Media, Democrats shocked that Rove is human , intelligent

NY Times:

Late Thursday night, Karl Rove, “the architect” of the last two Republican presidential victories, was on his new television perch at Fox News, offering free advice to Senator Barack Obama as he closed in on the Democratic nomination.

Any move by Mr. Obama to declare victory before the last of the Democratic primaries in June, Mr. Rove said, would alienate Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s wing of the party. “That’s a mistake,” he said. “That just is rubbing the loser’s nose in it. And a lot of those supporters will remember it by November.”

In the Obama campaign war room in Chicago, where Mr. Rove’s talking head was just one of several across six television screens, his counsel was taken with a heavy dose of salt.

“Wouldn’t taking his advice be a little like getting health tips from a funeral home director?” said Mr. Obama’s press secretary, Bill Burton.

The bête noire of the Democrats has turned pundit, and his old nemeses — along with those who used to cover him in the news media — do not always know what to make of it.

One year ago, when he was still a deputy White House chief of staff in the Bush administration, Mr. Rove was more likely than not ducking news organizations.

Now, he has joined them, as an analyst for Fox News and a contributor to Newsweek and The Wall Street Journal. A book is in the offing, too. (Still no word on a radio show, but there was an NPR appearance late last week.)

At times clearly partisan, at others apparently offering down-the-middle analysis, Mr. Rove in his new role as a media star marks another step in the evolution of mainstream journalism, where opinion, “straight news” reporting and unmistakable spin increasingly mingle, especially on television.

...

“After one editor dealt with him,” Mr. Meacham said, “the editor called me and said, ‘This just complicated my world view. I may like Karl Rove.’ ”

Some media critics have conveyed similar surprise.

As an on-camera presence, Mr. Rove is not necessarily a natural. Neither his doughy chin nor his ashen complexion would be confused with those of, say, Brian Williams of NBC News.

...

Colleagues say he is most in his element as he ticks through delegate tallies, the demographics of Congressional districts and raw vote counts. “It’s like watching him at a staff meeting,” said Russ Schriefer, who worked with Mr. Rove in the 2000 and 2004 Bush presidential campaigns.

It is also a familiar sight to the journalists whom he once buried with statistics and factoids pointing to certain victory for his side.

Unlike many of his fellow commentators, Mr. Rove has avoided many big predictions.

On March 6, he warned in The Wall Street Journal against reading too much into a victory in Pennsylvania for Mrs. Clinton, of New York. “If she wins,” he wrote, “there are five more contests with more than 50 delegates at stake in each, and Mr. Obama could regain momentum.”

...

He is a smart guy who is largely self taught. He is a voracious reader who obviously knows history as well as "factoids." I like watching him because he can look at the data and tell you where things are going or tell you what data is missing. I think Democrats and the media hated him because he was so good at framing the debate in ways favorably to his client as well as having a good understanding where the voters were who would react to that framing.

I think one of the biggest mistakes of the Bush administration is not having him out making their case more. It was like putting a blanket over one of their brightest guys. I am also glad to see Democrats ignoring his suggestions. That is good news for Republicans.

There is one prediction he made a few months ago that has not been born out. He said that John McCain would be at a disadvantage if the Democrat race went on much beyond his wrapping up the GOP nomination. In fact both Democrats have been revealed as flawed by their continued exposure. I think Rush Limbaugh got that one right.