The Republican National Committee just hired Alex Castellanos to head their communications efforts. Castellanos replaces Trevor Francis who was fired because he wasn’t getting RNC chair, Michael Steele, enough publicity.

This appears to a move toward a more aggressive posture by the RNC. Steele has been wildly ineffective in his role as chairman, generating more ridicule than anything else. His response to that is to bring in a media enforcer to harden the GOP message machine.

Castellanos is best known for his scorched earth and racially charged themes in his political campaigns, including those of former Sen. Jesse Helms. For several years Castellanos has been another talking head on CNN’s political panels even though he has remained a paid advisor to Republican candidates and causes. This has always been a clear violation of journalistic ethics, yet CNN has compounded their ethical blindness with this announcement:

“Castellanos is a CNN contributor, but the network learned independently of his new role at the RNC.”

So even though Castellanos is a CNN employee, he did not inform his bosses that he was assuming new duties on behalf of a political party. CNN had to learn this from someone else. And still, there was no indication in the announcement that CNN would cut Castellanos loose from his role as a commentator. Apparently having partisan conflicts of interest is not a problem for CNN, even when they are deliberately withheld.

Well, that’s the “liberal” media for ya.