Listen up, Hillary

Folks are trying to send Hillary Clinton a message.  Let's hope she is listening.   Better yet, let's hope that she learned from experience and has already made the decision on her own.

What's this all about?    Mark Penn, her disaster of a chief strategist for her 2008 campaign.

 David Corn's article in Mother Jones says that Penn's work on Hillary's campaign was maked by "hubris, lousy messaging, poor strategic planning, and legendary internal tensions -- including back-biting, leaks, and fierce inside politics.   He quotes Heilemann and Halperin's book about the campaign as saying "[T]he rest of Hillaryland detested Penn personally. They thought him arrogant and amoral, a detrimental force whose perniciousness was amplified by his inexplicably tight bond with the Clintons."

Penn had first worked to help revive Bill Clinton's political standing following the 1994 midterm losses in Congress and formed a close bond with the Clintons.   Penn, now a media strategist for Microsoft, recently had his power over their advertising budget removed.   Some see his reduced position there as a prelude to returning to the Washington 2016 political world.

What cost him at Microsoft was more of the same, apparently -- negative advertising against an opponent that just shows a mean streak.   I remember, back during Hillary's 2008 campaign, that my strong negative reaction to everything I knew about Mark Penn was one of the things that swung me to support Barack Obama.  The impression I got was making Hillary's campaign seem both disorganized, bumbling, and amoral -- all at the same time.

I thought then that, if this was Hillary's idea of the kind of staff she would choose to run the White House, I didn' want her.    So, even though I support her for president, I would have serious concerns if she turns to Penn again for 2016.   So do others.

Corn also quotes another Democratic operative who said Hillary would make a great president:   "I would do anything for Hillary. . . . Anything.   Except work with Mark Penn."'

Hillary, are you listening?

Ralph