Cerberus

Ladies and Gentlemen, with the departure of Karl Rove from the Republican party, we are witnessing a true shift in the landscape of American politics. Truly, as I have stated before, he was no miracle-worker, not a Pygmailion (see Salon's article http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/08/14/rove2/index.html), and certainly no Machiavelli. As in the above-mentioned article, the main failing of Karl Rove's politics was a lack of long-term vision, a lack of, well, real politics. He managed to unite as many fringe groups as possible from outside of the well-endowed Clintonite majority, and promised each one the moon for their support. However, he, like many other short-sighted politicians, simply promised too much to too many, and could not dig himself out of this impossible situation. All of these caveats nonwithstanding, I'll continue...

The re-alignment of American politics is significant, because Karl Rove served as what was likely the most important go-between for the Bush administration and the public, which they are so tacitly empowered to represent. His departure is the second blow to the Republican Cerberus (Rumsfeld being the first and Cheney to be the last). The great legacy of Karl Rove is that he re-shaped the Republican party around his own caustic and short-lived style of politicking. Using the entire Republican party as collateral, he bet his future on the unity of all the fringes of American conservatism, betting that their mutual and prolonged disgust with the prospect of a Democratic victory would pardon any neglect on his own part. This was not the case.

The idea of being a constantly embattled ruling party does not hold in a free society. There was no control of the media to ensure that the great, unseen, liberal-terrorist enemy remained the focus of the population's fear, and that very mutual disgust on the loosely tied far-right could not hold. Now, to the Republican party remains the task of re-inventing itself, and ridding itself of the last three years of its history. Rove's exile is the first step.