"He is way beyond anything Nixon had at his disposal. He is closer to a behind-the-scenes Nixon operator named Murray Chotiner, who could cut off an opponent at the knees so quickly the person did not immediately realize he had been crippled. As I note in the book, the first time I heard the name Karl Rove was when I was asked if I knew anything about him by one of the Watergate special prosecutors who was investigating campaign dirty tricks. I didn't have any knowledge. But I recalled that question when working on this book, and located a memorandum in the files of the Watergate prosecutor's office that indicates they were asking others as well about Rove. Based on my review of the files, it appears the Watergate prosecutors were interested in Rove's activities in 1972, but because they had bigger fish to fry they did not aggressively investigate him."

Karl Rove Politics See all quotes by Karl Rove →

React to this quote

More by Karl Rove

“I think it was Osama bin Laden’s .”

“At the end of the day, it's of keen interest to me to see whether or not we can get Karl Rove frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs. And trust me, when I use that name, I measure my words.”

“We will fuck him. Do you hear me? We will fuck him. We will ruin him. Like no one has ever fucked him!”

“Once again the powers of light and good have triumphed over the media!”

“As people do better, they start voting like Republicans...unless they have too much education and vote Democratic, which proves there can be too much of a good thing.”

“Karl Rove told me about Valerie Plame's identity on July 11, 2003. I called him because Ambassador Wilson was in the news that week. I didn't know Ambassador Wilson even had a wife until I talked to Karl Rove, and he said that she worked at the Agency and worked on WMD.”

Resonant Thoughts

"Tis impossible to judge with much Precision of the true Motives and Qualities of human Actions, or of the Propriety of Rules contrived to govern them, without considering with like Attention, all the …"

— John Adams

Politics1947

#knowledge

"I had been reading Michelle Alexander’s book The New Jim Crow, which talks about mass incarceration and mass incarceration being the new Jim Crow. But I really believe education is also the new Jim Cr…"

— Dominique Morisseau

Literature1978

#books

"Nothing in the traditional life of Aborigines was more impressive than their practical knowledge. They were masters of their environment even though they could do little to change it."

— Geoffrey Blainey

Education1930

#knowledge

"Well the voices, for me especially in first person story-telling, the voice is of primary importance. And the voice reflects and articulates that particular character and what that particular characte…"

— Chang-rae Lee

Literature1965

#art