Obsessing about Rove:
Is Rove just acting cocky as a way of lifting GOP morale, or does he really believe it? And, if the latter, is he deluding himself, or does he once again know something that Democrats do not?We're in this crazy period where we're analyzing what happened in the election that hasn't happened yet, and part of the craziness is the gripping fear that Karl actually knows.
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Rove' confidence probably comes from three sources.
1. Republican internal polls must be showing different numbers from MSM polls. This would not surprise me as MSM routinely cooks poll numbers to suit their left-wing propaganda purposes.
2. Rove has confidence in the Republican's get out the vote system that worked miracles in 2002 and 2004.
3. Rove believes that most voters do not make up their minds until the last week of the campaign. So for Rove, this campaign has just started.
Rove's genius lies in simply encouraging those on the left to talk a lot.
I think if Rove stopped wearing that high-necked smock, and had those ears looked at, he'd look alot more normal.
Karl's got it all wrong of course. He's busy getting people from the constituencies of his candidates to go to polls and pull levers for them. What a waste of time, when he could be photoshopping cable news hosts into blackface and posting them on the internet and, you know, really making a difference!
I bet he uses Microsoft Photodraw on a PC! And I bet he calls it "The Adobe Shop." Man, he's square.
Karl is too busy making Bob Casey's mouth move and sounds come out to be involved with stealing the election. That honor falls to Diebold's, er, I mean Hugo Chavez's voting machine company. Chavez is, of course, another Rove plant like Joe Lieberman, Ben & Jerry's-Powered Howard, and Harry Reid on any day that he doesn't climb onto the Senate's lectern and try to gnaw Orrin Hatch's throat out in a show of real resistance to the Republican program.
More people believe in talking to the dead, than approve of this President. Double digit deficits in polls across the country. Terrorists that killed us campaigning for you, that you haven't caught yet.
A Genius Strategist I tell ya!
Garage,
Doesn't that indicate that crazies and people who approve of Bush are different subsets? Is that really the Democratic strategy this time around, GOTCV (Get out the Crazies' Votes)?
More people believe in talking to the dead, than approve of this President.
The danger in using Presidential approval as a metric is that it presumes that the audienced polled are disapproving for the same reason. As has been mentioned by others, much of the increasing disapproval numbers come from Republicans. For some of us, that means he isn't being conservative enough on issues like spending and balancing the budget.
Legitimate campaign issues, to be sure, but not one that would make the voter more likely to vote Democrat (unless you know multitudes of people who enjoy voting themselves a tax increase; I don't).
Factor in the redistricting advantage that Republicans enjoy in a number of states, and the demonstrated ability to generate turnout, and I stand by the sentiment that the Republicans will maintain control of Congress...barely.
Then again, if the American public thought rationally, cellphone ringtones wouldn't be a multi-million dollar industry.
More people believe in talking to the dead, than approve of this President.
And just as many think Kevin Barrett is on to something. Therefore ... ???
And just as many think Kevin Barrett is on to something. Therefore ... ???
Therefore either:
a.) Karl Rove isn't a genius.
b.) You can't put lipstick on a pig.
I think Dems just squeak by though in the House, as the polls don't reflect gerrymandering. (As BJK noted) And if they do win the House, I doubt there will be a noticable difference honestly, as the war will still rage on.
One thing is certain: If the R's do, in fact, retain control of both houses, the media will, following the protocol established in a number of foreign elections, immediately backtrack on their pre-election pronouncements that this election is a referendum on Bush/Iraq/Etc., and claim that, oh, it was really a lot of local issues that overshadowed that stuff.
Re: Anthony:
One thing is certain: If the R's do, in fact, retain control of both houses, the media will, following the protocol established in a number of foreign elections, immediately backtrack on their pre-election pronouncements that this election is a referendum on Bush/Iraq/Etc., and claim that, oh, it was really a lot of local issues that overshadowed that stuff.
That's possible. I think it's more likely that commentators will run with they "they won, but!" storyline, about how they eked out a victory, but it nevertheless stands as a stern rebuke to the President, and now he had better listen to his betters, etc. etc.
Sorry anthony and balfegor, but you are both wrong.
When the Republicans retain both houses, the media will be far too busy covering stories about the Democrats complaining that the election was stolen, and the lawsuits they have filed.
Next will come all the talking heads trying to defend their polls, which once again will have proven to be totally inaccurate.
By December, they might finally get around to discussing the meaning/implications of the election results.
I think Rove honestly believes what he's saying. He'd look like too big of an idiot if he predicted victory -- in the face of most of the conventional wisdom -- and then his party got pasted in the elections.
But he could very well be wrong (and I think he is). Rove's brilliance has been seriously exaggerated. It wasn't his political genius that won the 2000, 2002, and 2004 elections -- it was the Democrats' political stupidity. His candidates win because the other side seemingly does everything it can to make swing voters not want to vote for them.
I believe Rove is a super smart guy. But I get tired of the media covering the race and making prognostications rather than covering the issues.
