Marc Ambinder reports on Rove's speech today before the NRA:
At the NRA convention in Kentucky this afternoon, Karl Rove portrayed Barack Obama as an effete, South Side liberal who claims he's immune to criticism and and who would confiscate guns by the barrel. The gun stuff is much less important than Rove's general line of argument; Rove has a direct line to McCain advisers Steve Schmidt and Charlie Black and has been pushing the campaign to make these sorts of contrasts.
Through a transcription provided by the wonderful Jamie Farnsworth of CBS News, it seems that Rove pulled the old anticipate-the-response card: "We know what he's going to say-- it's divisive, distractive, keeps us from coming together. After all, he says, we are the change we have been waiting for. what the heck does that mean?""Does it mean we've been keeping ourselves waiting? Why was change late anyway? I don't get it. let me tell you what's divisive. It is divisive to undermine the Second Amendment, to undermine to constitution of the United States."
More Rove: "It is divisive to say one thing and do another, to belittle the values of the people -- which is exactly what Obama was doing in San Francisco. Our answer is no we won't."
Ah yes, the classic, all-American "no we won't" approach to campaigns. Nothing succeeds in presidential politics like the rhetoric of "no."
Look, this is really simple. It is Rove's approach to politics that has gotten us to this point. The man took a president with a 90% approval rating and turned him into one of the most disliked president's in history. And yet McCain is taking advice from this guy?
I'm supposed to be worried about this why exactly?
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