Karl Rove ran a shadow smear campaign against his own candidate

[NAO]

Karl Rove ran a shadow smear campaign against his own candidate - and his candidate won the race.

The election in question is a 1996 Alabama Supreme Court Seat between incumbent Kenneth Ingram (D) and Rove's client, Harold See (R).

Rove had fliers printed up that viscously attacked See and his family. He had them distributed at night in a covert fashion so no one would know were they came from.

As expected, the smears against See created outrage and a backlash against Ingram (the Democrat). Ingram's campaign was at a loss as to how to respond - they did not think they could convince people that See's campaign had attacked See to create a backlash against the Democrats. But that was the reality of the situation.

See won the election.

This narrative was drawn from an article in the November 2004 issue of The Atlantic titled "Rove at War" which is highly recommended.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. Welcome to DU. This sort of reverse psychological warfare on the

part of Rove does not surprise me in the least.

He's such a mihop kinda guy.

[rocktivity]

2. Like that trick in the Bugs Bunny/Daffy Duck cartoon

you can only do it once.

:headbang:
rocknation

[TheDebbieDee]

3. I don't know about that. Some of our electorate will never...........

be called the "sharpest knives in the drawer."

[chicagojoe]

4. The world would be a better place without Rove. He's dog crap.