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There is an anecdote that perfectly encapsulates the essence of Karl Rove. It goes like this:
Alongside his ambition and fixation on politics he appears to have believed that the end always justified the means. At [high] school debates he had a mountain of reference cards. Every debater on the team brought a shoebox of cards, but he would bring up to 10 boxes and dump them down, intimidatingly. A team-mate said “there wasn’t a thing on 99% of them”.
That’s our Karl: A boastful blowhard with precious little to back up the boasts, and addicted to ethical shortcuts to make up for his nothingness.
Lost in the blizzard of schadenfreude over his comeuppance and meltdown last Tuesday is this fact: He’s had similar comeuppances in the past, though the resulting meltdowns weren’t quite as spectacular as was last Tuesday’s.
For instance, let us consider 2006. Even as all the evidence was pointing, for those who were paying attention (and who were ignoring the sort of pundit-fog Rove specializes in emitting), to big gains for the Democrats, Rove was adamant that such gains simply weren’t in the cards — his “math”, you see, told him differently, as he announced to NPR’s Robert Siegel in late October of 2006:
SIEGEL: I’m looking at all the same polls that you are looking at.
ROVE: No, you are not. I’m looking at 68 polls a week for candidates for the US House and US Senate, and Governor and you may be looking at 4-5 public polls a week that talk attitudes nationally.
SIEGEL: I don’t want to have you to call races…
ROVE: I’m looking at all of these Robert and adding them up. I add up to a Republican Senate and Republican House. You may end up with a different math but you are entitled to your math and I’m entitled to THE math.
Three weeks later, Democrats had won control of both houses of Congress and Shoebox was wandering around in an angry daze much like the one he’s in now.
It took some time for Rove to regain his blustering composure, but regain it he did — he had to, as it’s his most useful weapon — just in time to do a little consulting work during the 2008 campaign:
Rove has one of the most expansive rolodexes in Washington, which he’s been putting to use for the 2008 election: According to the National Journal’s Peter Stone, Rove has been calling up old friends like Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens and casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, and convincing them to spend millions of dollars on outside right-wing groups, known as 527 and 501(c)(4) entities. An unnamed GOP consultant who “has met with Rove a few times this year” told Stone that “Karl is up to his eyeballs in this.” The Washington Post has also reported that Rove is working with outside groups who aim “to influence the outcome in November.”
Rove’s Rolodexes didn’t avail him or McCain of much in 2008, but he was able to ride the Tea Party and anti-ACA waves in 2010, thus rebuilding his damaged image as the Rasputin of US politics. So when the Citizens United ruling was handed down, Shoebox was in a perfect position to use his political groups to take advantage of it, sucking up cash from psychotically gullible billionaires like a hooker in Macau. They gave him $390 million all told to get Mitt Romney elected president of the United States — and now that Karl’s failed to deliver, they are holding him responsible:
”There is some holy hell to pay. Karl Rove has a lot of explaining to do,” an anonymous GOP operative told The Huffington Post. “I don’t know how you tell your donors that we spent $390 million and got nothing.”
A study by the Sunlight Foundation found that Rove’s American Crossroads got only a 1.3% return on investment, meaning only about 1% of all the money got the candidate they supported into office, or kept the candidate they opposed out.
So in sum, Karl Rove’s billionaire pals gave him nearly $400 million to defeat President Obama in particular and Democrats and their issues in general, and he got waxed. Badly.
No wonder Rove was having a breakdown on the air on FOX last Tuesday: He is now in very deep trouble with a number of very powerful men, and these men didn’t get where they are by playing nice.
I hope you banked your cut of all that money you took from them, Shoebox. You likely won’t be getting any more of it.
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This (insert your favorite epithet) outed a CIA agent. He’s supposed to be in PRISON.
PW, Thank you for this post.
“Shoebox” I love it and I could not agree with Boo more about where Karl really belongs. i bet the Wilson’s are doing a happy dance today.
They have so much class, but one twirl around the floor would not hurt.
I would be delighted to see him behind bars!
I’m not sure Rove gives a shit what anyone thinks of him, including his billionaire sugar daddies. He has a thoroughly compliant corporate-owned press parroting all of his talking points, including the ass-hat editors at WaPo who just had to end their top online story of the morning with several grafs of negotiating advice from a third-term slave-state idiot in the House.
