Karl Rove Endorses Hillary Clinton
2 comments August 19th, 2007
Karl Rove, soon to leave his role as President Bush’s key political advisor, enjoys near-mythic status as a political tactician. In a flurry of media appearances, he has expressed his viewpoint that Hillary Clinton is “fatally flawed” as a presidential candidate, due to her high negative ratings in polling data.
Many media pundits have speculated that Rove knows that Hillary Clinton will use his attacks upon her to solidify her support among the left-liberal base of the Democratic Party. Supposedly, that will help her achieve her goal of securing her party’s presidential nomination, a goal also sought by the Republicans, because they are said to believe that she would be the easiest Democrat to beat in November 2008.
I would like to offer an alternative interpretation. I think that Karl Rove actually knows that Hillary Clinton is the most formidable candidate the Democrats can field and that it is virtually certain the Republicans are going to lose the White House in 2008. What is at issue is preventing a total wipeout of G.O.P. seats in Congress. Hillary Clinton and her political machine are poised to inflict a severe defeat on Republican congressmen and senators that can perhaps be mitigated by the Democrats nominating a presidential candidate lacking the ruthlessness and resources of Hillary Clinton and her clique.
As the saying goes, politics makes strange bedfellows. It may be that Rove is making common cause with Obama, by butressing the arguments being made by some opponents of Hillary in the Democratic Party, claiming she is not electable, owing to her negatives in the polls. Will it work? Not a chance. The Clinton political machine is already preparing the attack ads that will use Karl Rove’s attacks on her for the benefit of Hillaryland. In effect, perhaps without realizing it, Karl Rove has just lent Hillary Clinton an endorsement that she can actually take to the bank. If Karl Rove were playing soccer, this would be described as an “own goal.” With Republican “opposition” as inept as this, Hillary and Bill Clinton are probably basking in bewilderment at how cooperative many Republicans are unwittingly proving to be in facilitating their own electoral destruction in 2008.
