White House Hits the Daily Double With Terrorist, Rove

It was a good week for the White House -- they killed a notorious Iraq terrorist and learned Karl Rove will not be indicted in the Plame Affair. Both bits of news are welcome to a White House with low approval ratings months before to a mid-term election ... and provided enough of a confidence boost that President Bush went to Iraq.

Meanwhile, Forbes reports that 75,000 Iraqi and multinational forces are to be deployed in Baghad, and "Baghdad will [have] a curfew and a ban on personal weapons."

Rove continues in his role as chief political advisor to the President. Reuters reports that he is advising Republicans to make the economy a cornerstone of their campaigns this fall. At a $100 per person Republican fund-raiser, Rove said, "We have the strongest economy of any major industrialized country in the world."

This rose-colored glasses view of the economy discounts the national debt and Congressional deficit spending. Public debt stands at 65% of GDP. (chart) And as I wrote in November 2004: If we had closed the doors on almost every federal agency during fiscal 2005 -- that years' budget would still have been in the red.