*snicker* New FOXNews “analyst” Karl Rove has some words of caution *snort* for any politico thinking about going negative on Barack Obama *guffaw* by focusing on his middle name. *BWAHAHAHAHAHA*
Sorry, it was hard to keep a straight face as I typed that. As I wipe a tear of mirth from my eye, let us just remember this is Karl “John McCain fathered an illegitimate black baby” and “John Kerry made up his Vietnam injuries” Rove. The man who redefined dirty tricks in a campaign claims that using Obama’s middle name will help Obama and hurt McCain.
Download | Play Download | Play (h/t Heather)
ROVE: Look the “Hussein”…using his middle name helps Obama, it doesn’t hurt him. So anybody who wants to help John McCain ought to stop using…
WALLACE: How do you explain that?
ROVE: ‘Cause I think people look at it and say, ‘look, that’s one step too far. You’re trying to leave an implication that he is a Muslim when I know he’s not.’ And I think you know, lot of times attacks in politics fail, in fact they turn into a negative for the person who’s doing the attacking because people think it’s gone too far. And this frankly, goes too far. Now, having ties to Louis Farrakhan and his anti-Semitic comments, that’s…that’s…you know, people have a reasonable, that’s a reasonable question. Do you agree with him, do you renounce him, do you reject him? But this idea of getting up there and using the guy’s middle name in order to imply something about him is…it goes too far.
Really? You have to wonder about Rove’s ulterior motive with this–plausible deniability for future whisper campaigns? The whole “Obama is secretly a Muslim” meme is one that is playing very, very well with the wingnut blogosphere and the rest of their base. And that he thinks Obama’s “ties” to Louis Farrakhan are fair game. Hmmm….shall we look at some of the scary things that John Hagee has said, an endorsement that McCain actively pursued? Would you advise McCain denounce and reject Hagee, Karl?
Filed Under: Election 08, Fox News Sunday/Chris Wallace, Karl Rove
No Trackbacks To “FNS: Rove Claims To Have Standards On Negative Campaigning“
tell a lie and make sure it’s BIG and never stop telling it. be relentless in your conviction of propaganda. this is the tactic that Hitler used as well.
weldon @ 1:
I posted that on Shemp Hannity’s forum and posted all the major talking heads. They banned me for that one.
They want to save all of the negative propaganda for when they know which one will be the nominee.
Look, dirty politics is a fine art. You have to have had training in college. It’s best left to professionals.
Rove apparently thinks his past will go away if he ignores it. That’s gonna’ be pretty hard to do, once the indictments start rolling in. Lawyer up, porky.
“Hussein doesn’t bother him”? Really? Then why were the reichwing so offended by a person saying, “Go fuck yourself, Mr. Cheney”? Why so offended as “He put the W in AWOL”?
Rove is an anal cyst, not an analyst. Actually, he’s better described as what comes out….
This isn’t about whether the trick is dirty or not, but about whether the dirty trick is effective or not. Specifically, Rove know that MANY conservatives who may harbor racist views, are really sort of soft racists, in that they probably are racist, but don’t like to think of themselves as racists. Coming out strong with a racist ‘Obama is a black muslim’ strategy will backfire with these typed of voters, causing them to either stay home or maybe even voting for Obama, rather than admit to themselves they are racists.
Chopvac @ 6:
Hey, thats a total insult to anal cysts!
Marcus Aurelius @ 5:
Oh, he’s alredy lawyered up. Just hope the prosecuters are on top of their game. Problem is all the evidence they have destroyed.
All I know is, Karl Rove must have been one butt-ugly baby. That is truly a face only a mother (or GWB) could love.
I’m fairly convinced the man would view a 2nd Civil War in the US as a positive thing. red vs. blue. think of the consulting fees!
rove seems to have no problem with being a religious or racial bigot, he’s just askeered that he might be pegged as the wrong kind of religious or racial bigot.
I am not a Senator Obama supporter. I voted for Senator Clinton in the Arizona Presidential Preference Election back in February.
With that information out of the way, the real question EVERYONE should be asking is: If the U.S. Constitution prohibits a religious litmus test for anyone seeking Federal office, than why shouldn’t a person of the Muslim faith be allowed to run for President?
Phoenix Justice @ 13:
I can imagine that question coming up if we ever have a muslim running for president. Hasn’t happened yet, so why should we be asking that question?
Phoenix Justice @ 13:
Cause a large portion of our country are either racial or religious bigots?
If it were up to me I’d ask every american this question: Would you vote for an incompetent/dishonest person of your faith, over a competent/honest of a differing or no faith?
