'The Plank' at The New Republic On—Line reports the breathtaking news that in early 2006, disgraced ex—Congressman Mark Foley was thinking of not running for re—election, until....(sinister Phantom of the Opera type sound track, please!) Karl Rove talked him out of it! Apparently Rove was concerned about Republicans losing control of the House in this election cycle. Foley supposedly wanted give up his seat to become a lobbyist, but Rove made it plain that Foley would find that career much more successful if he stayed on to assure Republican maintained control of the House.

I have a teensy little problem with that. 

In 2000, Republican Foley carried the Florida Sixteenth with 61% of the vote.

In 2002 he carried it with 79%.

In 2004 he carried the District with 68%.

Polling by Majority Watch in the Florida 16th had the Democrat leading Foley's replacement, Negron, whose name will not appear on the ballot, by between 3% and 7%, as of October 2!

If after a major scandal in that District involving the incumbent Republican, the Democrat leads a very late replacement (two days!) by barely more than a standard margin of error — how worried would anyone have been, much less Darth Rove, in early 2006 about finding an electable replacement for Foley if he did drop out? If in the previous three Congressional election cycles, the Democrats never got more than 39% of the District vote and averaged less than 31%  — exactly how worried do we think Rove would have been about the Florida 16th?

What would it take for a District to have been considered a 'safe' Republican one by the folks at TNR? A three election cycle win at an average, say, 75%, as opposed to the historically measley — 69%?

If concern over the Florida 16th gave Karl a case of the vapors, he's just not the fierce and frightening political warrior the Democrats and TNR imagine! Or maybe it just has to be all Rove, all the time!

Denis Keohane  10 13 06