I’ve made it to be no secret that I heart Karl Rove. I look up to the man and rank him right up there with my other heroes Magneto, Cobra Commander, and UFC President Dana White. So when K-Ro (as he’s known on the street) opines on the future of the GOP and who is a “real” Republican as he did on “Fox News Sunday”, I listen.
Of course the media being the media, all you’ll hear from his interview was this quote, taken out of context, aboot if he sides with Rush Limbaugh over Colin Powell:
I — yes, if I had to pick between the two.
Of course, this is just another Bush crony throwing Colin Powell under the bus and siding with Rush Limbaugh, who you and I all know is the real head of the Republican Party. Yet if you look at the whole segment, Rove is hardly anti-Powell…
Anybody who says they’re a Republican is a Republican. There is no membership committee that designates whether you are or not. If you say you’re Republican, you’re Republican. Look, Colin Powell has a right to advocate this view. I defend his right to do that. I don’t agree with it, but I defend his right to do so. I would hope that he would back up that vision by finding candidates who represent his vision of the future of the Republican Party and actively working for them. That’s what it ought to be about.
I don’t like this thing where people – and Powell is one them – who said, “Rush Limbaugh, shut up.” I mean, that’s – we believe, as Republicans in the marketplace of ideas, let that marketplace decide. Let everybody with a competing vision find the kind of candidates they want to support and work hard for them. I want Colin Powell to go out there and lay out his vision, and then I want him to back it up by finding people who share it and working like heck to get them – and that’s how you win the party – the party’s intraparty battle of ideas.
And THEN when asked if he’s pro-Rush…
I – yes, if I had to pick between the two. But you know what? That’s – neither one of those are candidates. Neither one of those are going to be people who are offering themselves for office. Again, that’s – this is a false debate that Washington loves. The real debate takes place out there in the real world by people getting out there and encouraging and helping the kind of candidates who represent their vision for their party, Republican or Democrat.
This happens every election after the party loses. It’s a healthy thing. I say go to it. Find the people that you think represent your vision, outline it, and work like heck for them, and the country and the party will be better off for it.
I think Karl Rove touches on something very important, when he says Colin Powell should search out Republican candidates who share his vision of the party. My problem with these self loathing Republicans is that they seem to enjoy the media attention they get for being the self loathing Republican du joir, yet do nothing to actual help the party they claim to love and have a vision for. All going on MSNBC and saying how much Rush Limbaugh sucks does is give Chris Matthews a leg tingle, and lets them run twenty more commercials aboot the “Republican civil war.”
If cats like Colin Powell actually backs up his criticism by supporting candidates who he feels represent the Republican Party that he claims is waiting to emerge, and engages in an actual debate with other R’s that have a different vision, awesome. Let’s get it on.
But making the media rounds just to complain…we’ve seen this movie before, and quite frankly, I’m bored.
