It is not so farfetched. I am not prone to conspiracy theories – for example, I think Oswald acted alone, and although I do believe in extraterrestrial life, I do not think there has been an organized cover-up of UFO contacts with Earth. But isn’t it a bit convenient that less than two weeks before Election Day, with polls running heavily against John McCain in favor of the first serious African American candidate for U.S. President, a young white female should be caught faking an attack by a 6-foot, 4-inch black man so deranged that he would sexually assault her and carve the letter "B" in her face? It might have gone something like this:
It’s midnight three days ago. Steve Schmidt answers his door. Rove doesn’t wait to be invited in, he walks past the bald campaign manager and into the dimly lit apartment. The 37-inch TV is on Fox News. Rove ignores Schmidt, watching as a digital electoral map fills the screen, showing a half red, half blue map of the U.S.
"I can’t lie to you. It’s going to take something outside this campaign to change the map between now and the 4th," Schmidt says.
Rove doesn’t answer. After a long pause, Schmidt sighs and sits.
"You aren’t pushing the right button," Rove says, finally. His voice is almost a whisper, seething, like a serpent. "Ignore all the Ayers bullshit. Even the Jeremiah Wright stuff. What’s the one thing that has worked against these black assholes since the fucking dawn of time?"
Schmidt rubs his face. "I don’t know. What, you’re thinking something like the Harold Ford ad? Willie Horton? What?"
Rove smiles, chuckles pityingly. "You’ve got to think outside the box, Stevie. We aren’t going to win this thing on advertising, even if we found some kind of fucking Daisy ad to play every hour between now and the 4th."
Another pause. Schmidt leans back against the wall. "What, then?"
"Think. What's the most outrageous thing you can think of that would make people rise up against Obama? What would be so horrible, that it would change people’s minds in the last days? Give them something to hang their doubts on?"
Schmidt shakes his head. "I suppose if he raped a thirteen-year-old white girl, that would do it."
"Don’t be a dumbass, the guy’s cleaner than a Costco-size bottle of Purell," Rove answers. "But you aren't seeing it. It doesn’t have to be Obama that’s the attacker. Could be somebody like him. You know the kind of guy I mean? And how about if an unfortunate McCain campaign worker were to be the victim?"
Schmidt’s eyes widen. "That’s some seriously fucked up shit, Karl. I know we gotta take off the gloves, but I don’t know if I can get things in place for that kind of thing to happen soon enough to accomplish anything."
"You really are as dumb as a box of rocks. Fake it. Find some willing college student who will take one for the team, get herself knocked around a bit and report it to the police. All of those people out there with a nagging feeling, a distrust they can’t place about Obama, will react to this like the blacks have declared war on the whites. It’s fucking perfect."
Schmidt is smiling now. "I think I know where to start. Pennsylvania. Fucking swing state. We got a pretty good turnout in Pittsburgh from the college crowd, there’s bound to be someone there who’ll do it."
"Do it or you’re fucked," Rove says, rising. He moves to the door and lets himself out.
Schmidt does not answer, already texting the Pittsburgh field office. Then he hears the sound of the front door closing behind Rove.
"We all are, you fat bastard."
UPDATE: I appreciate all of your comments, and I especially appreciate that you aren't HRing me for this. I intended it primarily as a creative story and not as an assertion of what I think really happened. Just trying to give folks a change of pace from the hyper-frenetic news scooping that everyone is doing around here (e.g., 20 diaries will appear with nearly the exact same text copied and pasted from another source, whenever something of interest is reported elsewhere).