Rove Redux

My thoughts on Rove:

The White House has had a number of, if not, great, fairly optimistic events happening in the past few days. Within, there must be at least a palpatable hope that the endless slide might be over.

As it relates specifically to politics, I think Rove's dodging the bullet is a good thing. Here's why.

The Democratic party and liberals in general, out of power in every branch of government, are trying to use every option they have to their benefit. In this particular case, many liberals seem to have been hoping for Rove's indictment as a way to even the political playing field in the runup to November.

Having Rove back in charge, with his name cleared (to a certain extent) forces the Democrats to not rely on the weakness of their opponents, but the strength of their ideas. Ultimately, this will either mean that a) they'll lose in November, or b) they'll win because their ideas appeal to a broad band of people. This is significantly better then winning as a result of everyone being sick of the other party (which even so might still happen).

This is one of a few first steps the White House and Republicans are taking to get back on their feet and in a fighting stance. I hope they keep going. If Democrats are confident in their ideas, they will stop bitching about campaign strategy and talk about what they'd do in office. I think at this point, the public has come to see through the campaign fluff that the GOP threw out in '04, or at least a majority has. I think, and hope, that this upcoming election will ultimately be about which party can better run the government: who has the better plan for Iraq? Who can bring the budget in line? Who can follow through on their promises and get laws passed?

If Rove were indicted, and the scandals kept piling up, the Democrats could simply play the 'we're less corrupt' card, which very well might work. If the GOP gets back on its feet, the Democrats will have to take a stand for what they believe in.

Or they might still get throttled as wussy-boys by Rove.

{update 10:31 AM}Check out this link from slate.