Rove Takes a Powder for the Children

Much maligned Bush top aide, "MC" Karl Christian Rove has finally called it quits. As with every other recent Bush "retiree," Rove claimed it was for the family.

"There's always something that can keep you here, and as much as I'd like to be here, I've got to do this for the sake of my family," Rove said.

As he sails off to the sunset, let's reflect on the sterling career of Rove as provided by Wikipedia
and the BBC.

In the fall of 1970, Rove used a false identity to enter the campaign office of Democrat Alan J. Dixon, who was running for Illinois State Treasurer, and stole 1000 sheets of paper with campaign letterhead. Rove then printed fake campaign rally fliers promising "free beer, free food, girls and a good time for nothing", and distributed them at rock concerts and homeless shelters, with the effect of disrupting Dixon's rally (Dixon eventually won the election). Rove's role would not become publicly known until August 1973. Rove told the Dallas Morning News in 1999, "It was a youthful prank at the age of 19 and I regret it."

Rove traveled extensively, participating as an instructor at weekend seminars for campus conservatives across the country. He was an active participant in Richard Nixon's 1972 Presidential campaign. As a protégé of Donald Segretti (later convicted as a WatergateGeorge McGovern as a "left-wing peacenik", in spite of McGovern's World War II stint piloting a B-24.

Rove discussed campaign techniques that included rooting through opponents' garbage cans. On August 10, 1973, in the midst of the Watergate scandal, the Post broke the story in an article titled "Republican Party Probes Official as Teacher of Tricks."

In 1977, Rove was the first person hired by George H. W. Bush for his official (ultimately unsuccessful) 1980 presidential campaign, which ended with Bush being selected as Ronald Reagan's vice-presidential nominee. Reagan and Bush won the election, but Rove was fired in the middle of the campaign for leaking information to the press.

Rove advised tobacco giant Phillip Morris, and ultimately earned $3,000 a month via a consulting contract. In a deposition, Rove testified that he severed the tie in 1996 because he felt awkward "about balancing that responsibility with his role as Bush's top political advisor" while Bush was governor of Texas and Texas was suing the tobacco industry.

In 1986, just before a crucial debate in campaign, Rove claimed that his office had been bugged by Democrats. The police and FBI investigated and discovered that the bug's battery was so small that it needed to be changed every few hours, and the investigation was dropped. Critics suspected Rove had bugged his own office to garner sympathy votes in the close governor's race.

Rove was fired from the 1992 Bush presidential campaign after he planted a negative story with columnist Robert Novak about dissatisfaction with campaign fundraising chief Robert Mosbacher Jr. (Esquire Magazine, January 2003). Novak provided some evidence of motive in his column describing the firing of Mosbacher by former Senator Phil Gramm: "Also attending the session was political consultant Karl Rove, who had been shoved aside by Mosbacher." Novak and Rove deny that Rove was the leaker, but Mosbacher maintains, "Rove is the only one with a motive to leak this. We let him go. I still believe he did it." During testimony before the CIA leak grand jury, Rove apparently confirmed his prior involvement with Novak in the 1992 campaign leak, according to National Journal reporter Murray Waas.

Rove has been accused of using supposed pollsters to call voters to ask such things as whether people would be "more or less likely to vote for Governor Richards if [they] knew her staff is dominated by lesbians." During the race, a regional chairman of the Bush campaign was quoted criticizing Richards for "appointing avowed homosexual activists" to state jobs. Only circumstantial evidence links Rove to the push-polling.

During the bitterly-contested 2000 Republican primary, allegations were made that Rove was responsible for a South Carolina push poll that used racist innuendo intended to undermine the support of Bush rival John McCain: "Would you be more likely or less likely to vote for John McCain for president if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?" Although McCain campaign manager Richard Davis said he "had no idea who had made those calls, who paid for them, or how many were made", the authors of the 2003 book and subsequent film Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential, allege that Rove was involved. In the movie, John Weaver, political director for McCain's 2000 campaign bid, says "I believe I know where that decision was made; it was at the top of the [Bush] campaign". Rove has denied any such involvement.

After the presidential elections in November 2000, Rove organized an emergency response of Republican politicians and supporters to go to Florida to assist the Bush campaign's position during the Florida recount.

Rove chaired meetings of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG), a secretive internal White House working group established by August 2002, eight months prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. According to CNN and Newsweek, WHIG was charged with developing a strategy for publicizing the White House's assertion that Saddam Hussein posed a threat to the United States. WHIG's existence and membership was first identified in a Washington Post article by Barton Gellman and Walter Pincus on August 10, 2003; members of WHIG included Bush’s Chief of Staff Andrew Card, Rice, her deputy Stephen Hadley, Vice President Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff Lewis “Scooter” Libby, legislative liaison Nicholas E. Calio, and communication strategists Mary Matalin, Karen Hughes, and James R. Wilkinson.

Last month, the US Senate issued a subpoena against him as part of an investigation into the sacking of eight federal prosecutors, but Mr Bush ordered him not to testify, citing executive privilege.

Mr Rove was also investigated in connection with the exposure of CIA agent Valerie Plame, though prosecutors decided he should not face any charges.

So Long Karl, I expect we will see you pulling strings for someone's campaign very soon.