First Read (Free subscription) | 10 hours ago
From NBC's Domenico MontanaroIn August of 2008, Bloomberg News headlined one of their stories this way: "Harvard? Yale? No, Delaware School Is New Epicenter of Politics." That's because both Steve Schmidt (who ran day-to-day operations for the McCain campaign), David Plouffe (Obama's campaign manager), as well as Obama's vice presidential running mate Joe Biden all attended the University...
Firedoglake (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
Before she got the veep nod, Steve Schmidt apparently grilled Palin about her views on evolution, apparently to ensure she wasn’t a flat-earther creationist. The CSM provides this exchange from Going Rogue. [Schmidt] knew my position: I believed in the evidence for microevolution – that geologic and species change occurs incrementally over time. But I didn’t believe [...]
BlogNetNews.com/Iowa (Free subscription) | 11/19/2009
By Emily Geiger So, I really wasn’t planning on writing about Sarah Palin again, but, after seeing some of the news coverage of the last 24 hours, I have to. I pointed out yesterday what a hypocritical jacka$$ former top McCain aide Steve Schmidt is. I mean, it takes [...]
First Read (Free subscription) | 11/18/2009
From NBC's Mark MurrayJohn McCain today picked up the phone and called Reuters to defend Steve Schmidt and Nicolle Wallace -- who worked for him in the last year's presidential campaign -- from the charges that Sarah Palin has made about them in her book. "There's been a lot of dust flying around in the last few days and I just wanted to mention that I have the highest regard for Steve Schmidt...
The Plank (Free subscription) | 11/18/2009
Sarah Palin’s autobiography Going Rogue doesn’t have an index. Why? Well, I’m not exactly sure. But it sure makes finding gems in the text--such as the defense of that $150,000 clothing bill, the petty attacks on Katie Couric, and Palin-isms like “maverick” and “dang!”--a pretty tough slog. So, here’s an index. A really, really long and thorough one....
National Review Online (Free subscription) | 11/17/2009
Sarah Palin’s Going Rogue goes on sale today. There are tons of excerpts and reviews already out there. But for a quick tour of the book, here is a compendium of Sarah Palin in her own words. Palin says she tried to change the statement that went out about Bristol’s pregnancy because it suggested she and Todd were happy about the pregnancy. The statement went out anyway. A McCain campaign...
Progressive Values (Free subscription) | 11/16/2009
Although, the new book "Going Rogue" was recommended by me as a pretty good historical document on the 2008 campaign this past week, new critics are starting to emerge for Sarah Palin's new book. Chief critic has been Steve Schmidt, John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign manager, who termed the new book by Sarah Palin as a work of "total fiction". Even some say that John McCain...
Political Ticker (Free subscription) | 11/16/2009
WASHINGTON (CNN) – Barack Obama's former campaign manager and John McCain's former campaign manager agree: Sarah Palin would be "catastrophic" for Republicans if she is the party's presidential nominee in 2012. Steve Schmidt, McCain's former campaign head, first made the assertion in October, telling a Washington audience that the GOP "could have a catastrophic election result"...
Crooks and Liars (Free subscription) | 11/15/2009
Ruh roh. It looks like the political soulmates of the 2008 election have lost that lovin' feeling : In what reads like payback for McCain aides’ disparaging comments about her in the wake of the ticket’s loss to Barack Obama, Ms. Palin depicts the McCain campaign as overscripted, defeatist, disorganized and dunder-headed — slow to shift focus from the Iraq war to the cratering economy,...
Daily Kos (Free subscription) | 11/15/2009
Sarah from Alaska: The Sudden Rise and Brutal Education of a New Conservative Superstar By Scott Conroy and Shushannah Walshe Hardback, 320 pages, $26.95 Public Affairs: New York November 2009 'Tis the season for campaign books aimed at political junkies as the holidays ramp up. Reporters and campaign staff (and, famously, a certain roguish candidate ) have used the past year to assimilate the historic...
The Immoral Minority (Free subscription) | 11/15/2009
Is Palin really going rogue? Hardly. Getting even is more like it. Palin's biggest score to settle is with those senior advisers--Republicans all--in the John McCain campaign, on whose shoulders Palin lays the blame for her failed and tortured debut on the American political stage last fall. Most notable among them, of course, is "The Bullet," Steve Schmidt, who took over McCain's teetering...
The Political Carnival (Free subscription) | 11/14/2009
By GottaLaff John McCain's former presidential campaign manager Steve Schmidt is calling out Barbie McLipSchmutz. This popular practice is becoming a cottage industry of its own. Now think back a few months... Remember when B-Lip got punk'd by the Sarkozy impersonator ? Via CNN: " Right away, the phones started ringing ," Palin writes. " One of the first calls was Schmidt, and the force...
Political Ticker (Free subscription) | 11/14/2009
WASHINGTON (CNN) - John McCain's former presidential campaign manager Steve Schmidt is the latest McCain adviser to cry foul over accusations Sarah Palin has penned in her yet to be released memoir "Going Rogue." Excerpts obtained by The Huffington Post characterize Schmidt in an unfavorable light, particularly in reference to the prank phone call Palin received [...]
Hullabaloo (Free subscription) | 11/11/2009
Precious Moments by digby This is just so special: They’ve battled each other for years, but 22 Republican and Democratic pundits relaxed together for the Bipartisan Policy Center’s two-day conference in New Orleans. The goal — and the title of the conference — was lofty: “Tak[e] the Poison Out of Partisanship.” And as it turns out, it’s possible. The biggest...
The Immoral Minority (Free subscription) | 11/05/2009
Here are just a few of the incredible quotes from this book. Oh this is REALLY good stuff! — The awkward goodbye with McCain: McCain and Palin parted ways that night after she saw him getting into a Chevy Suburban outside the Arizona hotel where the campaign had gathered on election night. The conversation went like this: “‘John? Is that you'’ Palin asked. Cindy [McCain] was...
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