Charlie Cook, Karl Rove’s consigliere
by digby
Via @Billmon1 on twitter last night I read that Charlie Cook has some advice for the Republicans. He says that even though the second term presidents often stumble, it’s important that the Republicans not publicly come down too hard on Obama with all these scandals because congress is already disrepute and the public might not respond the way they want them to. He offers another plan:
Republicans would be much wiser to pursue a third option: Dig up as much damaging information as they can about the Obama administration and leak it to reporters they know will write tough stories that won’t be traced back to the source. That way, the public won’t see the GOP as being obsessed with attacking the other side and playing gotcha at the expense of the big issues facing the country—the ones voters really care about.
As Billmon pointed out, he’s basically advising them to take Obama down through Nixonian ratfucking and rumor-mongering rather than public hearings and investigations. Not that they would need any prodding, mind you. They are pros at that practice, having invented covert political war when Barack Obama was still playing with his covert GI Joe dolls. But still, it is a bit startling to see an allegedly dispassionate political analyst come right out and tell them they should do it in order that they not appear to be the reckless partisan wrecking crew they really are.
I’m sure Karl Rove’s heart was warmed by the friendly advice. But since the immediate plan is to gin up the rubes for 2014 in order to take the Senate and take as much hide as they can off Hillary Clinton in the process, I’m going to guess they’ll open several fronts in this campaign. If I were the administration I think I’d be prepared for everything. Cook’s no wartime consiglieri.
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