Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Leaving for Family


I tried to find a picture of Karl Rove's family on "Google Images", but there weren't any, at least in the first 10 pages of photos.


You know, that Karl Rove resigned yesterday to spend more time with his family...of course. Not because of continuing controversies around Valerie Plame, the dismissed US attorneys, the plummeting esteem of the administration, and so on, but because after 35 years working for Mr. Bush, he realized he had neglected his family and it was time to come home. Oh, and that he had to make up his mind by Labor Day. For resigning members of the Bush administration, family is like the "dog ate my homework" excuse.


So, let's pretend for a minute that he did resign for family reasons. Mr. Rove, I think you are probably going to be very disappointed. See, your son in college most likely doesn't want you more involved in his life, and if you are fantasizing oh even weekly visits, I'm guessing they aren't going to happen. And most of the wives I know of workaholic men who retire complain mightily about their husbands now hanging around the house. As one woman said to me, "For better or worse...just not for lunch."


There is no question that many of us struggle to balance our work and our families...it's just we don't use our families as a convenient excuse to quit, as so many in the Bush administration seem to do.


On the other hand, Rove will be gone in three weeks. Let's hope others aren't far behind.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

My thought was, as long as he's out of there, who cares why he's leaving! ;)

+JN1034 said...

We also discussed his family yesterday after watching his resignation speech. None of us could recall a Rove family. We also did web searches and came up empty-handed with photos, but did learn he's married and has a son (thanks to Wikipedia). We needn't pretend he resigned for family reasons, unless he's using the word in a Mafioso gist.

+JN1034 said...

PS. We cited you and Balancing Acts. Thank you for this groundbreaking resource. We need these types of initiatives in all congregations. We know one of our Greek Orthodox collegaues in the States is a signatory of your "Religious Declaration on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing." Your work is so necessary, and we look forward to cooperating as best we can from our faith tradition. We've much in common, though some Orthodox would (incorrectly) cite otherwise.