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If there’s one thing likely to rally Republicans around Sarah Palin, even those who might harbor qualms about her, it’s to see her literally laughed at and mocked by the likes of Charles Schumer and Bob Shrum. On Today’s Meet The Press, the senior senator from New York and the former Dem campaign adviser did just that. Schumer went first, literally laughing out loud [see screencap] when host David Gregory asked him if Sarah Palin is the future of the Republican party. Then it was Shrum’s turn. View video here.

Next time you’re debating Bob Shrum and want to lure him into making ugly and over-the-top attacks, just remind the audience of his unblemished 0-8 record of having lost every presidential race on which he’s worked . . . This morning’s Today offered a prime example of the phenomenon. Nicolle Wallace, former Communications Director to Pres. George W. Bush, made passing reference to Shrum’s failed work on behalf of John Kerry in 2004. A clearly stung Shrum responded by referring to her as “pathetic” and accusing her of possible “foolhardiness.” For good measure, Shrum called Wallace’s claim that Dems are...

Just a moment ago, Bob Shrum proclaimed that the tea parties are not "protests", but "squeaks". He further stated that anti-tax sentiment may be there in certain segments, it is nowhere near a majority, and has waned over the years. He said 10 years ago, anti-tax protests were far more momentous (think of it like an oil field; a strong opening, but a gradual depletion over time). Shrum also said the GOP was in "deep trouble" and would not repeat 1994. He cited demographics and the shrinking Republican party. He said there will always be conservatives who are anti-tax, but...

Having rendered themselves irrelevant on every major issue, Republicans consoled themselves last week with a delusional round robin. First, the Drudge Report, linking to a Pew Poll, featured a headline denying what most of us observe in the real world: “President Polarize: Poll Shows Historic Divide…Partisan Gap in Obama Job Approval Widest in Modern Era.” Perhaps demonstrating that Drudge, not Limbaugh, is the maestro of the GOP chorus, the point was quickly picked up by Karl Rove on the house network, Fox News. Then the Washington Post’s Michael Gerson, one of the few Bush aides to emerge from that administration...

Caroline Appointment: Mitchell Mimics Maureen in Mocking Al D'Amato By Mark Finkelstein | January 7, 2009 - 15:19 Does Maureen Dowd moonlight at MSNBC as Andrea Mitchell's [file photo] writer? Here's how for, purposes of defending Caroline Kennedy in her NYT column today, Dowd mocked former New York Republican Senator Al D'Amato [emphasis added]: [B]elieve me, she talks a whole lot better than the former junior senator from New York, Al D’Amato, who once wailed that he was “up to my earballs” in some mess, and another time complained to me that those “little Jappies” bring over boats full of...

Bob Shrum has made an addition to the ever-growing list of things you can't utter about Obama, because it's racist: don't you dare say Obama's never done anything hard. The veteran Dem strategist issued his diktat while debating Ed Rogers, former aide to Pres. Bush 41, on today's Hardball. Shrum seized on and distorted Rogers' statement, manifestly made in the politcal sense, that Obama had "never done one hard thing," to play the race card. View video here.

It's hard to dislike political consultant Bob Shrum. Because of the Shrum Curse, he is exactly 0 for 8 in getting the presidential candidates he worked for elected starting with George McGovern in 1972 and most recently John Kerry in 2004. And because all of the candidates he worked for have been Democrats, that is why he is so well liked by Republicans because of his reputation as the Eddie Mush of presidential campaigns. In case you are unfamiliar with Eddie Mush, he was the character in the movie "A Bronx Tale" who was a total jinx. He had a perfect track...

May he live to be 120, but when Bob Shrum eventually goes to his reward, his epitaph could read "Here lies Shrum. He thought he was great. But his presidential record . . . was 0-8." After Shrum taunted Pat Buchanan as "living on Mars" for supposedly overestimating the power of affirmative action as an issue, Pat fired back, reminding Shrum of his dubious lifetime achievement of having consulted on eight losing Dem presidential campaigns with nary a win. View video here.

Francois de La Rochefoucauld had a point when he said, in his frequently quoted formulation, that hypocrisy is the tribute that vice pays to virtue. In the case of John Edwards, however, hypocrisy is simply a way of life. The infamous $400 haircut — actually, some of his hairstyling sessions ran as much as $1,200 all told — wasn’t a freak embarrassment for a candidate so self-righteously devoted to the poor. It was part of a pattern so pervasive that it has become the defining aspect of Edwards’s candidacy. When he lambasted hedge funds for incorporating offshore to avoid or...

Political junkies have been awaiting the new memoir by Bob Shrum, the famed consultant to a string of Democratic presidential candidates, including Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004. After compiling an 0-8 record in presidential campaigns, Shrum has taken something of a beating from the political and media establishment of late, and he has been conspicuously absent from the 2008 campaign thus far. But it seems he's determined to play a role after all, as is clear from his forthcoming book, No Excuses: Concessions of a Serial Campaigner. As befits a canny campaign veteran, the book is...

