Ok, I am now ready to admit I was wrong.

A year ago I put myself in Karl Rove's shoes and came up with a crazy strategy for winning the election. It was to invade Cuba, take out Castro, and then sit back and watch the Democrats fume as American Marines marched victoriously on downtown Havana.

With two weeks to go before the election invading Cuba is no longer an option.

But I still think it must have occurred to Rove. If carried out successfully, it would have guaranteed a landslide for Bush.

Castro of course has no ties to international terrorism. But it would be easy to paint him as a ruthless dictator. And Bush could brag that he had liberated another country.

Now Rove is going to have to be content with letting Bush run on his sorry record.

Karl, if you're reading this, you have my sympathies.