If Rove were a half-normal person he’s take the money and run. He must be up $25 to $40 million from his cut on this cycle. The problem is he has no life (as far as we know–though there was that interlude with Gannon/Guckert, so maybe there’s hope for him yet). He always only had one pony, and that pony is lame.
I’m still bathing in the afterglow of Romney’s defeat. I think what opened their eyes more than anything else is losing Florida. They thought (and I think most of us believed) that they had it sewed up. That defeat has got to have sent shivers down the spine of every Thug operative in the nation. They own the state legislature and the governor’s mansion, and did all they could to depress the vote.
I wonder if there is a secret history of Obama operatives countering the vote suppression attempts. Might make a good Le Carré novel.
Now we know what happened to Bush’s brain when they came up with the surge. After seeing this breakdown on FOX i can imagine Rove in 2006 saying, “No no! we ARE winning! We just need more troops and my great plan of turning Iraq into our 51st state!” That dude just stalled out mentally and couldnt see what was in front of him.
Thanks, PW.
Texas has a long history of crooks using politics to steal. They turn up like Rove in many places, even in other countries.
Remember Billy Sol Estes, who got friends in the military out in the TX panhandle to sell him earth moving equipment at fire sale prices so he could run a crooked construction co?
‘Russian authorities are investigating the sale of defence ministry assets at prices below market value.’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-20265166
Oh, but KKKarl sez he did it ALL for nothing. He VOLUNTEERED his time, doncha know?
at least that’s what he said on a Fox clip I heard
Recommended, PW.
David Axelrod is an affective campaign manager and he’s a cool cat.
And, on a media note, that reporter who said he had received a phone call two hours earlier but didn’t share the information because several states weren’t finished voting, made it sound like he was being generously kind. Isn’t it actually illegal to announce a win while voting is still happening. Maybe I’m remembering incorrectly.
Maybe Mike Mc Connell was the means of Karl’s “brain” to produce results.
Too bad he forgot how to fly while flying.
Do we have a total of how much the GOP and the other Super PACs like Karl’s spent this election vs what the Dems and their Super pacs spent?
There are two things that Karl Rove insisted on as strategies (which means his go-fers actually did them): do the math and hit them where they are strongest.
The GOP worked to know where their votes were coming from (and, parenthetically, how to tweak the number of votes just enough through suppression or miscounting to steal it and get away with it). OfA learned the lesson of knowing where their votes are coming from but adjust the count by going out and making sure that sympathetic voters actually get to the polls and vote–and they know which registered Democrats or people on their canvass lists have voted. The rest of the Democratic Party and other parties seem not to have grasped this part of politics. Promote and pray is not a campaign strategy.
Rove defeated Gore by attacking his intellect and his accomplishment in creating a public carrier internet run by private companies. The attack on his intellect through Bush’s honest stupidity in the debates and Gore’s irritated response worked. The attack on the internet was an attack on Gore’s overall credibility by claiming Gore said he “invented” the internet.
Obama’s team learned the lesson but plays it differently. Obama rope-a-dopes to let the opposition expose both their strengths, the weaknesses, and their offensive strategy. And with the current GOP, they can be expected to overplay their hand. And then Obama attacks their strengths by praising them and exposes their weaknesses by lecturing them about them. (Remember when he told the House GOP Q&A that they were going to paint themselves in a corner by becoming too extreme.)
Just a math refresher. In the US, there are 50 states, 210 media markets, 50 states, 3080 counties, 192,480 precincts, and it takes roughly 70 million votes to win 270 electoral votes. Senate seats in one-Congressman states take 170,000 votes. In the largest state California, around 10 million votes. House seats 170,000 votes. You need 4 volunteers (at least) for every 1000 votes you need to turn out. And 10 volunteers (at least) to be the critical mass for a field office.
Next Question PW are the 1% punks? Karl just took them for $390 million what are they going to do about that anything? I understand to go through the courts would take time and publicly embarrass them more but there are plenty of ways the 1% can ruin a man.
Or have they drunk their own cool aid? Which means we can laugh at them more when they give again to Karl.
KKKarl is the Republican Party. A bunch of greedy nutcases.
