Shortly after launching his campaign for RNC Chairman in mid-November, Saul Anuzis, the beleaguered MIGOP Chairman, began circulating news of LGBT (read: moderate) support for former Maryland Lt. Governor Michael Steele to prominent social conservative committee members.

Steele’s past work with Christine Todd Whitman’s centrist Republican Leadership Council, his dissenters argue, disqualifies him to lead the Republican Party as the faithful opposition to President Obama’s social agenda and economic recovery plan. But today, after a series of Anuzis-led attacks, an email exchange between Patrick Sammon, the out-going President of the Log Cabin Republicans, and Katie Packer, a long-time Anuzis operative, surfaced.

Sammon, who has remained neutral in the race, reached out to all the contenders for the top Republican post in an effort to build the relationships with the national party apparatus seen as critical to LCR’s continued existence. “We want to be in a position to work well with whoever wins the race for Chairman,” he said in his email to Packer, later obtained by the Politico.

Speaking on behalf of Anuzis while he and his family vacationed, Parker responded, “I think you will find him to be a very reasonable individual who does not seek to grow the party by dividing it.”

If we’re to take Packer’s inclusive language at face value — the sort of inclusive language for which Steele has been attacked — then we could safely assume the Michigan Republican chief shares the same ‘radical’ goals of inclusivity vis-à-vis a multi-faceted, historical brand conservatism held by the LCR’s and the RLC, but then you’d remember Anuzis implicitly chastised these groups for liberal tendencies in his correspondence with RNC members.

James Bobb, Jr., RNC national committeeman from Indiana, is concerned some of the candidates are either incapable or unwilling to “unify all branches of the conservative movement.” All branches minus libertarian-minded Republicans, that is. Bobb continues: “Unfortunately, there are those who want to divide the conservative movement by pitting fiscal conservatives against social conservatives, and ultimately to drive social conservatives out of the Republican Party.”

After news of Team Anuzis’ correspondence broke, Saul quickly distanced himself from Packer and said he had approved no such outreach, nor did he seek Lob Cabin’s endorsement. Still working to build inroads in the social conservative community, Saul simply couldn’t afford the perception that he was seeking to “grow the party” with the help of, gasp, gay and moderate Republicans.

But the apparent toxicity of centrist Republican groups is evidently of little concern to the would-be Chairman, at least when he’s able to temper their demands. To 20th Century Republicans like Anuzis, gay and lesbian Republicans are helpful if and only if they’re quite and make no demands for acceptance and equality.

Working to build a stronger, more inclusive Republican Party is not indicative of “liberal tendencies,” as Anuzis might suggest. What is indicative of “liberal tendencies” is Anuzis’ repulsive indecision on the matter.

My criticisms of Anuzis aside, Republicans aren’t the only ones who understand a full embrace of the LGBT community is politically disadvantageous. How long have Democrats been crowing they support a repeal of President Clinton’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell military policy?