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Mark Penn Dances Around a Postgame Analysis
Mark Penn has stridently refused to talk on the record about the Clinton campaign since he left it, but is more than willing to shill the paperback version of his epic Microtrends to the foreign press, so long as the questions don't stray into politics.
So how does a British reporter ask questions about Penn's flawed campaign strategies without bring up the most famous and recent example of its application?
Rather delicately, it appears:
Despite the loss of his official status in the campaign, he remains closely involved."Americans
overwhelmingly favour small, reasonable ideas over big, grandiose
schemes ... There is no One America any more, or Two, or Three, or
Eight," he writes. "In fact, there are hundreds of Americas."A message more opposed to Obama's call for unity would be hard to imagine.
What
Penn chuckles
about the possibility that voters might be intelligent without being
fixated on narrow self-interest - that they might, for perfectly smart
reasons, favour a more ambitious message of unity or change? I mean,
just hypothetically, obviously, since we're not discussing the
campaign. Could a candidate with a message like that, even if he was
relatively inexperienced, ever stand a chance against a more cautious,
more experienced ... Oh, for goodness' sake.
uneasily. For a man so often described as arrogant and prone to
shouting matches with fellow campaign advisers, there's a disarming
nervousness in his manner. "As I say, it's not a political book..."
My favorite part of the story is when Penn does some of that multi-tasking that he's famous for, and interrupts the interview to read a text message:
While we're discussing Colombia, Penn's BlackBerry chimes. He peers at
it through wire-rimmed spectacles, and his face clouds over. For
several long moments, he reads in silence, then sighs. Later, I learn
that this coincided with the news of Clinton's foot-in-mouth comments
about Robert F Kennedy, which gave the impression that she was
remaining in the race in case Obama was assassinated.
I imagine that there's an awful lot of off-the-record sighs within the Clinton camp these days.
Comments (3)
Did Penn leave the Clintons campaign in the last 3 days and I missed it?
June 2, 2008 10:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
How Many Angles Can Dance Inside The Head Of A Penn?
June 2, 2008 10:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
I just want to let everybody know, for historical reference, that June 2 was the day the Court of Oyer and Terminer convened for the Salem Witch Trials.
I just automatically think of June 2 as Salem Witch Trials Day, in case that ever pops up in conversation and it seems inexplicable or inappropriate to you.
That's just how I remember it's June 2.
So don't freak out or make a big deal out of it if I bring it up.
June 2, 2008 11:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
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