In the run-up to the 2004 Democratic National Convention, when it was not yet clear who Bush's opponent would be that November, Rove and his aides had begun to fear that their most dangerous foe would be then-Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina...
But instead of attacking Edwards, Rove's team opened fire at Kerry.
Their thinking went like this, [Rove lieutenant Matthew] Dowd explained [after the election]: Democrats, in a knee-jerk reaction to GOP attacks, would rally around Kerry, whom Rove considered a comparatively weak opponent, and make him the party's nominee. Thus Bush would be spared from confronting Edwards, the candidate Republican strategists actually feared most...
"Whomever we attacked was going to be emboldened in Democratic primary voters' minds...So we started attacking John Kerry a lot in the end of January because we were very worried about John Edwards," Dowd said. "And we knew that if we focused on John Kerry, Democratic primary voters would sort of coalesce" around Kerry.
"It wasn't like we could tag [eliminate] somebody. Whomever we attacked was going to be helped," he said.
[end quote]
It worked! Kerry went from mashed potatoes to the ketchup king. Aren't conservatives happy now?
Is anyone actually buying this BS? In the run up to the Democratic Convention in 2004 the nomination was already decided. Kerry became the front runner by winning the New Hampshire primary at the end of January 2004 and had the nomination wrapped up five weeks later. And Rove is claiming credit for this? Keep in mind that Kerry was such a weak competitor that he would have won the election except for the Republicans fixing the election results in Ohio. Doesn't say much for Rove if he got his dream candidate as an opponent, especially one who ran as crappy a campaign as Kerry, and still almost lost the election.
was taking criticism for "attacking" Sen. Clinton. Although the "attack" was a simple statement of fact, that no one has ever won the presidential election going in with negatives as high as hers.
She bit and welcomed the "attack" knowing it would give her a boost.
Rove took criticism from all sides. Does anyone really think he didn’t know exactly what the result of his statement would be?
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