Cavuto: “Karl Rove leaving: A loss for Wall Street?”


The August 13 edition of Fox News' Your World with Neil Cavuto featured a discussion of White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove's resignation during which, as noted by the Think Progress blog, the on-screen text read: “Karl Rove leaving: A loss for Wall Street?” Host Neil Cavuto posed this question to his guests, Weekly Standard executive editor Fred Barnes and Fox News director of business news Alexis Glick, and, indeed, Cavuto, Barnes, and Glick all agreed that Rove's departure from the White House will be a “loss for Wall Street.”

As Media Matters for America has documented, Cavuto frequently purports to identify possible effects on the stock market or the economy of "news" stories, or allows his guests to do so, often in order to attack Democrats and progressives.

Fox News touts Your World as “currently the No. 1 rated signature business show on cable.”

From the August 13 edition of Fox News' Your World with Neil Cavuto:

CAVUTO: Another news alert for you. You know him, of course, as a political maestro. Wall Street knows him as a bit of a market maestro. Today, Karl Rove -- said to play a very key role in pushing the president's tax cuts, for one thing -- announced that he will be cutting out of town by the end of the month.

ROVE [video clip]: It's not been an easy decision. As you know from our discussions, it started last summer. It always seemed there was a better time to leave, somewhere out there in the future. But now is the time. I will miss -- deeply miss my work here.

CAVUTO: So will Wall Street miss him? Let's ask my colleague and friend, FNC's director of business news Alexis Glick, and Fred Barnes. Fred is the co-host of The Beltway Boys. What do you think, Alexis?

GLICK: You know, I think we are going to miss him, because -- let's put it in context. He has orchestrated some of the best recoveries in the economy with President Bush. We talk about the tax reliefs. Remember, coming out of 9-11 you had $100 billion in economic losses. You lost a million jobs in the three months after 9-11, and those tax cuts made a difference. But we're not really going to miss him, because he's going to be running someone else's campaign.

CAVUTO: Do you think so? I always wonder whether the draw of private-sector work, you know, and the money you could make offsets helping another campaign.

GLICK: I think he does. I mean, I would be surprised. I know they're saying he's going to go write a book, he's going to relax, be with the family, but it's hard not to get enticed getting back into it. And for a guy like this, he's been an architect of such big events, I find it hard to believe he'll sit on the sidelines.

CAVUTO: All right. By the way, I agree with that, which should make you rethink that. Fred, what do you make of just his legacy in the financial markets? We've heard a lot politically, but I think Alexis is right here. He played a very crucial role pushing the tax cuts. To a less success, the president's emphasis on trying to deal with Social Security. But these were things that were sort of tonic to Wall Street. Do they lose a key ally now?

BARNES: Oh, I think they do lose a key ally. Look, we're -- Karl Rove is not replaceable. He really is one of a kind, and he did play a key role in the tax cuts, particularly the 2003 ones that reduced that rate on dividends and capital gains to 15 percent. He was a critical player there. You know, he thought that one of the most important things that President Bush has done during his entire presidency is to cut taxes but not raise them at all. And Karl talked about that all the time. He was a strong force for exactly that.