May 10, 2007 | 5:09 pm

Is Karl Rove an atheist?

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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At the least, Rove‘s not a person of faith. That’s what godless superstar Christopher Hitchens says in an interview with New York magazine. Here’s the excerpt from the Washington Monthly‘s Political Animal:

Has anyone in the Bush administration confided in you about being an atheist?

Well, I don’t talk that much to them — maybe people think I do. I know something which is known to few but is not a secret. Karl Rove is not a believer, and he doesn’t shout it from the rooftops, but when asked, he answers quite honestly. I think the way he puts it is, “I’m not fortunate enough to be a person of faith.”

The Political Animal—also known as Kevin Drum—wasn’t surprised.

In fact, I’ve never really thought Rove was all that committed a conservative, either. He strikes me more as a pure political operative, someone who could have signed up with either side if different opportunities had presented themselves when he was young. But he signed up with the conservative cause early, and once that happened he was the kind of person to jump in with both feet.

But Mark Kleiman, a UCLA public policy prof, was a bit more cynical:

If we’ve learned anything in the last six years, it’s that when Karl Rove’s lips are moving, he’s lying, generally for partisan advantage. He knows full well that (1) he’s unpopular (2) atheism is unpopular and (3) voters still tend to associate Republicans with religiosity and Democrats with godlessness. So he’s decided to pretend to be an atheist, hoping that some of the bad reputation he’s worked so hard to earn rubs off on us.

Un-uh. No way. I’m not having any. The godly put Rove and his puppet in power, and the godly are stuck with the pair of them.

By the way, a Google image search for Karl Rove will turn up some comical mock photos, like the one above.