Karl Rove: Birther Issue Turned Donald Trump Into A ‘Joke Candidate’ (Mediaite)

Karl Rove, image via WikipediaEmail • Twitter • Facebook • LinkedIn • Youtube

by Frances Martel
April 16th, 2011

Reality TV and real estate personality Donald Trump may be as far as nine points ahead in the latest GOP 2012 polls, but that doesn’t mean the Republican establishment is ready to embrace him with open arms. On last night’s On the Record, Karl Rove did his best to distance the party from the Donald, telling Greta Van Susteren that his “weird conspiracy theories” about President Obama’s birth certificate made him a “joke candidate.”


After a lengthy discussion about the current budget battle in Congress in which Rove claimed Republicans had attained victory, if only because the federal government’s budget authority had been reduced by $60 billion, Van Susteren questioned Rove on Trump’s impact on the Republican Party. Rove refused to answer whether Trump “hurt” the Party, noting instead that his obsession with President Obama’s birth certificate “hurts Donald Trump.” “He was an interested candidate who had a business background and could have contributed to dialogue,” Rove lamented, adding that making the birth certificate a centerpiece of his campaign delegitimized him. “He’s off there in the nutty right, and is not an inconsequential candidate,” Rove concluded, adding that “the guy is smarter than this” and he was “sorry to see it happen.” He also denounced claims that President Obama didn’t go to school, citing a friend who was a classmate of the President’s, and the conspiracy theory about the newspaper reports in Hawaii.

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Sarah Palin To Fox News: I Don’t Want To Talk To Media Oulets Other Than Fox News (Mediaite)

Image by GregTheBusker via Flickrby Ray Rahman
November 5th, 2010

During Fox News’ election coverage, on a night when attention should’ve been on actual candidates, Shepard Smith turned his attention to his colleague Sarah Palin. If she does one day decide to run for office, Smith asked her, would she talk to media outlets that aren’t Fox News, the network at which she currently has exclusive “protection”? Palin’s answer was not promising—for curious voters or for her potential candidacy.


She began by reminding Smith that she can’t be “constrained”: “I can still talk to whomever I want to.”


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The most powerful Republican in politics (Politico)

Haley Barbour, image via Wikipedia

By JIM VANDEHEI & ANDY BARR & KENNETH P. VOGEL 

8/20/10 

 

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour is the most powerful Republican in American politics — at least for the next three months.

Barbour, who runs the Republican Governors Association, has more money to spend on the 2010 elections — $40 million — than any other GOP leader around. And in private, numerous Republicans describe Barbour as the de facto chairman of the party. (See "End Run: Romney's Crafty Financing")

It’s not just because he controls the RGA kitty but, rather, because he has close relationships with everyone who matters in national GOP politics — operatives like Karl Rove, Ed Gillespie and other top Republicans running or raising cash for a network of outside political groups. Together, these groups are essential to Republican hopes of regaining power because Democrats are cleaning their clocks through more traditional fundraising efforts. 

The political class, in particular, is consumed with Barbour’s behind-the-scenes endeavors — this week, with the $1 million he got from Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. (See "Fox Parent's Donation Causes Stir")

Yet the reality is that Barbour has been uniquely adept at leveraging concerns about President Barack Obama into huge contributions from many others. Bob Perry, the Texas businessman who funded the Swift boat attacks in the 2004 campaigns, has given more than twice as much as News Corp.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0810/41236.html#ixzz0xCf3BuJa

Helen Thomas, Karl Rove, Gaza and Jewish Republicans (PajamasMedia)

By Roger L. Simon

How’s that for a collection of  keywords for Google search?  Well, it was (sort of) earned by me last night from the interviews I conducted for PJTV at the annual Republican Jewish Coalition summer bash, this year at the Beverly Hilton.

Most notable was Karl Rove, the RJC’s keynote speaker of the evening, who is apparently a reader (once in a moon anyway) of this blog.  I did something of a formal interview (up soon on PJTV) with Bush 43’s former senior adviser turned author, commentator, etc., etc., on a number of issues pertinent to the occasion, one of which has already become dated. Helen Thomas has retired or — as Drudge wittily put it — been “sent to Poland.”

Shall we sing it all together now?  “Ding, dong, the witch is dead… Which old witch… the wicked witch…”  And on and on.  (It’s worth adding, to be our version of politically correct, that Poland is far from the worst place anyone could be sent these days. How about Turkey?)

But back to Rove.  Other than Thomas, I talked with him about two key areas — the Gaza Flotilla situation and  the direction of the American Jewish vote.

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Did Rand Paul Cancel Meet The Press Under Orders From Karl Rove? (Mediaite)

Karl Rove, image via Wikipedia

by Glynnis MacNicol  
Mediaite  
May 23rd, 2010

It’s hard to blame Rand Paul for pulling out of a Meet the Press appearance on Friday after the kind of week he’d had following Tuesday’s Republican primary election in Kentucky. His scathing interview with Rachel Maddow on Wednesday night will probably go down as a lesson in what cable hosts are supposed to do, and what newbie politicians will now look to avoid at all costs (hopefully not to the detriment of her show). On today’s MTP roundtable even Bob Woodward noted that it was a pragmatic decision on Paul’s part.


But was it Rand’s decision? Politico is reporting this morning that Paul canceled the appearance because “senior Republicans” told him to do so. Two senior Republicans in particular: Karl Rove and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY).

Karl Rove, the former top adviser to George W Bush, called Paul’s campaign manager this week and said the candidate was hurting himself with all the exposure, according to a source familiar with the conversation (In an email, Rove only said “no comment” when asked about the matter)

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