Rove resigns
Updated on 13 August 2007
How much did George Bush rely on Karl Rove and how will he cope when his brain is missing?
President Bush nicknamed him the architect, the boy genius. And so, in the dog days of this Washington summer, a battered president badly in need of friends sounded loath to lose his most trusted adviser.
Rove never liked upstaging his boss - hiding in his shadow for the last 14 years. But this emotional parting betrays just how important Karl Rove was and begs a question: how much of a lame duck presidency is this without him?
His critics nicknamed him Bush's Brain. And it wasn't a compliment.
A book and film with the same title alleges that Rove ruthlessly schemed to win Bush the governorship of Texas and had never stopped since.
In the 2000 election Rove helping to destroy John McCain, Bush's main Republican rival.
And in 2004 masterminding Bush's re-election, giving him that second victory the president's father never had.
And though Iraq was already not going well, Rove helped convince America otherwise.
Rove's skill? Relentless character assassination coupled with an unrivalled ability to turn out the conservative Christian vote.
Rove's skill? Relentless character assassination coupled with an unrivalled ability to turn out the conservative Christian vote.
Yet Rove's own morality was repeatedly questioned in court for divulging a CIA agent's identity to a journalist (though he escaped jail).
And with the loss of congress in 2006, Rove's star had well and truly fallen. He'd been in charge of welfare and immigration reform. But it came to nothing.
The memory of hurricane Katrina, and Iraq's reality, brought the Bush project to its knees.
Perhaps Rove believed the Bush legacy was written long ago, after 11 September 2001. So why not stay on for the final act?
He says he'll write a book, that its time to let his hair down. And Rove's shoes are near impossible to fill as his close friend the president sweats out his final 17 months.
