Posted on 10/27/2010 3:38:13 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Karl Rove, the former senior adviser to George W Bush, has cast serious doubt on Sarah Palin's viability as a White House candidate, questioning if the American people thought she had the "gravitas" for the "most demanding job in the world".
Expressing the strongest public reservations about the conservative star made by any senior Republican figure, Mr Rove said it was unlikely that voters would regard someone starring in a reality show as presidential material.
In two weeks, the former governor of Alaska launches a cable television series exploring her home state's wilderness.
"With all due candour, appearing on your own reality show on the Discovery Channel, I am not certain how that fits in the American calculus of 'that helps me see you in the Oval Office'," said Mr Rove, who remains a considerable force on the U.S. political scene.
He added that the promotional clip for Sarah Palin's Alaska could be especially detrimental to any political campaign. It features the mother of five in the great outdoors saying: "I would rather be doing this than in some stuffy old political office."
Mr Rove also implied that Mrs Palin lacked the stomach for the rigours of a presidential primary campaign, which will begin early next year before the first polls in 2012.
Mr Rove was asked if 46-year-old Mrs Palin, who is among the front-runners for the next Republican nomination, would be a wise choice if the party wanted to seize the White House from President Barack Obama. He replied: "You can make a plausible case for any of them on paper, but it is not going to be paper in 2011. It's going to be blood, it's going to be sweat and tears and it's going to be hard effort."
He said Mrs Palin had done a "terrific job" in 2008 when Senator John McCain took her from near obscurity to the vice-presidential nomination, but added: "Being the vice-presidential nominee on the ticket is different from saying 'I want to be the person at the top of the ticket'.
"There are high standards that the American people have for it [the presidency] and they require a certain level of gravitas, and they want to look at the candidate and say 'that candidate is doing things that gives me confidence that they are up to the most demanding job in the world'."
After losing with Mr McCain in 2008, Mrs Palin resigned as governor to write books, become a television pundit - on the same Fox News network where Mr Rove is an analyst - and an influential supporter of Tea Party-backed Republican candidates in next week's mid-term elections.
Thanks to her staunch conservative views, Mrs Palin remains a highly divisive figure with high negative ratings. Many Republican strategists think her selection as nominee would almost guarantee Mr Obama a second term.
But such is her popularity among the grassroots of the party, few in Washington are prepared to stick their head above the parapet.
No major figure in the party has yet to come out in support of Mrs Palin, including Mr McCain, who refused to endorse her yesterday.
Mr Rove's forceful comments signalled his confidence in his own standing and track record as the architect of Mr Bush's two election victories. She could face further attacks from within the party's hierarchy in the coming months as the competition for the nomination heats up.
All the indications are that Mrs Palin will run for office. She has delivered a speech in Iowa, where the first caucuses are held, quietly accumulated members of staff and has a sizeable pot of money.
But Mr Rove suggested that "outside of the true believers", most Republican primary voters were still watching the race and would choose the candidate most suitable for the role. "They are going to be saying 'the person who can win is the person who proves to me that they are up to the job'," he said.
Karl’s definition of courage is disparaging conservative women who can kick his @ass...
If there was ever any doubt this election is about RINOs vs. the Tea Party, it is now completely gone.
She's not 71 and hasn't been in the top tiers of the party for the last 30 years. Hence, she's not qualified, since after all the Republican party works on seniority sort of like a Union.
That's why they get awesome candidates like Dole, McCain........... they paid their dues, hence they have “gravitas.”/sarc
Yeah, compared to the “gravitas” of Zero: “I’m going home to scoop the poop.”
“There is MUCH that is wrong with Rove’s propaganda, but this is, at root, a sexist comment.”
I had the exact same thought.
RINO Rove is an idiot.
“Sarah hurt her standing in the broad middle of the electorate”
I guess they never saw these numbers from Rasmussenand and last week Gallup confirmed the numbers.
Whose views are closer to your own? Palin/Obama
Overall: 52/40
Male: 55/37
Female: 48/43
White: 58/35
Black: 5/87
GOP: 84/9
DEM: 14/81
INDY: 59/27
Conservative: 80/12
Moderate: 28/61
Liberal: 14/85
Or these:
“.....76% of Republicans and 52% of unaffiliated voters now hold a favorable opinion of Palin.”
