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A Monitor luncheon with Karl Rove
Excerpts from a Monitor event on the possibility of new federal restrictions on abortion.
Karl Rove is President Bush's senior policy adviser, and one of the most influential and powerful people in Washington. He was the guest at a late afternoon Monitor-sponsored event in Washington for newspaper and magazine reporters.
On what will be in the president's State of the Union address next week:
"I think you will see the president in the State of the Union address attempt to both highlight the important international points that face the country and at the same time lay out a pretty robust domestic agenda because he believes the country has a necessity of confronting great challenges abroad at the same time it confronts different but none the less big challenges at home.
You have heard him talk about some of the domestic challenges so far - growing the economy, he talked about part of the health initiative, you will see a larger part of that. I don't think you will see this be a definitive speech on Iraq."
On how he would describe his "unique" service to the president:
"I am not sure I provide a unique service to the president. I am one voice among many around the senior staff table in the morning and one voice among a number that he hears from. I am not certain there is any uniqueness at all to it.
I do think that most of what passes for coverage of my role tends to exaggerate it. I think the town can only operate successfully through myth and one of the great myths is that there has to be some Svengali-like person sitting in the White House.... I repeat, this town operates in an odd fashion, and I think it operates on the basis of things that have to be, though they really aren't."
On what he thinks the administration has to deliver to the anti-abortion constituency:
"I think the practical and the possible is a ban on a particularly gruesome procedure, partial-birth abortion, and I think there is a strong desire certainly among House Republicans, and I think among many in the Senate, to deal with cloning. I think those are the immediate tasks at hand and we would do well to achieve them."
On whether he is concerned about how that abortion stance positions the president for reelection:
"I think in this country whether you are pro-life or pro-choice that there is a desire to find common ground. And I think people on all sides of the issue can find common ground on things like outlawing late-term abortions, particularly partial-birth abortions, involving parents in decisions of teenage daughters, and helping fund alternatives to abortion, such as better adoption services and child-care services. I think that is where we ought to look for progress; in finding things that people, regardless of their feelings on this issue, find common ground.
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