Karl Rove, thank you for recent help in building a permanent Democratic majority. For that, you deserve an award from the Democratic National Committee.

No, this isn’t a back-handed compliment — ‘nice going, Karl’ — about Rove’s tenure as a top White House political adviser and deputy chief of staff. Nor does it regard his role in shaping tax policy, Iraq, or any other Bush administration policy.

This concerns Rove’s “slammin and rammin” since the nomination of federal appeals Judge Sonia Sotomayor to become the first Hispanic and the third female to serve on the Supreme Court.

Call it the “Sotomayor Primary,” the first-in-the-nation contest for 2012 Hispanic voters, and Rove, while acknowledging their importance, is willfully driving this key bloc of voters away from the Republican fold.

Rove, arguably the top Republican campaign strategist and now a Fox News special commentator, has markedly reversed his previous counsel about how a permanent Republican majority depends on the GOP’s appeal to Hispanic voters, now America’s largest and fastest-growing minority group. “Hispanics dropped from 44 percent Republican in 2004 to 31 percent in 2008. The GOP won’t be a majority party if it cedes the young or Hispanics to Democrats,” Rove wrote last November.

Perhaps it’s a bad rap, but Rove’s pointed commentary on Fox has been nothing short of flawed,foul, or inflammatory.

“The Architect” ignores his own advice, now doing his best turning off those voters by hurling pointless and stupid insults at Judge Sotomayor as though no one will notice. And, as several of the best and brightest Republican consultants have made crystal clear, without a sizeable percentage of Hispanic voters, Republicans are resigned to a long “ice age” in the minority.

Sure, Rove’s offenses stop short of menstrual cycles, or David Duke comparisons. But Rove has caused dismay and angst with his harsh words for Sotomayor’s intelligence, temperament, and qualifications. Of course the race card has been played from the top of the deck before, most notably in California with Proposition 187 in the 2006 immigration debate. And certainly there are fervent factions within the Republican party proud to be viewed as anti-Hispanic. But given early signs of strong public support for Sotomayor’s confirmation — especially from Hispanic and non-Hispanic women — is it worth it?

Has Rove forgotten how to count to 270, the magic number of electoral votes? Ignoring Hispanics is stupid, since they have doubled in numbers since 2000, and conclusively provided the winning vote margins in Florida, Colorado, Nevada, and New Mexico, and arguably made the difference in Indiana and North Carolina and perhaps even the 2nd Congressional District of Nebraska. Oh, and don’t forget numerous congressional races, or Democratic Sens. Mark Begich of Alaska, Jon Tester of Montana, and Jim Webb of Virgina, all of whom were helped by a large Hispanic turnout.

Perhaps Rove is unaware that Hispanic voters watch Spanish-speaking news on cable television. Maybe he assumes they avoid the Internet. Or perhaps Rove assumes Sotomayor’s nomination isn’t big news to most Hispanics since she is Puerto Rican and roughly 70 percent of Hispanics are Mexican-American.

But of course Rove knows the importance of Hispanic voters in the rapidly changing political landscape — “it is a vote that is up for grabs” — since he crafted two gubernatorial and two presidential campaign strategies for Spanish-speaking George W. Bush, who assiduously courted Hispanics in targeted television ads broadcast on cable and local Spanish-speaking affiliates.

This rise in Hispanic influence is undeniable. In major television markets such as New York City, Los Angeles, and Miami, the local news on Telemundo and Univision cable channels typically win their time slots against the local affiliate newcasts in 16 major markets. Local newscasts in Spanish are now found in Raleigh, N.C., and Seattle, Wash. Moreover, Hispanics are now flocking to the Internet.

The Hispanic vote crested at44 percent for Bush in 2004, triple the percentage Bob Dole received in 1996, thanks largely to this outreach masterfully designed by Rove. In contrast, John McCain ’s 2008 percentage of the Hispanic vote fell back to 31 percent, despite his calls for immigration overhaul and a “path to citizenship,” a position also promoted by Rove (for which he too caught flak). A contributing factor: McCain’s targeted ads to Hispanics were delivered in English rather than Spanish; Barack Obama’s 2008 ads, like Bush’s in 2000 and 2004, were in Spanish by the candidate himself.