With the advent of Rove's resignation I kept hearing this great old song over and over in my head: The Jolly Beggarman. It's a great valedictory song for Karl, in that the protagonist of the song, The Jolly Beggarman, lacks any socially redeeming characteristics whatsoever, is a thief, a rapist, a liar, a conman, and has no compunction or remorse whatsoever.
It was the fashion in Irish songwriting of the nineteenth century that a beggar would arrive in the cold wind and the rainy night to seek shelter from the storm. The farmer's daughter would form a crush, the beggar (or siuler) would respond in kind, visit her room and steal her virginity. At that point, when the girl begins to have misgivings about what she's just given up, the hero reveals that he is a nobleman/general in disguise and that he intends to whisk her off to his castle to shore up their bargain with a grand wedding. Happily ever after, or something like that.
The joke of The Jolly Beggarman is that the farmer's daughter thinks she is a step ahead of the game, but when she asks what his real identity is, he replies "Sorry honey, I'm really a raggedy beggar, and you're shit out of luck, but I enjoyed myself, RATHER..." This accords with my view of Rove's rake's progress through our political system and the damage he's left in his wake to our government, not to mention our national discourse.
Mostly I can't get the refrain out of my head:
We'll go no more a-rovin'
A-rovin' in the night
We'll go no more a-rovin'
Let the moon shine so bright
We'll go no more a-rovin'
Let's just hold out hope that life will imitate art in this case, and that we are at the very least rid of the Jolly Beggarman.