Jackqueline got a chance to “infiltrate” a College Republicans event with Karl Rove as the guest speaker last night. Some very interesting tidbits come out of her notes on the evening, not least that Washington is going to be a prime target for the Republicans in the upcoming elections.

Most interestingly, they are planning to really compete in Washington this year. He said in 2000 they only lost this state by 138,000 votes, and that there were 118,000 Republican supporters living in King County alone who did NOT vote in 2000. (How do they figure that out?) So they think they have a shot at winning this state, if they can get out the Republican vote.

He also said Bush doesn’t want a “lonely victory” — so they’re concentrating their resources in states where they think they can help get a few more people elected down ticket as well. Here that would be our Governor and Senate races, as well as a couple of House races. They also want to “leave something behind.” They want Bush’s campaign this year to inspire a generation of young Republican activists like Reagan did. They’re really working on mobilizing grassroots volunteers, especially college students, to recruit people and get out the vote.

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p>Maybe not terribly surprising, but interesting to hear it “from the horse’s mouth”, so to speak (okay, secondhand, but still…).

Rove also talked about the Bush campaign’s plans to do their best to rake Kerry over the coals in the upcoming months.

He said the past year, especially the past three months, have been bad for them. He said as everyone in the room knew, the national media were not on their side. So they had to put off launching their campaign until the Democrats had a nominee, but they’ve been planning it, and a race against Kerry, for a long time. He kept emphasizing how much they’ve studied Kerry, what a wealth of material they have to use against him, and how many stupid things Kerry has said that they’ve gotten on tape. He mentioned how the National Journal recently rated Kerry as the “most liberal” Senator, amazingly making Ted Kennedy the more conservative Senator from Massachusetts. The ads they’ve rolled out over the past two weeks are just the beginning, and they’re planning to hit Kerry and have him howling every week. He said they’re very carefully testing these ads with focus groups before they run them to make sure they’re effective.

2004 is going to be a long, rough, nasty campaign. Bush needs to go, but I’m still very unconvinced that Kerry had the best chances of ousting him, and Nader’s egotistical grandstanding isn’t going to help things in the least.

As far as I’m concerned, there is no excuse for anyone to remain oblivious. If you care at all about where our country is headed, you really need to pay attention. Keep your eyes and ears open — and don’t just stick with the echo chambers of the people you agree with. Watch what the other camps are doing, whether or not you agree with them (or to what extent — Jacqueline runs far more to the Libertarian camp than I do, and I know I don’t agree with her wholeheartedly on many of her positions, but I’ve been enjoying reading her posts, as even if I don’t always agree with someone, I can always respect someone who seems to put some thought into what they believe). No matter what, don’t just bury your head in the sand.

iTunes: “What is Love?” by Jones, Howard from the album Pop and Wave Vol. 2 (1983, 3:38).

[See also: Look out, Bush | Top GOP pollster says Bush is in trouble | Electoral Map | I just don’t get it. | Dean ‘near-perfect’ in latest debate ]

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