Should Steele resign?

GOP National Committee Chairman Michael Steele is busy cleaning up after himself again. He was recorded at a Connecticut fundraiser saying of Afghanistan, “…this was a war of Obama’s choosing. This is not something the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in. If he’s such a student of history, has he not understood that you know that’s the one thing you don’t do, is engage in a land war in Afghanistan?” (Read a report of it here.) The suggestion is that the war is not winnable.

This reminds me of 2007 when Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid said the war in Iraq was “lost.” (Read a recent column from Las Vegas about it here.)
Both men were making political statements at times when the wars they referenced were not going well (June was the worst month for casualties in Afghanistan since the war began).
Reid, it turned out, was wrong. Gen. David Petraeus led a surge in Iraq that quelled much of the insurgency (although that doesn’t equate to victory). If Steele is wrong, it will again be because of Petraeus, derided by Democrats in 2007 but embraced today by Barack Obama.
So, should Steele resign his party leadership? Declaring any ongoing war lost or un-winnable is a serious thing, especially for someone with political power. At the very least, it could harm the morale of troops and embolden enemies.
This was more serious coming from Reid, who has real power in the Senate. However, Republicans should want Steele to resign because he has become a distraction that seems to be sapping momentum leading up to the November election. If he doesn’t resign, it would be almost impossible for the party to remove him early (Read why here.)
What do you think?