Anyone who answered yes would be put on a raft with the religious text of their choice and pushed out to sea.
This man is a traitor. His actions in the Plame affair gave material aid and comfort to the enemy in time of war.
He should be sent to the wall.
After a fair trial of course.
Standards?
really.
hmmmmmmm? what will he say next?
Do not underestimate Rove. By insisting that Obama’s middle name should not be used for negative campaigning, he has already achieved the following things:
1. He implies that there is something wrong with Obama’s name (”oh it is so bad and evil that even I will not touch it with a ten foot pole!”)
2. He perpetuates the meme in the news cycles — people are now always talking about it, continually reinforcing point 1, that there is something bad about it and you should be worried.
3. Like Calpurnia, he is seen to be chaste and above the fray, so when negative attacks do occur downstream in September and October (oh yeah you bet they are gonna happen) he has complete plausible deniability.
Obama needs to squelch this fast, and as fast and effectively as he dealt with the flag pin nonsense. Otherwise it will become a millstone around his neck, the elephant in the room that will never go away. The more people try not to think about it, the more prominent it will become.
Rove is scared.
The truth of the matter is that the use of “Hussein” when referring to Obama is in fact having a positive impact on Obama because the negative tactic is losing effect and is backlashing on those that use it. People are beginning to see the lunacy in it. It’s a fringe effect, but it is gaining momentum.
At the moment, Rove is just sticking another finger in yet another leaks in the dyke holding together the neo-con dream. The sooner he shuts these (obvious) loon-jobs up the better it will be for McCain.
why is no one discussing this important factor??
Stop-Clinton movement takes root
“Obamacans,” as the campaign likes to call its Republican supporters, offer a variety of reasons for turning out for Obama, not the least of them a lack of interest in the Republican primary now that Sen. John McCain of Arizona has all but wrapped up his party’s nomination. Others say they genuinely think Obama is the best candidate for change.
But a significant proportion say they are temporarily backing Obama for strategic reasons. They plan to vote Republican in November, but for now, their goal is to try to make sure Clinton cannot win.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23394070/
Nicole,
I think you’re great, but on this one I think you missed the point. Rove is not coming out against negative campaigning, he’s advising Republicans to make sure they do it in a way that doesn’t backfire. He’s like the parent who doesn’t care what his kid does as long as he doesn’t get caught.
What is wrong with Chris Wallace, is he really that clueless….
See? Obama really IS uniting the country. He’s gotten me to (somewhat) agree with Karl Rove…
This man endangered the lives of dedicated civil servants for pure political gain. The fact that he now carries on as if no such thing happened, indicates he is a true sociopath, making him more dangerous than most folks think. Just a hunch.
they are influencing our primary. we are being so easy to manipulate. they are helping put forth the weaker candidate. once you peel away the votes that really will go to mccain, the hillary support that will not vote for OBAMA, minus the democrats voting for nadar, i think you OBAMACANS ar in for a predictable surprise.
43% of people associate OBAMA with INEXPERIENCE.
Rove’s ulterior motive is simple and obvious; he would much rather his Party run a campaign against an “I am not a wartime president” Barack Obama candidate during wartime than against Hillary Clinton. He knows the American people always elect the more hawkish candidate as president at a time of war. He knows it, McCain knows it, Clinton knows it.
The only one who doesn’t seem to know it is Barack Obama. But he’ll certainly find out all about it eventually.
crazyworld @ 21:
Rove’s and McCain’s supposed repudiation of these remarks is also designed to keep them above the fray. They’ll just let those other ugly people say those ugly things. McCain’s too good for that, don’tcha know.
Rove knows that Obama will not sit back and take it like Kerry and McCain did.
I think Rove was trying to say that if you’re going to do it, then go full bore. Don’t stop at Hussein - go for the Hussein Osama.
Put out commercials, send out flyers, splash it on billboards, make a movie about it. That’s how you do it.
Don’t leave them questioning whether he is a Muslim, leave no doubt in their puny skulls that he is.
Anonymous @ 2:
there’s a REASON why Obama will not go on FOX. it’s because he is going to dismantle FOX. annex it, tear it apart, scatter the pieces and display it for ALL to see.
he’s going to institute the fairness doctrine and all the rest of the corporate MSM will be SO AFRAID of losing billions of dollars they will quickly fall in line.
Glenn Beck et al will be held up and displayed as the EVIL they are.
#26 “Rove’s ulterior motive is simple and obvious; he would much rather his Party run a campaign against an “I am not a wartime president” Barack Obama candidate during wartime than against Hillary Clinton. He knows the American people always elect the more hawkish candidate as president at a time of war. He knows it, McCain knows it, Clinton knows it.
