2002 Elections
Karl Rove's Election-Night Diary - 11/5/02
Dear Diary:
Now, THAT
was fun! The liberals never knew what hit 'em. Clueless, those guys.
But,
based on our polling and focus groups, yours truly knew weeks ago. That's why I
could safely send George out on the Hustings for that last-minute pick-me-up to
the GOP troops. The Prez wasn't happy about having to work, and disrupting his
nap patterns, but he sure appreciates my plan now.
The boy genius rides
again. Sure feels good. I needed to redeem myself big time after blowing the Jim
Jeffords thing, which threw our whole agenda into disarray.
But now it's
clear sailing. Thank you, Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. We rode those
bogeymen into the sunset. I was worried that maybe we were too obvious and the
electorate might see through what we were doing. But no worry; by playing up the
possibility of new terror attacks and the evil Saddam, the fear factor worked,
and the American citizenry marched in lockstep, giving us whatever we wanted.
Our friends in the media kept all that sinking-economy news off the
front pages, and all our scandals as well. I loved the way I orchestrated Harvey
Pitt's resignation, dropped right into the election coverage and nobody even
noticed), and then, thank you Lord! The D.C. sniper came along and dominated the
news cycles for several weeks just before the vote. And he was even named
"Mohammed"! Couldn't have asked for a better script.
And the best part
was that the Dems didn't know what to do. They were so unbelievably dispirited
and disorganized. They wanted to slam us on the Iraq issue but couldn't or
they'd risk revealing themselves for the unpatriotic wimps they are, so a lot
felt obliged to vote with us. When key Dem leaders like Daschle and Gephardt and
Feinstein and Kerry voted with us, I knew the election was in the
bag.
Those stupid liberals had no unified program to offer in opposition
to ours -- and, what's more important, no balls. The September 11 events are
still working their magic for us, just as we thought they would. (And now, given
the election results, we can be assured that there will be no independent
investigation of our behavior or the cover-up. We're home free!)
Well,
sure, we've still got to work with the Dems in the Senate, who could, if they
decide they're going to put up a fight, cause trouble for our legislation. But,
I think we can roll enough of them to get the required 60 votes when we have to.
We'll get our judges approved, we'll get the tax cut made permanent for
our friends, we'll change the composition of the Supreme Court (goodbye, Roe v.
Wade!), ANWAR here we come with our drilling rigs, and on to Baghdad. (If we
really want to go there; we don't need to now. We could get the U.N. inspectors
in there and finesse our way out of having to invade.)
The added bonus of
our electoral sweep is that we're in good shape for the 2004 race. Jeb's in
place, and Liddy might be a dynamite partner for George. A Bush-Dole ticket!
Now, that's brilliant! We'll carve the women's' vote away from the Dems. They
can keep the Jews and the blacks and Arabs. The Dems ain't goin' anywhere for a
long time. We're in like Flynn for at least six more years, with Jeb to
follow.
We've got the Congress, we've got the White House, we've got the
Supreme Court, we've got the media in our pockets. And all the Dems have to
oppose us is a few predictable malcontents, an insignificant peace movement
(which we can always ruin with some of our undercover guys engineering some
violence), and some wackos writing on the internet.
Given our election
sweep, Ashcroft can take care of all those traitors, without having to look over
his shoulder all the time. John is so happy; he was smarting about having lost
to a dead man in the last election, but the Carnahan widow is no more.
Of
course, it's possible that we've stirred up a hornet's nest and the Dems will be
galvanized to reorganize themselves into a true opposition. (Gephardt probably
will resign as House Minority Leader -- I don't blame him: Nobody wants to have
to do daily battle against that obnoxious, but effective, buzz saw Tom
Delay).
But I doubt it. They're too frightened and scattered, and they
just don't have the troops behind them in the electorate to give them courage.
Nor do they have a real leader; Daschle and Gephardt abdicated when they voted
for the Iraq war. Wellstone could have been the rally-around guy, but, sorry for
him great for us, he's gone.
No need to worry. We're in the driver's seat
for the next six years, and probably beyond, and our political enemies are just
going to have to get used to it. If not, we'll destroy them totally. This is
going to be so much fun! #
Bernard Weiner, Ph.D. was with the San Francisco Chronicle for nearly 20
years, and taught American politics and international relations at San Diego
State and Western Washington Universities. He is co-editor of the new online
political site CrisisPapers.org.
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