Rove lamely attempts to defend Bush's approval ratings.

Crooks and Liars:

Karl Rove, the "architect" of the George W. Bush presidency, appeared Tuesday morning on the TODAY show to talk about President-elect Obama's transition team and offered perhaps the weakest "defense" of George Bush's almost universal unpopularity. According to Rove, who for some reason is still lauded by the villagers as some sort of political genius, the problem is not with Bush and all the terrible decisions he's made, but rather with the American people who have simply become "tired" after eight long years of disastrous GOP rule.

The fun begins at 4:10.

Lauer: "President Bush said in an interview recently that he's 'sure some of the vote for Barack Obama were a repudiation of Republicans' and he said 'I'm sure some people voted for Barack Obama because of me.' He's leaving office with dismal approval rating. What went wrong? You were the architect of this administration in many ways. What went wrong."

Rove: "Well, first of all, let's look at what went right. [..] Look, at the end of eight years -- Republicans or Democrats...when they've had the White House -- people tire of it."