The only one who doesn’t seem to know it is Barack Obama. But he’ll certainly find out all about it eventually.”
So the cloak is removed. One-half of the Democratic party is willing to accept a perpetual state of war.
michelle @ 25:
And 57% of people don’t. Funny math you have there. As for the rest of your post, you know little about politics.
Hagee is more dangerous than people realize. He will be the head of the Department of the End of Days, under president McCain. He will direct the military to reproduce seens from revelation on location.
It’s Me @ 26:
Yes he will, when he buries John Mc Insane in November.
I think there’s more here than meets the eye. Frank Rich hits on it in his column today… The Republicans are about three ‘macaca’ comments from permanently casting themselves as your crazy racist uncle. Rove is no dummy, and he likely sees this. Yes, it served him well to make up really vile lies about McCain, Kerry and many others. Obama, at least for now, is probably immune to it — and these attacks won’t work.
I’m sure Rove will be thinking about disgusting memes to throw at Obama down the road. But there’s a reason he’s going public with his opposition to them now — he wants his party to shut up before they permanently marginalize themselves.
Rove isn’t saying not to take part in smear campaigns. He’s saying that the particular smear campaign that involves saying “Barack Hussein Obama” has the capacity to backfire onto the smearers, therefore it doesn’t meet the basic test as qualifying as a bona-fide turd-blossom. What makes him so good at being bad is that his smear campaigns can’t be traced to their source, and can’t be turned around any farther than saying “That’s not fair!”
I also think it’s a huge tactical mistake for the Repubs to use any of their far-right religious nut-cases against Obama. Obama’s success at getting lots of people to come out and vote for him, people who would otherwise remain outside of the presidential political race, has resulted in there being a huge number of non-nut-cases who support him. Non-nut-cases could care less what somebody like Hagee or Cunningham think or say. Everytime Hagee or Cunningham or anyone else that comes from that Christian evangelical camp speaks out, a thousand more non-nut-cases are convinced to vote for Obama. Despite what the far-right religious nuts would like for us to know, there are waaayyy more us than of them.
RGS @ 35:
Karl Rove is a pedophile and has kiddy porn on his computer? I’m not saying anything, I’m just asking an innocent question and have to wonder about his ALLEGED interest in beasiality and necrophilia?
bmw 528 @ 37:
How true. Paradoxically, what goes around comes around.
Rove is just afraid that Drudge will print HIS full name: Carl Adolf Manson Rove.
By saying he disapproved of mentioning Obama’s middle name “Hussein”, porky has accomplished the smear by raising the topic and saying the name. Expect Faux News and porky to constantly bring up this faux issue and play the Saddam Hussein Name Association Game. A classic bank shot smear, porky’s trademark.
Nah this meme is doing great at revealing bigots in their lairs. Keep it up.
Karl “Turdblossom” Rove appears to be very nuanced in his application of his specialty, mud slinging dirty trick politics. He understands that if one is going to say something completely false or with completely false implications about a political oponent one must do so anonymously so that the 70% of the electorate that sees through the cheap ploy won’t know with 100% certainty who did it. The other 30% will fall for the ploy or be subconciously affected by it: mission accomplished. If the ploy is completely transparent then the 70% who can clearly place the blame will take it out on the supposed beneficiary of the ploy and the beneficiary will end up not benefitting but sufferring lost support. Further, timing is crucial. Last minute mud slinging of the cheap kind, which using the term Hussein is, will have an effect whereas if done far ahead of time it will backfire because the candidate will have plenty of time to respond and make the mudslingers look like what they are: scumbags. Take McCain black baby scandal as example. This ploy was done at the last minute so that McCain had no time to undo the damage that was done.
I think Rove’s just trying to save his fat ass. He knows Obama WILL become the next President so he’s trying not to piss off a man who could have him arrested for TREASON!
kkkarl is getting worried
his old tricks don’t work so well under the light of day
too many people are watching this election
kkkarl wants to take his bag of tricks and hide, until it’s safe,, and people ain’t watching anymore …
if too many people learn how kkkarl operates, the dirty tricks that kkkarl likes might become immpossible to hide in the future
this isn’t about a single election. It’s about kkkarl’s future mealticket
michelle @ 20:
I think they are trying to divide us. You’ve got Rush telling his listeners (sheep) to vote for Clinton in Texas. Take anything you read or hear from the media or right wing nuts with a grain of salt. There is motive behind their rantings.