In the six-way race for Republican National Committee Chairman every candidate has earned some kind of short-hand description.

There is, in alphabetical order, Saul Anuzis, a tech-enthusiast who never fails to return a phone call or email, the reliably-conservative Ken Blackwell, Katon “the Southern One” Dawson, incumbent Chairman Robert “Mike” Duncan, election expert Chip Saltsman and the charismatic Michael Steele.

Blackwell, however, expanded credentials beyond the conservative endorsements he’s gained in a conversation with some writers in a private suite at the Capital Hill Hyatt Tuesday. What many race-watchers gloss over he argued, is his extensive resume and the persuasiveness of the “shareholder’s revolt” he’s proposed leading among RNC members.

“This is not a corporation, this is a federation I would be running,” Blackwell said, criticizing the current structure of the RNC. “It doesn’t further the notion of groupthink.”

If elected RNC Chairman Blackwell’s mission would be to change the culture of the RNC, which he thinks has become too dependent on Washington connections cultivated with the soon-to-be nonexistent Bush Administration. To help make the break, he’s pitched RNC members on a new revenue sharing program that would kick-back ten percent of net fundraising proceeds to state parties.

“The whole fundraising apparatus is so inside-the-Beltway oriented that I have seen a true responsiveness to my revenue sharing program,” Blackwell said, “No longer are we going to send a staffer to state and then act as if they were my Whip.”

Blackwell is also a strong advocate for opening up the RNC’s “voter vault” database to members, which helps satisfy the outside pressure for all RNC candidates to become more tech-friendly without riling older RNC members who are turned off by complex tech talk.

“Under the present system with the voter vault there are states who will tell you it’s almost inaccessible to them and didn’t help them accomplish their goals,” he lamented. “Through an open-source system you get the buy-in to technology, but you get the human commitment necessary to drive things.” Continued...