“...Unaffiliated voters by a 41% to 36% margin see Palin as good for the GOP.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2592751/posts?q=1&;page=1
The resignation was a tactical retreat, for the sake of her family, and whether you choose to believe it or not, the state of Alaska. After regrouping, she came back out for the sake of the country and her (and everyone else’s) children’s future.
Make no mistake: Sarah Palin is a fighter!
If she wasn’t, why would there be such a push to take her down?
Palin is positioned fine to take the primary. Do you think that Rove is against Mitt Romney? A man that only won one election in 18 years in politics, and that left that office with 34% approval and that turned that Governor's seat over to the the Democrats?
By Alex Spillius (again) - in between the journ0list’s opinion and ROVE’s few quotes, ROVE has finally come out of his RINO CLOSET to “talk about” Sarah Palin!
PLEASE SAY THE SAME ON FOX NEWS CHANNEL!
I bet you Rove orchestrated all of the smearing of Palin during the last run.
As opposed to...?
I might worry more if I looked at the rest of the Republican/conservative field and saw even one of the candidates that had noticeably more gravitas, more fire and more ability to endure a tough and even nasty election campaign than she does. I’m having trouble thinking of one that even has as much. We’re mostly looking at the same guys the Republican electorate looked at in ‘08 and said, “Eh, we’ll go with McCain.” I’ve said before, these guys need to worry less about whether she has the stuff and more about whether they do. I’m still waiting to see if they’ve figured it out yet. As for Karl Rove, there’s a reason he’s called the Magnificent Bastard and not the Infallible Bastard.
“There are high standards that the American people have for it [the presidency] and they require a certain level of gravitas, and they want to look at the candidate and say ‘that candidate is doing things that gives me confidence that they are up to the most demanding job in the world’.”
He might be right, but if so then how did we get the Bummer?
Sarah is far less green and has just the right personality to undertake the dismanling of the administrative state and getting government under control. And considering the act she would be following, it won’t be difficult to look far superior of a choice no matter what she does.
I’d take almost anyone over that lying marxist piece of trash.
McCain was weak, he was uninspiring to the base, he was ill suited to deal with a Obama.......etc. but he was obviously the chosen one that the party stood in front of us to vote for. He punched his tickets and served his time within this party and he had the influence and support from those that mattered. This party does not allow talent to rise quick while it shoves the uninspiring and weak in front of us. The Republican party has it's own agenda and they are disconnected from their base, that's also why they have a hard time. There is a reason why the party had a hard time coming to grips with the tea party movement just like the establishment can't really accept a Palin or didn't a Reagan in his time. -IMHO
If you gave me a choice between Sarah Palin and George Bush, I would pick Palin as the one with more intelligence, balls and gravitas.
I think it is hilarious that Karl Rove, who brought us George Bush, now thinks he knows who is and who isn’t good presidential material.
The only reason why Sarah Palin has large negatives is because the main stream media has done everything in its power to ridicule and destroy her.
If Sarah Palin was a liberal, every feminist in America would be screaming bloody murder about misogyny and patriarchy.
Oh well, I feared Bush lacked the gravitas to be President, and I still think my fears were somewhat justified. Funny that I don’t have that fear about Palin. Rove, soaking in a Washington bathhouse, getting buzzed on Potomac fumes, is frightened by strong women, especially conservative women who threaten to show the establishment men up as the pansies they are.
He has said this about Sarah on Fox for over a year and a half now. It was so blatant around the time Sarah gave her speech in HK is was pathetic.
This article is just a summary of it all in one place.
Nothing will change. Karl will still be the “architect” on Fox and Sean Hannity will keep sucking up to people like this.
IMHO she is running. Why would she endorse Dr. Benishek after the DNC has pulled out because they know it is lost? Because she needs MI District 1 to take Michigan Electorially. She is already playing an Electorial game and it gauls Rove because he still must feel the need for being close to power and he won't be part of a Palin Administration. He is part of the current power culture, and the Tea Parties and the likes of an Insurgent Palin scare the BeJeasus out of the likes of Rove and the rest of the Gucci Gultch crowd. They do not know how to handle us! LOL !!!
This is very true and they have just a short time left to understand this or they will face an increasing world of hurt from their own base long before the next elections occur. We won't sit around and wait long. Rush doesn't seem to think so either, he mentioned this same thing today, too.
We expect fight and action immediately. There is ABSOLUTELY NO REASON not to get straight to work in extricating this Republic from the marxist hellhole it finds itself in.
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