Friday, November 09, 2012

Conservatives and Billionaires Turn on Karl Rove

Perhaps one of the sweetest aspects of the 2012 election results is to have seen virtually all of the candidates backed by Karl Rove's foul Crossroads PAC go down in flames.  Living in Virginia one could help but hear the Crossroads ads - some of the most dishonest and blatant in their lies that I have ever heard.  Indeed, the Crossroads ads made Mitt Romney himself appear to be paragon of honesty in comparison.  In retrospect I suspect that the ads may have done more harm that good because anyone who paid the least amount of listening to other sources or a smidgen of fact checking could only see the ads as bald faced lies.  The election results indicate that contrary to Rove's belief, Americans are not all total cretins and morons - unlike the millionaires and billionaires Rove shook down for money that they might well have better burned based on the zero results Rove delivered.  The only short term winner apparently was Rove who no doubt paid himself very well along the way.  Here are highlights from a Salon piece that looks at the rising fury of those Rove played for fools:

Karl Rove helped pour $400 million of outside money into the 2012 elections. But since Republican candidates were walloped on Tuesday, the backlash against the Rove strategy is coming fast, and he has a lot of explaining to do.

Rove has alternately blamed Hurricane Sandy (“The president was also lucky,” he wrote in a Thursday Wall Street Journal Op-Ed. ”This time, the October surprise was not a dirty trick but an act of God. Hurricane Sandy interrupted Mr. Romney’s momentum and allowed Mr. Obama to look presidential and bipartisan”) and argued that if not for Crossroads, “this race would have been over a long time ago.”

But mostly Republicans are lashing out at Rove. Rick Tyler, an adviser for Todd Akin’s campaign, pointed to Rove’s management of his super PAC. ”Rove spends more for Republican candidates than the NRSC and the NRCC. He’s running things,” Tyler told BuzzFeed. He added, “Rove is definitely a problem.”

A Wednesday New York Times article highlighted Rove’s on-air meltdown over Fox News’ projection that Obama had won Ohio, saying that Rove’s refusal to accept the result “raises questions about his role.” Rove explained that his objections were based on memories of “premature calls” in 2000.

”The billionaire donors I hear are livid,” a Republican operative told HuffPo. “There is some holy hell to pay. Karl Rove has a lot of explaining to do … I don’t know how you tell your donors that we spent $390 million and got nothing.”

Minnesota mega-donor Stan Hubbard told Politico of the call: “Obviously, somebody made a mistake and didn’t do things right. There’s no question about that.”

I will be honesty.  I find Karl Rove to be a foul and nasty individual by almost every measure not the least of which is his willingness to brazenly lie and  sow hate and discord.  One can only hope that after the Crossroads debacle he will be relegated to the political wilderness where he belongs.

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