Saturday, July 30, 2005
Episode #45,685 Of "If This Involved Clinton Staffers Or Other Democrats, It'd Be All Over The Evening News"
#1: The big rumor in Texas power-broker circles is that Karl Rove's committing adultery:
For years, political insiders in the Lone Star State have whispered about Rove’s close friendship with lobbyist Karen Johnson, a never-married, forty-something GOP loyalist from Austin, Texas. The two first became close when Johnson sat on the board of then-Governor George W. Bush’s Business Council over a decade ago. Their friendship reportedly deepened after Bush appointed Johnson—a little-known spokesperson for the Texas Good Roads Association—to a seat on his Transportation Department transition team in 2000. The plum appointment enabled Johnson’s lobbying firm, Infrastructure Solutions, to snare such high-paying clients as Aetna and the City of Laredo. Sources say Johnson now frequently travels between Washington D.C. and Austin, where she frequently appears at Rove’s side at parties and unofficial functions. Although there is no evidence that their relationship is anything but professional, the close association between the married White House aide and the comely lobbyist has long raised eyebrows in conservative Texas circles. Asked about the pair, a prominent political journalist who has written extensively about Rove says, “I’ve heard the stories, but I would never write about Karl and Karen. If you want to keep your job as a reporter in Texas, you make believe you don’t see them together.”#2: Signs that the Texas GOP is starting to collapse under the weight of its own scandals. I won't hold my breath on this one, but it'll be nice to see it happening. I won't hold my breath in expectation of seeing these repudiations of the Bush/GOP Agenda make the nightly news, either.
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