Karl Rove gets all huffy when NYT asks him about Bush

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/23/us/politics/unseen-but-looming-over-the-race-george-w-bush.html

He does not speak on the stump or appear in television ads. Campaign audiences rarely hear his name.

But aside from President Obama and Mitt Romney, no one has shaped the 2012 election more than George W. Bush — on the economy and on the foreign policy issues in the spotlight during the final presidential debate on Monday.

... It is an awkward situation for Bush loyalists active in the Republican campaign this year, one they like to avoid.

“I have no interest in participating in this silly exercise,” Karl Rove, a former Bush strategist who now leads Republican “super-PAC” efforts to aid Mr. Romney, said in declining to be interviewed about Mr. Bush’s influence on this election. He left it to Democrats to assess his former boss’s impact, and they were more willing to take the bait.