When is the last time the MSM actually presented the problem with let's say social security and analyzed options to fix it?
Like never- it's much more fun and easier to assemble four pundit duestchbags on Sundayt morning to guffaw at Chris Matthews' attempts at being clever and throw out guesses on who will win an election.
Anyone ever hear Nora O'Donnell's laugh? She almost gets hysterical at his crappy schtick. She certainly knows where her bread is buttered.
I guess I really hate Matthews huh? Need to go take my medicine -LOL.
Some previous mid-term elections results during the second term of a Republican Presidency (via yargb.blogspot):
1986 (Reagan): Democrats add eight Senate seats and 5 House seats. Gain the majority in the Senate 55-45. Keep the House majority (258-177)
1958 (Ike): Democrats +14 Senate (65-35 majority) and Democrats ; 48 in the House (283-153 majority).
And also:
1938 (FDR): Dems lose 6 in the Senate, 76 in the House.
Even if the Democrats live up to some of the pundits's promises next week, historically, the Bush/Rove machine still comes out looking pretty good. But if the Republicans gain seats in the Senate or House or in both, well, then, once again, the social scientists, the sophisticates, and the cheerleaders will have been caught with their pants down. Truman holding up the paper. Wall of Berlin falling kind of stuff. I for one believe something reflecting a more fundamental change in the electorate is going to occur. But I'm usually wrong. In any case, a very, very telling election, or, hum-drum.
Rove's strategy was to get more conservatives to vote Republican rather than getting more independents to vote Republican. the main theseis is that independents don't really vote as much (this their independence).
Conservatives have long been arguing that the Country is more conservative and that there was a "silent majority." This worked in 2002 and 2004.
There is no reason to think it won't work in 2006.
There is nothing "brilliant" about this strategy - it's mostly the proving of a long thought theory.
Rove may only know that things look as good from his end regarding turn out as they did in 2004. It doesn't mean that Republicans will win, however, it may mean it won't be a slaughter.
I'm almost ready to believe because I'm told so often that the Democrat's eighteen wheeler is running strong, but one wheel seems to be coming off. And if Maryland ain't a sure thing... Who's on the defense again? And given the pounding he has taken, the 35% to 40% percent of the electorate that still supports Bush, are they not very, very, very likely to vote? A liability can become an asset fairly quickly during a mid-term election.
Never attribute to grand conspiracy theories what can be attributed to ordinary tactics. People who can't see even simple explanations for ordinary things are mentally impaired.
IOW - Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof!
Given how many fewer people vote in midterm elections vs presidential, getting some grassroots activity in a few key areas could pay off well or at least keep things close from a Republican perspective. Its a modern version of getting dead people in south Texas and inner city Chicago to cast for for JFK/LBJ.
Don't you guys get the emails? I'm on Karl's super secret probation news letter in which he tells us exactly what he knows and what will happen.
Karl is happy because, given even a modestly competent poltical opponent, he'd have been buried by now. That he's even in the game suggests that he can still pull a rabbit out of his hat and maintain control of both the Senate and the House.
The polls are for crap, but they always are. The R's are still in a lot of trouble, but the trends are positive. The internals are slightly more positive then the media polls--fancy that.
The horse races are, well, horse races but Karl has a few time honored tricks up his sleeve--more money, better organization, and killer GOTV.
He's also betting that the Dems will continue to step on their collective wankers.
It's Rove by a nose.
Never underestimate Karl Rove, he knows all of the old Apache tricks.
WV: hnikpsl
Meaning: Apache trick #34
Whose brain is more massive: Karl Rove’s or Antonin Scalia’s
Since I keep getting accused of being a Republican I think I'll go ahead and answer, because that's an easy one: Scalia. I disagree with a large percentage of what he says, but there's no doubting that the man's highly intelligent.
Shanna's right -- it isn't Bush supporters who think Rove's a genius. Bush supporters support Bush for their own reasons, or at least reasons they think are their own. It is Bush's *opponents*, the people who think he's a dim-witted inarticulate clod, who think that Rove must be a genius to keep winning elections. But Karl Rove only looks like a genius when you stand him next to losers like Terry McAuliffe or Howard Dean. It doesn't exactly take the second coming of Niccolo Machiavelli to think up stuff like "try to focus on patriotic and defense issues in wartime" and "cut taxes and increase spending to buy votes".
You know, I'm pretty sure that I've never met a single Republican, on-line or in real life, who actually cared one way or the other about Karl Rove.
Pretty much every conversation I've ever had about him has been with a Democrat demanding that I in some way "repudiate" any association with Rove (as if Karl Rove is somehow singularly vile in his political machinations, as opposed to, say, James Carville). Personally, I couldn't care less. He's the political guy. I prefer to care about the ideas guy.
Why in the world would anyone believe the polls? As I noted a few weeks ago, polls are only good for entertainment value, at best--much like a horoscope, and about as accurate.
The only polls that actually mean anything are the ones that will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on November 8.
Oops, make that November 7 in my earlier post.
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