Rove's Attack On Hillary's Health Was A Political Blunder

Karl Rove was once hailed as a brilliant political strategist by his fellow Republicans. That was because he successfully engineered the election of George Bush in 2000 (by getting a majority of electoral college votes in spite of the fact that Bush lost the popular vote). But since Bush left office, Rove political expertise has come into question.

In the 2012 election, the super-PAC headed by Rove spent multiple millions of donor dollars to defeat President Obama. It failed miserably, and Rove looked like a whiner when he objected on nationwide TV to the networks calling Ohio for President Obama (even though they were later proved to be right). Now it looks like Rove may have made an even bigger political blunder.

A couple of weeks ago, Rove questioned the health of Hillary Clinton -- referring back to a fall she had in 2012, and insinuating that she may have suffered "traumatic brain injury". And considering her age, he thought this would be an issue in the 2016 presidential election if Hillary chose to run. Rove was trying to chip away at the popularity of Hillary Clinton to give the GOP nominee in 2016 a chance to be elected -- but it looks like his nefarious accusation has backfired on him. He may have helped Hillary instead of hurting her.

It turns out that two-thirds of the public disapproved of Rove's scurrilous attack on Hillary. That's what a new Washington Post / ABC News Poll found. The survey was done between May 21st and 25th of a random national sample of 1,017 adults (and has a margin of error of 3.5 points).

The chart above shows the result of that poll. Note that 66% of the general public (and 67% of registered voters) disapproved of Rove's remarks. And that feeling was much the same across all demographic groups -- regardless of age, education, income, race, gender, or region. Even a plurality of Republicans disapproved (with 46% disapproving and 45% approving).

Are Karl Rove's 15 minutes of fame as a political strategist over? Could be. He certainly can't afford to make another blunder of this magnitude.