Letters to the Editor
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What a bunch of bull...
...Congress has provided the oversight that they promised they would. Our government has become so throughly rotten under Bush and his toadies, there are just too many issues to fix in one Congress. Simply exposing the massive illegality of the Bush Administration is a fulltime effort. However, what we are beginning to see is a real debate on war funding, Gonzales is gone (no matter what you think of the latest blowhard in the AG job), Rove has moved on, Karen Hughes is out, Rumsfeld has said good-bye and Wolfowitz has been knocked off his perch in the World Bank. While many people believed the message that the war will end after the 2006 Election, I think upon reflection the message that was sent was more along the lines of "Constrain Bush and provide oversight". The leadership has certainly not gone far enough in confronting Bush, but we have had real progress in restoring our democratic traditions and process. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are NOT the enemy people, they are our friends. Sometimes our friends disappoint us, but in the end we have to stick with our friends.
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With the best of intentions
Rove's statement is a cunning play on the themes of liberal discontent with the Dems. But look at it closely -- it's nowhere near 'right'.
1. The past lamented with crocodile tears: "...that moment has passed." The Dems have a moment every week. They can grab one whenever they feel like it. There will be many, many more as the current disintegration proceeds apace.
2. The shunning of immense power. "They have demonstrated both the inability and unwillingness to govern." Last time I looked, the executive branch had some ideas about governing. Since when has it become willing to abandon those at the behest of a small majority in congress? A real opposition party could make some trouble, but it couldn't govern. The system just doesn't work that way.
3. Suppose the Dems had shown some spine. Do you imagine that Rove would be praising them for 'governing'?
The Republicans are staring at a wipeout of historical proportions. Rove is trying to find a reason to favor his side -- essentially, lesser of two evils -- because no argument still exists based on what they do.
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Karl Rove Is Wrong
And you are an idiot. When Democrats make significant gains in both houses of Congress, occupy the White House, and make further gains throughout the state legislatures and governorships throughout America in 2008, I want you to revisit this post.
I am in no way advocating the prone political posture of the Democrats with this post.
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Yes.
Thank you for pulling this out of the rest of the Rovian ravings. As usual, there's a spin -- he is taking perception, magnifying it and feeding it back as The Truth. I don't know what "govern" means, but they can legislate, and they have done so in some notable instances. They have also renewed oversight with good results, in some cases. These are functions of Congress. What they have not done is to come up with a clear and credible alternative to Bush foreign policy.
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I'm sorry, but isn't Rove a strategist?
Does nobody remember Rove's confident assertion on NPR that Republicans were going to sweep the 2006 elections?
Does nobody remember before the Bush Terror started that Rove was called in by Jim Lehrer to assess W's performance in the debates and confidently asserted that Bush's performance was "presidential" and "masterful."
As a strategist, he can't admit defeat, ever, and he must assert that his side maintains complete control, even as it flails around looking for something beyond torture and 'lower taxes' and no health care for poor children to stand for. It is the carefully crafted tiny kernels of truth in his web of deceit that make us all cringe. That's his job.
Am I frustrated that the Democrats haven't got a veto-proof majority in the Senate? Yes. Am I upset that the Left isn't capable of moving the mainstream media's bias and setting the agenda for a change? Yes.
But those Dems in dangerous districts need to hold onto their angry Republican defections in the next round of elections, and we shouldn't pay a moment of attention to Karl Rove or any of the other pundits who are given bully pulpits by ideological outlets such as the Wall Street Journal.
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Two things...
1. It's Karl Rove, who wouldn't know the truth if was in suppository form and shoved up his lying...
2. It's the WSJ editorial page, who couldn't bother to tell the truth even if they were being paid to do so. Which they are not.
@ carlton: "Congress has provided the oversight that they promised they would."
How, exactly? By considering liability protection for telco's that violated the law, for years? By thinking, maybe, just maybe, they should hold in contempt former admin officials that have ignored subpoenas, basically telling them to mind their own business? By voting with the GOP (not all, but enough), hell, even allowing a vote, to censure MoveOn for a newspaper ad? By confirming people to the bench who obviously have no business being there? By declaring "off the table" the most important check on an out of control executive? The Dems have a lot of appeasement to atone for (MCA, the bankruptcy bill, Medicare "reform," Iraq, Kyl-Lieberman), and incrementalism and triangulation in the face of an onslaught of bullshit is half hearted, at best, and at worst, looks like a cynical attempt to merely wait out the clock until they get all the powers Cheney has accumulated, and all the K Street business.
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Here's the Interpretation
What Karl Rove is trying to do is bait the Democrats into cutting off the funding for the war. He, as well as all the Bush ilk, are trying to get he Democrats to move in this direction. Why else does he consistently call them out? He wants them to commit political suicide and cut off the funds so that the Republicans can cry foul and smear the Dems as defeatists.
The Democrats have done an effective job of not allowing for their labeling of defeatists. The Democrats will continue to slowly give Bush what he wants in oder to ensure that this war has the Bush, Cheney and Karl names written all over it.
Karl is trying to disspell the Dems out of the gate. He does not understand that he was a part of one of the worst presidencies in US history. He also doe snot understand that to get anything done in the COngress their either needs to be a super majority or a president of the same party, as Karl and Bush had the pleasure of having as they cramed thier ideology down the throat of unsuspecting Americans.
Karl has not, is not and never will be an effective leader. Leaders don't cheat and lie (qualities that are synonymous with Karls name). In his pice he's trying to swing the Independents to the right with the concomitatnt intent of trying to get the Democrats to cut off the funding for the War.
The Democrats are wise to Karl's motives. Karl's words are are fuel for the idiot blogers on right wing sites to cut and and paste as they try to discredit a Congress who has been in power for 10 months.