Niccolo Machiavelli wrote The Prince after studying the actions of people such as the Medicis, the Sforzas, and Pope Alexander VI (Rodrigo Borgia) and his son, Cesare Borgia. Secrecy, deception, and manipulation were the mainstays of these folks. But there was also a fair amount of use of such political tools such as a stray crossbow bolt fired from an upper window while an inconvenient person happened to be strolling in the garden below, a few drops of poison in a goblet of wine, or a quick dagger-thrust in a dark hallway.

Secrecy, deception and manipulation are still very popular and widespread political tools. Actual assassination is generally frowned on these days, but it has been quite adequately replaced by character assassination. Dig up something in a person's background, or if you can't find anything, make up a rumor, or an outright lie, and start circulating it. It seems that to be accused is to be condemned.

It's been long established that this is Karl Rove's favorite method. And he's very good at it. He managed to get George W. Bush elected governor of Texas against Ann Richards, one of the most popular governors Texas ever had, by spreading outright but very effective lies about her. One of his ploys was to garner the conservative Christian vote for Bush by having volunteers go to church parking lots on Sunday mornings and put fliers under windshield wipers saying that Ann Richards had a policy of hiring homosexuals in the Texas government. She had no such policy (one way or the other), but once the accusation was made, that's all it took. This put Bush in a position where he could make a run for the presidency. And, of course, Rove is still at it, neutralizing (character assassinating) critics of the Bush administration. The Valerie Plame leak (obviously vengeance for her husband's disagreeing with Bush) has Rove's fingerprints all over it.

It would be interesting to see what Niccolo Machiavelli would have to say after studying Karl Rove for awhile.   

Don Firth