Hillary Rodham Clinton would like to be president. In the last campaign, she might have been the vice presidential nominee. The New York senator and former first lady was on a list of possible running mates for 2004 Democratic nominee John Kerry, according to an upcoming book by top Kerry strategist Bob Shrum. But Clinton was quickly ruled out because quiet polling found she was too polarizing, Shrum writes. Clinton said around that time that she would not have been interested in the job if Kerry asked her. "I made it clear I don't want that to happen," Clinton said...

(Note: This is a special edition of the DUmmie FUnnies so the normal format will be dispensed with. Although much of this material has been covered in the September 15, 2006 DUmmie FUnnies EDITION, the events of today make it imperative to enter this again into the historical record.) "May I be the first to say 'Mr. President'?"---Bob Shrum, Nov. 2, 2004. It was close. Oh, so agonizingly close. The "infallible" exit polls showed him to be the landslide winner and Bob Shrum had already pronounced him to be "Mr. President." Democrats were celebrating and all that needed to...

How do you know when things have jumped ugly at Hardball? When host Chris Matthews himself has to jump in to separate the warring parties, even warning a Dem consultant to lay off the ad hominems. Bob Shrum is always spoiling for a fight. In contrast, Ron Christie is normally mild-mannered and affable. But the former aide to Pres. Bush and VP Cheney had definitely eaten his Wheaties this afternoon. The video portrays things beyond my poor power of description, but the fur began to fly when Shrum accused Christie of using talking points. Things went downhill from there. I'd...

James Carville and company announced in a recent memo to the Democrat faithful that the political season is now open and it is "time to go hunting." A review of the memo shows that not only are the Democrats betting their fortunes on either the utter collapse of the economy or a major homeland security fiasco, but their analysis of current trends and public opinion is completely off the mark. The latest memo from "Democracy Corps," the organization led by Carville, Stan Greenburg, and Bob Shrum, acknowledges that the "perception of success and strong leadership is helping the Republicans." Yet,...

<p>It is axiomatic that the goal of the foreign policy of the United States should be the advancement of the interests of the United States and not of any other country, no matter how sympathetic, including Israel. That said, should it not give Chris Matthews pause that his pointed anti-neo-con spiel has become indistinguishable from the well-rehearsed Pat Buchanan line on the matter? In a weird twist, Dem hyper-partisan Bob Shrum, a supporter of Israel, was the odd man out on this evening's Hardball.</p>

by Mark Finkelstein June 28, 2006 Over the last couple days, I've received four emails from one liberal reader of these columns, repeatedly asking me why conservatives are so 'angry and mean-spirited'. I tried explaining that while anger is common to the human condition, in no way do conservatives have a monopoly on the emotion. To the contrary, I cited a recent study revealing that, even when controlling for relevant variables, Republicans tend to be happier than Democrats. Since I was unable to prove the proposition to the reader's satisfaction, I very much hope he was watching this evening's Hardball....

Good News! Despite my deep concern, following his DEBACLE as an advisor for the Cegelis campaign primary in the Illinois 6th Congressional District, Pied Piper Pitt has RETURNED! Yes, I was deeply concerned that having FAILED at yet another endeavor, Pitt would hit the Bukowski barroom floor, never to get up again. And why my strange compassion for William Rivers (Pied Piper) Pitt? It is because I have come to realize that this hapless shmoe is becoming a new BOB SHRUM. For those of you unfamiliar with Bob Shrum, he is a Democrat campaign advisor who is a BLESSING...

George Soros is an exacting  taskmaster. In return for his money, he demands productivity. What he requires of employees and business associates in the investment world, Soros also demands from the political operatives he funds. “Mr. Soros isn't just writing checks and watching,” notes Wall Street Journalreporter Jeanne Cummings. “He is also imposing a business model on the notoriously unruly world of politics. He demands objective evidence of progress, and assigned an aide to monitor the groups he supports. He studies private polls to track the impact of an anti-Bush advertising campaign, and he is delivering his money in installments,...

Culture & Cosmos April 12, 2005 Volume 2, Number 36 Democratic Strategists Issue Memo on Loss of Catholics A memo authored by a prominent Democratic strategy organization calls the decline in support of white Catholics for Democrats "striking" and "a big part of the 2004 election story." One of the analysis' key findings is that Catholic voters are becoming more pro-life which the authors called "a factor in the recent losses and one of the blockages for Democrats, at least in the Midwest." The data also reveals that young Catholics are more pro-life than their parents and that bishops who...

Sen. John Kerry's political guru, Robert Shrum: "We're just going to stay in Washington while getting ready for our move [to New York, where Shrum, starting next month, will teach at NYU]. My aim is to stay out of the 'limited traffic zone.' How am I feeling? Disappointed. Right now, I'm waiting for a camera crew from CNN to interview me about Karl Rove. Just think, a switch of 55,000 votes in Ohio, and I wouldn't have been doing this interview. But you've got to be gracious."