Karl Rove Re-Aligned

By Andrew Gumbel, HuffingtonPost.com. Posted November 9, 2006.

Karl Rove's dream of ushering in a generation of Republican rule is officially dead. What now?

Bye bye, Turd Blossom. Karl Rove's dream of refashioning the American political landscape and ushering in a generation of Republican rule is officially dead. The radical Republican revolution, which began with Barry Goldwater, hit paydirt with Ronald Reagan and reached its highwater mark with the 1994 Contract With America, has come to a screeching halt, and it's largely the fault of George W's consigliere.

Make no mistake: when Rove was good, he was very, very good. He understood exactly how to manipulate, divide and intimidate the electorate so he could eke out the narrowest of winning margins -- the 50 per cent plus one model, which was as much as the radical Republican policy agenda was ever going to muster. But divisiveness will only take you so far. Politics is, above all, the art of coalition building. Without the Rehnquist Supreme Court, without a supine Democratic Party in opposition and, above all, without 9/11, he would never have made it even this far.