[cross-posted at And, yes, I DO take it personally and Daily Kos]
yeah, there are some pretty dangerous characters running around these days – frist, delay, cheney, dobson, perkins, santorum, cornyn, bolton, to name a few – but none of them scares me quite like karl rove… given the obvious critical juncture we seem to be at in this country with dobson attempting to take over the senate and the courts now that he’s already occupied the executive branch, it would be well to remember the “invisible hand” that’s keeping all the pieces in play…
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rove is a double-whammy guy, a pathological genius, and he’s been honing his take-no-prisoners, chop-the-bodies-into -little-pieces and shave-the-ground-with-a-razor- so-there’s-nothing-left brand of political “success” since his high-school debate team days in the late 60’s… he’s one mean son-of-a-bitch and his genius is being able to put the pieces together and keep them together… there’d be plenty of shit coming down WITHOUT rove, to be sure, but WITH him, the r’s are like a juggernaut, flattening everything in their path…
i’ve beaten this same drum over and over and i will continue to do so because that’s how serious a threat i believe rove to be… let’s turn to some sources, including rove himself… (all bold and italics are mine…)
the above quote comes from the book, “bush’s brain,” authored by james moore and wayne slater in 2003… they’re highly credible journalists who have made a study of rove over many years and their portrait is grim but very enlightening… quite frankly, the book should be required reading for every citizen of voting age in this country… the authors, without making direct accusation (the book takes great pains to focus on facts rather than speculation and diatribe), make a fairly convincing case that rove’s strategy during bush’s first term was to cynically use saddam hussein and the war on iraq as a very opportune distraction from the worsening economy, corporate corruption (bound to rub off on the r’s), and the fact that the “war on terror” was not going well… even today with the widespread belief that the american people were lied to about the reasons for going to war in iraq, the real motives behind iraq are rarely explored… the authors quote jason stanford, a national democratic consultant…
that’s the word… “evil…” i believe rove is evil… i believe there is nothing he wouldn’t do or say to advance the agenda of the far-right wing of the republican party but, even more than that, to win… when the man can utter incredible things like the following, we all need to be afraid, very afraid…
that may well qualify as one of the most pathological accounts i have ever read… well, ok, this one from sidney blumenthal is right up there too… blumenthal was describing bush and rove at the inaugural of the clinton library in arkansas last november…
once your eyes are really wide open to this guy, you can see the effects of that “invisible hand” everywhere… he’s really very, very good at hiding it and, no matter how much some particular piece of skulduggery looks like rove’s work, there’s only the thinnest suspicion of a shimmer of a ghost of a thread to concretely tie back to him… but he’s there… he’s always there… quoting from moore and slater once again…
You are preaching to the choir on this one, with me, I have thought Rove was evil and malignent for the last four years since he came into prominent public view.
I think everything you have said above is spot on. He is this countries no. one problem at this time.
Check out this site for “Voice of the White House” comments relating to Rove and others, by a white house ‘insider.’
http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/category.asp?id=41
a lot of folks tend to discount his genius, unfortunately… a great many more don’t even know who he is…
Keep on beating the drums as you put it in article above. It’s very hard to see his giant big head, tends to make me ill and I have not had breakfast yet. Will I be able to eat now, doubt it.
The method of his madness is eerily similar to Hitler is it not?…..Create a web of control and then tighten it till it chokes all who do not conform.
Wish we on the dem side had an equal force for good to match this man. Where are all the good men today….to stand up to this malevolence????????
You may be preaching to the choir, but we’re all on the same page of the hymnal for this anthem.
The particulars of his evil need to be laid out often, as soon as they emerge. It is not paranoia to feel he is the force behind this administration; this press; this religious craziness.
Your diary is scary, and it’s good.
I knew that.
Have you been able to connect him to the CBS/Dan Rather/TANG memo?
