Average Americans

By the way, the far left corners of the blogosphere have been crowing [porn star] Carey's appearance at the dinner will prove to be a "messaging disaster" for the GOP, tarnishing their pro-family image, muddying their morality machine, and in general reminding average Americans that Republicans are hypocritical hedonists who get squeamish about gay marriage but love the idea of threesome with a porn star.

We have news for the premature congratulators: Average Americans are hypocritical hedonists who get squeamish about gay marriage but love the idea of threesome with a porn star.

God bless you, Wonkette. This is my reaction to the Rove phenomenon.

Democrats are losing on national security. Or because of it. Or something. It’s not clear what really, especially to them. They just know that Republicans plus National Security, means election loss to them. Which is why Rove seems such a goldmine. It’s not just a huge scandal that makes easy headlines (it is). It’s that it’s about weakness on National Security. Democrats suspect the Republican leadership isn’t really concerned about National Security, so much as using it to win elections.

Whether Bush has to fire Rove or not, clearly his administration outted a covert agent for partisan purposes. What could be a clearer signal that to them, politics comes before security. Now those Republicans won’t have such a high ground anymore!

They still don’t get that National Security is, like the morals in the wonkette post, an attitude not a set of facts and policy. People who say they vote for the President because he’s “tough on terror” are more focused on the “tough” part than the “on terror” part. Tough on gays, tough on drugs, tough on spending, tough on Russia. It may not all be used today, but conservatives have always used it at some point. What Karl Rove did behind the woodshed, or whether Republicans take money from porn stars, are details and facts about the world. That the President is willing to come out and say “gays are bad” or “Saddam must go”, is more important to voters who list National Security or moral values as their top priority.

Addendum: This does not mean Democrats are hopeless of course. The country still thinks this was bad. And Democrats have their own unfair way of framing things that can help them. Just explaining why 4 months from now Democrats will sit around being exasperated wondering why their Iraq War Veteran in Ohio didn’t win the special election.