It would be amusing reading if only it were seen by everyone as the transparent excuse-making it truly is.
First of all, who was not to blame for the Republican debacle in which the nominee could not overtake a bid for re-election by the most deeply failed president since Jimmy Carter who managed – by hook and by crook – to get 10 million fewer votes than he got in 2008, according to Karl Rove:
- Karl Rove and how he misspent and mis-targeted hundreds of millions in super PAC money donated by Republican big donors; and
- Mitt Romney, his hand-picked candidate to be the Republican standard bearer.
Now let's look at who and what was to blame, according to The Architect:
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- Todd Akin, the Missouri Senate candidate who won, fair and square, his right to challenge Claire McCaskill and who Rove undermined by denying any super PAC money as well as vilifying him as strongly or stronger than Akin's Democratic opposition. (By the way, it's worth pointing out that some of Rove's hand-chosen Senate candidates that received the benefits of his support and financial largesse lost even more convincingly than Akin.)
- Voter fraud;
- The demographic shift Rove didn't warn about or apparently foresee before the election;
- The Democrats' superior ability to get out the vote – even though their candidate got out 10 million fewer votes than in 2008;
- The Democrats' ability to generate superior performance in generating negative information about Romney, even though Karl Rove's specialty is communicating negative information about opponents;
- The Republicans' failure to communicate on economic issues – even though it was the only issue on which they focused;
- The Republicans for sounding "judgmental" and "callous" on "social issues" – which Rove hates;
- The competition of the Republican primaries, which bloodied the eventual nominee. (Apparently, Rove would like to skip this process and have a committee appointed by him to choose the candidate.)
- Too many free and open debates among the Republican candidates;
- The media for portraying Republicans as a fringe party;
- The tradition of primaries in late summer. Rove wants them in the spring – another reason, apparently, to dispense with the process of actual votes and caucuses by the Republican grass roots;
- The failure of the Republicans' 72-hour ground game – the one presumably masterminded by Romney and Rove and other Republican geniuses.
One thing Republicans need not worry about, Rove wants everyone to know, is that the Republican super PACs, like his, being laughed at by Democrats and the media, for which he gives full credit for the 2010 midterm victories actually led by the tea-party movement, are not going away.
"They're in it for the long haul and don't take direction from the left," writes Rove – even though he repeats many of the post-mortem mantras of the left nearly verbatim.
Rove's closing words of encouragement?
"The fight goes on, beat 'em next time."
Now, I'm no self-proclaimed political guru, but I say a surefire recipe for the death of the Republican Party is to continue to listen to this finger-pointing, blame-gaming architect of defeat, discouragement and division among the rank and file of the party.
The honorable thing and the right thing for Rove to do would be to admit his own failure and move on with his life – giving others a chance to steer the ship next time.
Will he do that? Absolutely not.
He will continue to attack and marginalize all those in the Republican Party with whom he disagrees – even to the point of violating Ronald Reagan's 11th Commandment and "joking" about murdering them – as he did with Akin.
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