Some day the truth will out on that one and let’s hope
we get to see Karl Rove squirm.
nor any hope that rove or the rest of the gang will have their day of accountability… when mcnamara, kissinger, and ollie north are still walking around, pontificating, and negroponte, alive, well, and arrogant, now heads national intelligence, what are the chances rove, bush, cheney, rumsfeld, wolfowitz, perle, feith, et al, will have their feet held to the fire…?
our national precedent IS war crimes, it IS brutal, covert action, it IS deception… from the backing of the sadistic contras, to the support of the brutal pinochet regime, to the bombing of cambodia, all the way back to the still festering native american genocide, accountability has never attracted a particularly strong following in this country…
mcnamara, kissinger, and ollie north
are villified wherever they go. McNamara was
in the Fog of War, a senile unrepentent old
fool. Kissinger was forced to back off from
a Bush appointment.
Do you think Oliver North and Negroponte walk
around unaware of what is written about their
nefarious pasts?
You present only one side of the American national
precedent. These are dark times for America.
and, yes, it’s only one perspective, an ugly one to be sure, but certainly not the defining perspective… unfortunately, it’s one that tends to remain hidden even tho’ it’s a thread that runs throughout our history…
I only sort of agree. I think Rove is amoral, manipulative, and will do anything to get and keep power and I think the Democrats (and some Republicans) were too slow to recognize that. But I don’t think he’s any sort of evil genius that can’t be beaten or anything.
He’s a very nasty piece of work, but once one recognizes that, and also what his methods are, and his likely MO in any situation, then one just works smarter and anticipates his moves in order to counter them.
I think the left has bought in to the entire Rove genius thing way too much. His “genius” consists of a willingness to ignore laws, promote fear, rig voting, make sure that people are lied to, and when they discover it, reinforce the lie and don’t back down, and so on. Everything he (and/or Bush/Cheney/whoever) touches turns to crap. And people are starting to catch on to that, finally.
Sometimes I think what we need most to face him down is not a politician or a think tank, but Elliot Ness. He puts the Mafia to shame.
But he’s not unbeatable.
NOBODY’S unbeatable… but i do believe he is at the genius intellectual level and i do believe he is a master at tactics and strategy…
Yes I sort of think he’s a master of tactics and strategy too. But he can’t control the outcome.
Thus, while it was his idea to “roll out the product” of the Iraq invasion in Sept and steamroll it through, not a one of them seems to have expected that there would be any resistance among the Iraqi population. The occupation is getting more and more unpopular, as time goes on.
It may or may not have been his idea to treat the rest of the world, including allies, as if they didn’t matter but there too the public is finally catching on and getting worried about our image in the world.
There is the entire Schiavo fiasco as well, where the political instincts were wayyyyy off. And I think stuff like that will happen more and more… now maybe he has some sort of genuis tactical thing up his sleeve that’ll pull all this out of the mire, but if I had to guess, it would again be dependent on a willingness to break or bend laws, and to roll over opposition.
His strategy in 2004 of getting out the base and having the base also get out people (sort of the MLM of voting) was brilliant, but could have been forseen and duplicated in some fashion on the left. He didn’t exactly demonize the opposition either… he more made them (Kerry, Dean, etc) objects of scorn and laughter and mockery. Which is what we need to do, I believe. And even then, he depended on Republican Secretary’s of State and the machines, to “deliver”.
I think by concentrating too much on his “genius” and evilness and not enough on his actual criminal tactics, stripped down to basics, and on the really bad results of them, that we are giving Rove and the right too much power. They’ve screwed up everything they’ve touched. Nothing has worked except the manipulating of elections, that I know of. And the attempt to ram through the right wing agenda, which they’ve only been able to do thus far with the sometimes eager cooperation of the Democrats. Other than that, what have they done, or what has Rove pushed for, that’s worked?
his criminality… i also don’t think it’s giving him too much power to recognize his massive intellect… it’s just reality…
“Other than that, what have they done, or what has Rove pushed for, that’s worked?”
