Daily Kos

Mark Penn Denies Being an Idiot

Thu May 08, 2008 at 05:20:24 PM PDT

Time has come up with a list of the top five strategic mistakes Hillary Clinton made during her unsuccessful bid for the White House, and while in the grand scheme of things it doesn't really matter why she went from inevitable to also-ran, there is one point in the article that deserves some attention:

As aides looked over the campaign calendar, chief strategist Mark Penn confidently predicted that an early win in California would put her over the top because she would pick up all the state's 370 delegates. It sounded smart, but as every high school civics student now knows, Penn was wrong: Democrats, unlike the Republicans, apportion their delegates according to vote totals, rather than allowing any state to award them winner-take-all.

It should be noted that Penn denies the story, so we'll just have to take him at his word that he isn't that stupid.  But if it's true it does raise the question, was this the stupidest thing said or done by a Clinton surrogate over the course of her campaign?   Because Penn had some stiff competition.  Who could forget:

  • Geraldine Ferraro's claim that Obama has an unfair advantage because he was black.
  • Bob Kerrey's happiness that Barack Hussein Obama attended a madrassa and had all that experience with Muslims.
  • Billy Shaheen's concern over Obama's use of drugs and possible questions on whether he was ever a drug dealer.
  • Andrew Cuoma saying that "You can't shuck and jive," in reference to Obama.
  • And of course the First Surrogate, Bill Clinton, comparing Obama's win in South Carolina to Jesse Jackson's wins in the 1980's, and then being shocked at the suggestion that he was trying to paint Obama as "the black candidate."

Let's throw Mark Penn a lifeline here and prove that he wasn't the worst of the Clinton surrogates. Share your favorite (for lack of a better word) "worst surrogate moment," of the campaign.    

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Tags: Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, Billy Shaheen, Geraldine Ferraro, Andrew Cuomo (all tags) :: Previous Tag Versions

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