Karl Rove gave hope to the hopeless

I learned something surprising today: Karl Rove is almost 57 years old. I would have thought he was about ten years younger. It turns out the extremely unfortunate looking, like the extremely attractive, take on a kind of ageless quality which makes it difficult to properly gauge their time spent so far on earth.

It's not that Rove's physical appearance hasn't been commented upon. He is often compared to Gollum -- the mystical hobbit rendered wretched by his own greed. Some also see a little hint of Fraggle Rock in Rove's round face and squinched-together eyes. But Rove's physical ugliness is always over-shadowed by the next hyperbolic thought, often along the lines of "Karl Rove is the man most responsible for the decline of Western Civilization."

Or that he is a genius. Yet the man's unattractiveness is not and should not ever be in dispute. Now, as he passes from the scene he has controlled for so long, and with such a steady underhand, Rove needs to be celebrated for what we can all agree upon.

It must be tough, being an ugly kid growing up in America. (I wouldn't know, thank God.) That whole anyone can be president spiel . . ? Not so much in these days of fake tans and 400 dollar hair cuts. Even the image of the sinister hunchback pulling the strings from behind a curtain becomes far fetched when presidential strategists are expected to be TV-ready with the bouncy vibrant hair of a Stephanopoulos.

Over thirty years ago famous singer Leonard Cohen sung of those oppressed by the figures of beauty. I wonder what he thinks now that omnipresent cameras and Internet social networking have left nowhere for one with a radio face to hide?

Karl Rove struck back hard at his oppressors by boldly matching his unfortunate bone structure with a slovenly appearance.

More than a controversial political mind with a "dirty tricks" playbook, Rove was our last connection to the time when a man was judged not by the symmetry of his face, but by the content of his plan to gain electoral power through dividing the nation into two hysterical color coded factions.

So long Karl Rove. We will never see another like you.