MyDD: Is Rove Grooming Romney?

[RSchewe]

by Scott Shields

Political Wire links to an article from the http://cbs4boston.com/seenon/local_story_262153649.html">CBS affiliate in Boston about the the White House courting Massachusetts Governor and likely 2008 GOP candidate Mitt Romney to oversee the federal recovery effort on the Gulf Coast.

As the White House gears up for the massive job of rebuilding hurricane-stricken areas, there's been talk of bringing in someone like Governor Mitt Romney to oversee the project. And CBS4 News has learned there may be more to that than just talk.
. . .
"It's an honor to have some people suggest that I should be a possible candidate to lead a reconstruction effort in New Orleans, but I'm happy being governor," Romney told CBS4 Political Analyst Jon Keller.

For a guy who claims disinterest in the job, Governor Romney seems to have given it a lot of thought.

"You begin by finding out what's really going on. Do a complete audit of the infrastructure, not just a financial audit but an audit of the people, of the capital in place, of the infrastructure, what has to be done, what the options are," Romney said.

And two top Republican sources tell CBS4 News that GOP officials have made tentative inquiries about Romney's availability to help guide the recovery.

With http://thinkprogress.org/2005/09/05/rove-katrina/">Karl Rove leading up the administration's Katrina 'efforts', the logical inference to make here is that Rove is trying to put Romney into a position of national prominence to help him in 2008. As we all well know from http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,1103581,00.html">Mike Allen's piece in Time and a variety of other sources, that the Bush administration's first priority is politics, with actual governance coming in a distant second.

Though Romney is the Governor of Massachusetts, he couldn't be any less moderate. His tenure in that job has exposed him as a hardcore partisan, not a consensus builder. Just this past May, Romney vetoed a pro-embryonic stem cell research bill. And then in July, he vetoed an emergency contraception bill, parroting the extremist claim that it's a form of abortion (which it is not). Both vetoes were overridden easily by the Massachusetts Legislature, but Romney wanted to make a big show of proving his rightist credentials.

Leave it to the Bush administration to fill yet another position with a political ally. This is not a job to give out for resume padding. This is something that needs to be handled on a bipartistan --if not completely nonpartisan -- basis. For me, this is just one more piece of evidence that the administration is far more concerned about politics than people.

http://www.mydd.com/story/2005/9/20/14142/7346

[liberalpragmatist]

1. It is interesting - I thought they were grooming Allen

Knowing Rove, he's probably grooming 3 or 4 of them - they're making good noises over McCain, boosting Allen, promising Frist favors, and boosting Romney. But in the end, they'll pick one and screw the other ones.