I am sure they’ll kiss and makeup cuz KKKarl probably has a shoebox full of dirt on all of them.
(Reminds me of an old LBJ line about preferring to have J.Edgar inside the tent pissing out rather than outside the tent pissing in.)
I wonder if Karl did the Math but factored in stealing the election but Anonymous shut him down?
If so I would expect the GOP to start pushing for new laws to get Anonymous.
People kept saying before the election that the suppression tactics could backfire and I said to myself “yeah right.”
I have had a great joy in reading a lot of comments from different sites these past few days and one of them really hit the nail on the head and proved how wrong I was.
This commenter, and I am sorry I cannot remember where, said that he/she was in a precinct that was mixed population.
Some Whites came up to the three hour long line and just left rather than mix with the folks standing in line.
Folks were prepared to stand in line for Obama, Romney, not so much.
I loved it.
‘Rove defeated Gore by attacking his intellect and his accomplishment in creating a public carrier internet run by private companies’
In my area, the attack was on his socialist un-American principles directed at wingnuts looking for some basis to attack a decent man.
\
Rove tactics included the ‘not a dime’s worth of difference’ theme that the right always promotes, to keep some justification for voting against their own interests alive in reactionary areas.
Just how much cash did the GOP 1% blow on the Tea Party the last four years and how many Tea Baggers and Blue Dogs for that matter lost seats the last four years?
Joe Lieberman an independent now should be included in these totals being forced to retire and not having a Tea Bagger or another Blue Dog to fill his seat should count for a 1% er lost too.
I am just trying to point out our victory is bigger than we thought.
I think what really happened is that Rove was running a scam, he probably siphoned most of the money, which is now in his overseas numbered accounts. Their hate of “socialist” Obama made them blind. I guess Rove, if anything, is a brilliant psychologist, as well as a scam artist.
good see Rove getting his but I’ll really feel much better when the Wall St Dems get theirs! Replacing GOP Rovers with Ruben/Clintonites does not help much!!
Imagine what would have happened if the GOP used Karl’s money to identify what voters really wanted and both created positions that voters could support and ran candidates that would run on these positions. Then of course once in office they could pull an Obama and lie er change their minds.
Nixon ran on Peace with Honor and won if anything Karl’s failure is he sought to change people’s minds through endless repeating on news media and tv ads while trying to keep our ideas off the air but in the end outright about what voters wanted to hear won.
Karl was not helped by Sheriff Joe with Hispanics, the Numerous GOPers against abortion or by Anti Gay nuts if only Karl could have gotten them to shut their mouths the GOP very well might have won.
Last round numbers I heard was each side spent $1T to keep Obama in the White House, Senate Dem, and House Repub. $2T to maintain the status quo.
I expect Karl to blame Ron Paul voters for staying home or voting Libertarian for his loss soon.
I expect Karl to insist that Rep Ryan start talking to Ron’s people more and get some Cred.
The GOP as a whole will go more Libertarian but not on social issues.
Holy Crap if Both sides or even one side had a brain and donated that for hurricane relief America would be stronger, better now but if only one side did it that side would have gotten a ton more votes.
Mitt very well might have gotten the Blue States he needs.
If only one side put America first they would have had a mandate and a landslide.
Watching clips of Rush tells me what the right wing really thinks, and Rush is aghast that they should woo the Other voters, it would mean ‘opening the borders and giving out birth control’. Need I point out that both are good plans with reasonable regulation, but of course regulation is anathema to the fanatics.
It’s simply wonderful to watch KKKarl melt-down & have a come-uppance of sorts, but I wouldn’t count him OUT just yet. I think the Rover has dirt on everyone, and he’ll fight like the devil he is to keep skin the game. Too much money to GRIFT for that con artist to call it a day.
Does seem as if the R-Team has painted itself into a corner with their radical looney extremist nutcase “ideas.” There is certainly a very very very dedicated contingent of voters, however, who’ll cling & grasp to their lunacy, their so-called “Christian values,” and so on.
IMO, a big issue for the R-Team this time around was running a MORMON for POTUS. The fundie base has *always* believed that Mormons worship Satan (literally) and that they Are. Not. Christians.