well, let’s see…
-the social contract is in tatters and social programs are being progressively starved
-civil liberties are disappearing by the day
-racism, bigotry and hatred are not only being tolerated, they are being encouraged
-the executive branch is now stacked with toadying ideologues
-the takeover of the judicial system is nearly complete with only some appeals courts appointments to go before tackling the biggie, the supreme court
-the deficit is skyrocketing and the dollar currency is at great risk
-the special privileges, perquisites, and breaks for the wealthy are growing at a breakneck pace (as is their wealth)
-the economy is being fueled on debt
-savings rates are at historic lows
-the real estate bubble has reached frightening proportions and some new homeowners may soon see negative equity but bankruptcy won’t be an option
-environmental protections are in ruins
-consumer protections are being dismantled
-corporate social responsibility is dwindling along with governmental oversight of business
-the middle class is disappearing
-social darwinism has been confirmed as the secular ideology
-the constitution, the bill of rights, and the declaration of independence are no longer our national bulwarks
-fundamentalist christianity has been confirmed as the religious ideology
-practical, working, mutually beneficial relationships with other countries have been repudiated
-all accountability within the world community has been renounced
all of this and more, of course, you already know and neither of us would put any of it in the category of what’s “worked” – but that’s precisely the point… what to us is a litany of abuse and criminality is to them (and to rove) a chronicle of success… they have accomplished a phenomenal amount and it’s taken them over 30 years of intensive effort to do it…
rove’s vision is very long-term… clearly he isn’t the only major player but he is the one who, more than anyone, has always seen all of the pieces and how they could come together… moreover, has been masterful at making sure they continue to fall into place…
no one would be happier than i if the present difficulties the r’s are experiencing continued to fester and grow and eventually blossomed into the giant, poisonous, diseased abomination it is… i truly hope that’s where it’s headed… but even if it does go that way and the bushco cabal gets sent packing, there’s still cancerous lesions on every part of this corpus we call the u.s… they’ve been growing and metastasizing for years… as the docs say, bushco is just the “presenting problem…”
Genius? He is a political animal with one ambition:
Power.
He does have a major weakness, his diet.
Bon appetit Karl! mange, mange, mange.
I agree with most of what you are saying, especially the disastrous effects of what policies and such they’ve put into place, and how they consider them victories.
Long term, however, I’m not so sure. They have indeed spent 30 years laying the groundwork and blanketing the landscape in the small spaces, and have finally achieved at least one long term goal… being the party in power in the White House, the Senate and House, and most of the Supreme Court (they are working on solidifying that). And what’s the first thing they do? Start acting like a bunch of crazy guano insane people… to the point where even those who have supported them can’t help but notice.
I think the prospects for a long term Republican dominance are getting slimmer by the day because in order to gain the slight majority that they have, they’ve had to become the party of the wacko religious right — not only the ones that are using the religion as a power tool, but also the ones that really believe all that junk. And that is starting to freak out people (way too slowly, but at least it’s a beginning).
Anyway, I just may be too much of a pollyanna but I think they’ve sown the seeds of their own destruction, because the vast majority of people in the US don’t especially want a religious theocracy, even if they are Republicans. Nor do they want a South American type economy, or many of the other things that seem to be in the plans.
So, is it too late to push back against all this stuff? It may be… they may have it all sewn up, but not, in my mind, because of Rove’s genius and strategy, but because of common thuggery and criminality (and that’s really nothing new in politics).
Maybe we are talking about the same things but just emphasiszing different points.
PLEASE rent or buy the dvd of “Bush’s Brain”. Even former partners will no longer speak his name. This is not just some fly by night political/campaign advisor. In the movie he is called the”Co-President”. Nothing gets decided without Karl! Pure Evil. He will stop at nothing and the way he twists and turns things is his genius. BUT on that note, no one is infallable and this brcks of shit are starting to crumble IMHO.