by Matt Gertz
Appearing on (where else?) Fox over the weekend, Karl Rove wove a web of obfuscation to defend his role with a $50 million GOP slush fund and attack President Obama for calling attention to it.
In a speech, President Obama said that "two groups, funded and advised by Karl Rove," have been huge players in support of the Republican candidate in the Illinois Senate race. On
Fox News Sunday, Rove passionately responded. Note what Rove denies, and doesn't deny:
<...>
Rove vigorously denied having
personally put up the money for the two groups in question, the 527 group American Crossroads and its 501(c)(4) non-profit arm, Crossroads GPS. Instead, he said he is "helping to raise money for these groups" and "absolutely doing everything I can to raise money for them." He then attempted to direct the Fox audience to American Crossroads' web site so they could donate to the group. This was apparently too much even for Bret Baier, who repeatedly said "all right" over Rove's recitation of the URL.
I'll leave it to someone else to explain the political distinction between Rove personally contributing the money, and
lining up the donations from billionaire Texas oil barons. He's still providing the group's funding, whether it's coming from his bank account or not.
What did Rove avoid denying? Obama's statement that Rove has "advised" the groups. So is he? Is he picking the races the groups are targeting? Defining lines of attack? Approving the attack ads?
Fox has been utterly unconcerned that their top "political analyst," who regularly appears on air unopposed by any Democrat to discuss the 2010 elections, is simultaneously raising money that is being used to bolster Republican campaigns. But you think they'd care if he's guiding American Crossroads' decisions on which races to spend that money on.
If Karl Rove is reading his group's polling of Senate race, picking out the best paths of attack on Democrats, and simultaneously channeling those attacks into TV ads and his Fox News commentary, you would think that even Fox would have to respond.
— By Mother Jones
This past weekend, Karl Rove accused President Barack Obama of creating an "enemies list." The former George W. Bush strategist did so after the president and the Democratic National Committee attacked the efforts of Rove, Ed Gillespie (another former Bush aide), and the Chamber of Commerce to exploit the Supreme Court's controversial
Citizens United Supreme Court decision by pouring tens of millions in secret campaign cash into dozens of House and Senate races to help Republican candidates. But as David Corn points out in a PoliticsDaily.com
column, Rove is mugging history to score a political point.
Calling out political opponents is not equivalent to drafting "an enemies list." For younger readers who may not be familiar with the term, it comes from Richard Nixon's heart of darkness. When Nixon was in the White House, his aides compiled what was officially known as the "Opponents List" or the "Political Enemies List." It was a secret roster. Its first iteration listed 20 names, including top Democratic fundraisers and strategists, the managing editor of The Los Angeles Times, two liberal Democratic members of Congress (Ron Dellums and John Conyers), CBS newsman Daniel Schorr, and actor Paul Newman. A subsequent list expanded Nixon's official enemies to several hundred people, including Ted Kennedy, Bill Cosby, Gregory Peck, football great Joe Namath, and the entire New York Times and Washington Post. A White House memo detailed the purpose of the list: "how we can use the available federal machinery to screw our political enemies." Think IRS audits.
By pointing a finger at Rove, Gillespie, and the Chamber of Commerce, Obama is not crafting a covert list of people to screw. He is trying to shame them into disclosing who is financing their multimillion-dollar campaigns to elect Republicans. Obama is correct when he decries the broken campaign finance system, which is easily swayed by special interests and wealthy folks. Under Citizens United, a billionaire industrialist who hates environmental regulations can flood a House or Senate race with ads (true or false) denouncing the candidate who supports environmental safeguards. The ads don't have to state who's behind them. The billionaire could hide behind a perfectly pleasant-sounding name: say, Citizens for Restoring American Progress. One sad truth of U.S. politics is that money and ads usually (though not always) do influence outcomes in congressional races. Consequently, secret funders have much clout and can shape American democracy. (Earlier this year, the House passed Obama-backed legislation that would force disclosure of contributions, but Republicans blocked it in the Senate.)
It is unlikely that Rove, Gillespie, the chamber, and others engaged in this covert politics will indeed be shamed by Obama and his Democratic allies into making their money men and women public. We can expect this debate to continue as Election Day nears. So if Rove wants to defend this practice of secret-cash politics, he should do so openly and not duck behind a canard. That is, let him explain why he shouldn't be on a list of the enemies of transparency and open and accountable government.
By falsely tagging Obama with a Nixon-like tactic, Rove, who came of age as a young GOP activist during the Tricky Dick years, is himself acting in a very Nixonian fashion.
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