Rove's fate leaves Bush agenda in jeopardy

If Karl Rove, chief political strategist for President George W. Bush, were a betting man he might be feeling relieved.

The odds on his being indicted and forced out of the White House have swung from 1-2 last week to a 70 per cent chance that he will stay, according to sportsbook.com, an online website.

However, Rove has established his reputation as a political strategist by relying on his forensic analysis of the party faithful rather than by gambling on hunches.

Now he is facing someone with equal forensic skills: Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor, who gives a whole new meaning to the prosecutorial byword relentless.

As Fitzgerald prepares to wrap up his investigation into who leaked the name of Valerie Plame, a covert CIA agent, the possibility of a Rove indictment has pushed every other issue to the margins of the political agenda.

The question is whether he was part of a White House effort to undermine her husband, Joseph Wilson, a former ambassador, who questioned the administration's evidence that Iraq was developing nuclear weapons.

Any indictment of Rove would be a devastating personal blow to the president.

The two men have known each other for 31 years, forging a remarkable symbiotic relationship, or what ecologists call "mutualism", where both species benefit equally.

From the time Rove met Bush in the early 1970s he was politically smitten.

Since then Rove has steered him through every significant ballot-box success, starting with his election as Texas governor in 1994. Bush called him the "architect" of his 2004 victory, while Rove has said: "I have no other persona other than Bush."

If he did have to step down his departure could threaten what is left of Bush's second-term agenda.

After weeks in which the administration has been on the defensive for its handling of Hurricane Katrina and the Iraq war, "it would continue the flow of bad news", says Paul Light, politics professor at New York University. "There is a natural ageing process of presidencies," he says.

Cycle of waning

"This one was well into its cycle of waning influence but in the last three weeks the ageing process has accelerated. If Rove goes it could be the de facto end of the administration's influence in Washington."

Rove has assumed a particularly central role in the second term. His title as deputy chief of staff at the White House obscures his real status: overseeing both politics and policy.

It was Rove who was first on the telephone to pacify conservatives over the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, who has tried to sell immigration reform to sceptical lawmakers and who devised the strategy of using Social Security reform to woo younger workers to the Republican party.

He also helps to vet cabinet, judicial and congressional candidates, spreading his influence across Washington.

If not as omniscient as some of the apocryphal tales attest, he is ubiquitous, once joking that the only domestic issue he was not involved in was baseball.

John Pitney, professor of government at Claremont McKenna College, says those abilities are hard to replace.

"The biggest problem is finding someone who can see the whole chessboard. There are lots of political people who can manage a campaign or do policy. There are very few who know both."

In a White House notorious for its insularity, Rove scrupulously maintains external ties, acting as the go-to man for anyone who wants to get a message to the president.

David Frum, a former speech-writer for Bush and fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, says: "He talks to everyone, from Catholic groups, the Republican party network over the country to conservative intellectuals and the Washington media."

Capable of mistakes

Rove is capable of mistakes. Bush's battered image, approval ratings of 39 per cent and bungled handling of Social Security reform show that. Even so, it is hard to see how the president will salvage his floundering second term without him.

Over the past week Rove has cancelled three keynote speeches and brushed past the reporters camping outside his north-west Washington home. But friends insist he remains fully engaged, such as on the Miers nomination.

Vin Weber, a Republican strategist who had dinner with him in the past few days, says: "He showed no signs of wear and tear. He is working the agenda hard right now, reaching out to a lot of people and asking what the president's agenda should be next year."

With an eye on the 2006 elections, he warns that any fall-out could also hit Republicans. "Rove looms large in the minds of most Republicans. It would be a psychologically demoralising and a substantive loss if he were to go."