BIGGER FISH TO FRY:

So, Why is this man laughing?: Karl Rove just may hold the key to George Bush's re-election bid (Kenneth T. Walsh, 9/06/04, US News)

Mostly, though, Rove's raison d'être these days is to quietly build the best grass-roots organization ever. His goal is to name a Bush coordinator in 29,000 crucial precincts in 17 key target states, and the campaign is 95 percent of the way there right now. Similarly, Rove says the campaign has now recruited 980,000 of the 1 million pro-Bush volunteers it hoped to have signed up by Election Day.

Yet Rove's influence is not purely political; he also has a hefty policy portfolio. White House Chief of Staff Andy Card says Rove "doesn't play very much in foreign policy" but has a pivotal role on domestic affairs, pushing a conservative agenda that includes cutting taxes, encouraging charities to do more social work, opposing abortion, and reforming education by promoting accountability for teachers and schools.

The question asked increasingly in Washington is whether, by encouraging Bush's already strong conservative convictions, Rove exerts too much influence. Argues John Podesta, a Democratic activist and former White House chief of staff for Bill Clinton: "He may go down as making the worst political move in history by taking the post-9/11 period and trying to lurch the country to the right not just on war with Iraq but on energy, on economics." If Rove and Bush had tried to unite conservatives and liberals on a common agenda after 9/11, Podesta says, "it would have produced Republican dominance . . . for a generation."

Mr. Podesta is thinking small, like a Clintonite. The GOP is guaranteed dominance--Mr. Bush wants to continue the revolution.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 29, 2004 11:35 PM