Nicked from the letters section at Romenesko:

From JEROME WEEKS, Dallas Morning News: Given the recent back-and-forth in these letters about insider access and political manipulation — including William E. Jackson, Jr’s posting about the Judith Miller/Ahmad Chalabi resurrection — interested reporters should pick up the March 10 issue of The New York Review of Books — for the letters page (not available online). Mark Danner, journalism prof at Bard and Berkeley,writes about ‘How Bush Really Won’ and notes what happened with the coverage of Bush’s first campaign ads, which stirred up a furor over the use of World Trade Center footage of a dead fireman.

Prof. Danner writes: “Indeed, the controversy was so serious, according to the Times, that it had ‘complicated efforts by Republicans to seize the
initiative after months in which Mr. Bush has often been on the defensive.'” And Newsweek reported much the same thing, with “campaign officials on the defensive.”

But seven months later, after the election, Newsweek published a very different “inside account,” based on exclusive access to the campaigns, a story which it had agreed to embargo until after the voting. In this version, two Bush strategists “were ecstatic. At a strategy meeting the next day — the same morning the Times headline appeared — they joked about how they could fan the flames…. [The controversy] meant lots of ‘free media’; the ads were shown over and over again on news shows . . . The ‘visual’ of the rubble at the World Trade Center was a powerful reminder of … Bush’s finest [hour]…. What’s more, the story eclipsed some grim economic news…. ‘Unfortunately, we’ve been talking about 9/11 and our ads for five days,'” one of the strategists “deadpanned at a senior staff meeting. ‘We’re going to try to pivot back to the economy as soon as we can.’

“There were chuckles all around.”

Folks, they’re laughing at us.

This sounds about right, and this is what ought to bother everyone associated with the Loyal Opposition. You got punked. If you’ll forgive me putting it so indelicately, you need to start wearing lipstick because Karl Rove likes his bitches to look nice.

Never mind whether the Democratic party needs to find ways of talking about values or should insist on the secular democracy explicitly intended by the Framers. Never mind whether Dean represents the right ideological face of the party. Yadda yadda yadda. Dubya won because Rove is smarter than the people who ran things for Kerry (hint #1 – Kerry entrusting key elements of his campaign to people best known for their losing streaks? Hello – McFly?). The GOP didn’t win on message – sure, values was a component, but let’s not confuse related factors for primary causes. They won because they were better strategically. They were sneaky, clever, and evil. They believe in Mill, not Kant (if you don’t get the reference go look it up).

And the one guy the Dems have that we know to be smart enough and evil enough to whip the GOP at this game – James Carville – sat it out, far as we can tell. Maybe he didn’t want Kerry to win because he’s angling to back Hillary in 2k8 or something. Who the hell knows what happens in the head of a man who was born very smart and very very mean, and then hooked up with Mary Matalin. Jesus, that’s only marginally better than marrying Anne Coulter. It’s like starting with the world’s brightest pit bull, then flogging it every day and feeding it human flesh. I like James Carville – not, you know, that I’d want him in my house or anything, but from a distance – and had he been in the cockpit of the Kerry 2004 machine we might well have had a different outcome. Even if Bush had won, we’d at least have had a more entertaining variety of political theater to enjoy.

But I digress. The issue here is that whatever message the Dems want to back and whatever candidate their dumbass nominating machine cranks out in 2008, the critically important factor – perhaps the most important factor – is who’s going to be in charge of yanking the puppet strings. Who’s the man or woman behind the curtain? Where’s your Machiavelli?

If Campaign 2008 pits a GOP strategist along the lines of a Karl Rove against a Dem field marshall who’s neither as smart or as evil, it won’t matter if the Democrats are running the next JFK against a hyena on a murder spree. If we have learned anything from experience, it’s that winning the White House in the 21st Century has zero to do with substance.