QUILLBLOG

$3 million for Karl Rove’s memoirs?

Maybe, according to the New York Post:

Karl Rove, the controversial and long-time senior adviser to President George W. Bush, is shopping a memoir in an auction that will kick off today and likely result in a seven-figure payday.

“It will sell for millions, but how many millions is the question,” said one publisher who is expected to bid.

“It’s going to be an interesting auction, he’s smart and he’s capable of moving beyond the cliches,” said the publisher, who predicted a $3 million sale.

Among those who have taken a pitch meeting with the man known in some quarters as “Bush’s Brain” were HarperCollins (which is owned by News Corp., which also owns The Post), the Threshold Editions imprint of Simon & Schuster and the Random House imprint of Random House, Inc.

Rove is being represented by Robert Barnett. The famed Washington, DC attorney has fetched multi-million dollar advances for everyone from Alan Greenspan to Bill and Hillary Clinton to most recently Tony Blair and Ted Kennedy. Barnett declined to comment.

When your best justification for spending a few million dollars on the self-aggrandizing recollections of one of the most hated men in America is that “he’s capable of moving beyond the cliches,” you know things have gone terribly, terribly wrong somewhere.