Even though my fundie family members managed to bark out platitudes about Bishop Mormon Mitt being such a “great Christian,” I have a feeling that other fundies found it *very difficult* to vote for a Mormon…. especially after they had been so heavily propogandized & brainwashed to HATE on Obama for not being a Christian, either (even though he probably is).
Perhaps, finally at long last, the cognitive dissonance simply became too much even for the lunatic fringe to bear.
It’s interesting, that’s for sure.
Somehow, though, I cannot see El Lushbo & weird Glenn Beck backing down at this point, which I’m finally thinking is a GOOD THING.
heh…
An even more succinct pic was Karl Rove’s insistence that, while others had their numbers, he had THE numbers… and he was wrong.
PW- I like the Rasputin reference, but remember : he was shot, stabbed and poisoned, and refused to die.
I am channeling Nick Nolte’s character in Prince of Tides.
He’s just one of the underling chess pieces that get moved around the board and then knocked off when their usefulness has ended.
Rather than Rasputin, perhaps the Norse mythological character of Ratatosk, the Squirrel of Discord, would be more appropriate.
Serious, Ratatosk ran up and down the Tree of Life, spreading malicious gossip and lies, in an effort to destroy all that was good.
Sound familiar?
Yup, and sharing a cell with Cheney and Libby.
But eventually, Rasputin did die.
Rove’s career should have ended in 2006, but he came back from that. However, I don’t think he’ll come back from this — and in a way, that’s a pity, because I’d much rather see the GOP’s billionaire bigot backers wasting their money on him than putting it to more effective use.
Exactly. That is the 1% of Karl that isn’t total bullshit. But it’s something that anyone with half a brain (provided it’s not soaked in the sort of bilgewater that passes for Conventional Wisdom in the traditional US media) can understand and implement.
Joe Biden did this during the debate with Paul Ryan. He wasn’t afraid to come right out and call Ryan’s vaunted facts and figures “malarkey”, and Ryan, the Darling of the Villagers, collapsed like wet toilet paper. (Attacking an opponent’s alleged strength works even better when it’s easy as pie to expose that strength as a weakness.)
Dang, that could describe half the Republican Party’s operatives right there! As well as, to be fair, allegedly Democratic jerks like Joe Lieberman and Lanny Davis, the latter of whom we last saw shilling for dictators.
And this is where Shoebox has a grain of truth to his post-election whine that the Democrats suppressed GOP voter turnout: GOP turnout was apparently suppressed — about five million white voters stayed home — but that wasn’t because of anything Obama did, so much as it was a goodly chunk of the GOP base finding it impossible to vote for a Mormon who passed something greatly resembling Obamacare when he ran that liberal East Coast elitist state of Massachusetts.
(By the way: The GOP’s picking Romney for their 2012 candidate — which was in the cards as soon as the 2008 election was in the books, as Romney Got Next as a consolation prize for losing the ’08 primaries — guaranteed that they could not seriously use the ACA as a weapon. Not as an effective one, anyway.)
as long as the wealthy have good profit margins there will be plenty of $$$ to subvert this middle class democracy. anyone who thinkis right wing money is going to dry up is clueless. the money may flow more quietly to state races. Remember the wealthy have the means and the smarts to plasy the long game
Karl Rove, for his part in the strategy of feeding the rhetorical equivalent of red meat to a Rep candidate’s fundie base, helped create in Dem voters the idea that Obama was the lesser of two evils.
Karl Rove has earned himself a fishing trip on Fredo’s Lake.
Just when you think the Crazy cannot get more crazy, Texas, weighs in, to extend the
Crazy Window. At least one Republican official want to change the Texas Republicans to the Texans for Seccession. Yes, it could happen since Texas is a whole other country.
But who gets to vote for it? Not Obama voters, because they are maggots. Latino voters? I think not. We might have another Civil War.
Would Texas leaving the Union would weaken the US empire and thereby compromise out the nation’s capacity to wage perpetual war? Is it crazy to prefer jihad to McWorld? Why should England and the Thirteen Colonies live under the same government?
Did MSNBC spend a segment or two on Rove again? This would explain today’s blogosphere’s reoccurring theme (the neocon’s bluedogger drone regurgitation (not to be confused with the neocon’s teabagger drone regurgitation)). That fat fuck from News Corp only represents half of our problem. Comcast represents the other.