Karl Rove...

I never really understood the beef the left had with this guy. White House Deputy Chief of Staff and an advisor to the President... I'm not even sure I'd call the guy "senior Cabinet", other than he'd known GW since '71.

I'd say his biggest mistake was in promising Bob Siegel (sp?) from NPR a GOP House and Senate a week prior to the '06 mid-terms. He got pretty high-and-mighty on Bob, and told him anyone saying the Dems were gonna take over both branches didn't know what they were talking about. Seems the polls Rove had been reading weren't as good as the ones Bob had been reading, after all.

I have nothing against Karl... I'm just not a huge fan. If he could point to something and say "There is what I helped achieve... there is my hand at work in the Bush Administration" then perhaps it would be a different story, but his name is associated with "strategy and planning" within the Bush White House, and I just don't see a lot of success stories coming from that area of Bush's legacy.

Prior to '03, Bush could do damn-near no wrong when it came to PR... but after that, it was ALL a disaster (as we have repeatedly said here at the Bund... Ryan is right). I don't even blame Rove for the PR disaster that eventually became the Bush White House, really. Bush had a great TV personality and presence that should have been exploited far more than it was, but I can't blame Rove for all of that. I can't blame Rove for Bush's inability to give "off-the-cuff" talks that didn't get him in a jackpot, either.

He was exonerated in the Plame scandal at every level, and even the Washington Post called for his detractors to apologize to him for the trouble caused by the lies and false allegations (the POST, mind you!).

Like I said... he has a long list of things that he DIDN'T do, or SHOULDN'T get in trouble for, but not much success, other than his insight into the Bush White House since '08.

I'm just not a fan.