party in November.

“Rahm was merely showing conservatives some compassion,” said Nick Papas, a spokesman for the Democratic Caucus chairman and the former head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

While Emanuel’s visit to the GOP roundtable group was in jest, his message was serious — and Republicans know it.

Rahm's "advice" is fairly common these days. A lot of observers are emphasizing that the GOP needs to distance itself from Bush if they hope to avoid a Democratic landslide this November. But as Atrios and Josh Marshall both point out, it's not clear how the Republicans actually do that. Most voters are fed up with the country's direction and the GOP is inexorably tied to the administration that's been steering this ship for the past seven years.