Assuming Howard Dean wins the Democratic nomination, I don't doubt that Karl Rove's campaign against him will be nasty and probably somewhat skillful. I expect this will be the case for any of our candidates.
But I do think Karl must be spending at least a few nights grinding his teeth over Dean's rise to the top of the polls. Here's why:
This administration, more than any other in recent memory, is completely politically driven. Even a Bush-defender like Andrew Sullivan
worries about it. All the gossip from unnamed sources and people like O'Neill, who've left, confirms it.
That means that Rove has been planning this campaign since January, 2001, if not earlier. The ill-considered steel tariffs were a direct response to his assessment of the 2000 race. Tax cuts? Politically-driven. No one has denied the Suskind/O'Neill story about Cheney's "we've earned it" defense of the second tax cuts, nor the story about Karl keeping Bush on task for those cuts. And so on.
Now, up until -- at the earliest -- January of this year, who was Karl Rove anticipating would be the nominee? Probably John Kerry, with Dick Gephardt or Joe Lieberman in second, with John Edwards (once he started campaigning) a dark horse. I'm sure he noticed Dean, but I doubt he crafted policy decisions with a Dean nomination in mind.
And how well things were going for Karl -- both John Kerry and Dick Gephardt voted for the war resolution, as did John Edwards (with Edwards participating significantly in drafting the Patriot Act). I'm not looking at specific voting records right now, but this kos post seems to confirm my recollection that those same guys supported most of the big Bush initiatives (tax cuts, NCLB, Patriot Act).
I have no doubt that Karl Rove was the master behind the "uniter not divider," and "compassionate conservative" memes and -- more criminally -- the reprehensible way fear was used to push the agenda after 9-11. I'm sure he rubbed his hands together in glee as he watched the Democrats fall for each of these tactics.
I don't think Karl anticipated running against someone who would have a record of having spoken out against the Bush initiatives. I don't think Karl anticipated running against an anti-IraqiFreedom candidate. I don't think he anticipated that this election would be a forum in which GWB would be in any way on the defensive.
So, at the very least, he's behind on his planning. And if I'm right, recent moves such as "allowing" Canada to bid for contracts in Iraq are part of Rove's realization that Bush won't be able to stay in neocon/corporate cronyism territory with the cover that his Democratic opponent supported most of what he did over the last 3+ years.