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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...

The Talk Shows Sunday, May 18th, 2008 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Sens. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and Chris Dodd, D-Conn.; Rick Dutrow Jr., trainer of Kentucky Derby winner Big Brown. MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va.; former Gov. Mike Huckabee, R-Ark.; Republican strategist Mike Murphy; Democratic strategist Bob Shrum. FACE THE NATION (CBS): Gov. Charlie Crist, R-Fla.; Republican strategist Ed Rollins; former Govs. Mario Cuomo, D-N.Y., and Roy Romer, D-Colo.THIS WEEK (ABC): Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., and Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio. LATE EDITION (CNN) : Commerce Secretary Carlos...

In an excerpt from his new book, "No Excuses," Democratic operative Robert Shrum, who advised the 2004 Kedwards campaign, tells the story of how the lovely and talented John Edwards became Kerry's No. 2--and how John Kerry came to regret it: Kerry talked with several potential picks, including Gephardt and Edwards. He was comfortable after his conversations with Gephardt, but even queasier about Edwards after they met. Edwards had told Kerry he was going to share a story with him that he'd never told anyone else--that after his son Wade had been killed, he climbed onto the slab at the...

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...

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,...

Calderon wins Mexican presidential race By WILL WEISSERT, Associated Press Writer 16 minutes agoMEXICO CITY - The ruling party's Felipe Calderon won the official count in Mexico's disputed presidential race Thursday, a come-from-behind victory for the stiff technocrat. But his leftist rival refused to concede and said he'd fight the results in court.Calderon, a conservative who preached free-market values and financial stability during the campaign, was already reaching out to other parties to build a "unity government". His opponent, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, blamed fraud for his narrow loss in the vote count and called on his supporters to fill...

by Mark Finkelstein April 4, 2006 Be the death literal or figurative, in recent days Democrats and their MSM claque have demonstrated a ghoulish penchant for dancing on the graves of their political opponents. As documented here, on the very day of his death last week, MSNBC's Alison Stewart, subbing for Keith Olbermann on Countdown, took nasty parting shots at Caspar Weinberger. Stewart disparaged as both a budget "slasher" and a big spender the man who, as Ronald Reagan's Defense Secretary, contributed mightily to winning the Cold War. Today, it was Tom DeLay's retirement announcement that brought out the worst...

Prof: Don't look to '08 dems by Zack Barangan March 08, 2006 Former Democratic consultant Robert Shrum spoke at the NYU School of Law yesterday, answering students’ questions about his role in John Kerry’s 2004 presidential run and offering his own theories about how the Democratic party can reclaim influence in America. Shrum — who most recently was a consultant for the Gore and Kerry presidential campaigns in 2000 and 2004 — spoke at the lecture titled “Using Your Law Degree in Public Service and Politics,” sponsored by the Law Democrats. Shrum, who is now a senior fellow at the...

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,...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- After spending more than 30 years consulting for Democratic candidates, campaign operative Robert Shrum is using his pen to advance his own, liberal views. "The book is about what I have seen the direction of progressive politics take, what happens to it and where I think it ought to go," Shrum told CNN in an interview. The veteran political operative was coy about what else he would say in his book, and Washington insiders were aflutter Wednesday about whether it would include sharp critiques of his clients and colleagues from past campaigns -- particularly the failed presidential...

On the eve of Inauguration, John Kerry campaign manager Bob Shrum told the New York Daily News, "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." Shrum is not alone. "Teresa said, 'What do you want for your birthday?' I said, '55,000 votes in Ohio,' " Kerry told a group of supporters in a post-election trip to Des Moines. Cong. Charlie Rangel (D) of New...

Democrat Bob Shrum quitting politics NEW YORK, Jan. 13 (UPI) -- Democrat Bob Shrum, who for 30 years has been one of his party's most influential strategists and was a top Kerry campaign adviser, is quitting politics. The New York Times reported Thursday that Shrum, who is moving to New York to be a senior fellow at New York University, was through with political consulting. "I wanted to reflect on what I've done, not just keep doing it," he said in an interview. Shrum played key roles in eight losing Democrat presidential campaigns and two-dozen winning Senate races. In his...

Has Anyone else seen this report on the Kerry Campaign? You couldn't make this stuff up.

John Kerry, a terrible candidate who did everything wrong, was a real Michael Dukakis version 2.0. In fact, Kerry ran such a poor campaign that I think we in the GOP should examine the Kerry campaign and try to learn from it, so we don't make the same mistakes. With that in mind, here are what I believe were the top eleven reasons why John Kerry lost the election. I'm Talking 'Bout the Man John Kerry Sees in the Mirror. Put simply, John Kerry was an awful candidate for the presidency in almost every way imaginable. He's a dovish Massachusetts...

Twelve days before the election, James Carville stood in a Beverly Hills living room surrounded by two generations of Hollywood stars. After being introduced by Sen. John Kerry’s daughter, Alexandra, he told the room — confidently, almost cockily — that the election was in the bag. ... As Tom Vallely, the Vietnam War veteran whom Kerry tapped to lead the response to the Swift boat attacks, told me: “I kept telling Shrum that before you walk through the economy door, you’re going to have to walk through the terrorism/Iraq door. But, unfortunately, the Clinton team, though technically skillful, could not...

Bob Shrum, the man who brought you the Dukakis campaign of 1988, and made his candidate look ridiculous in a tank, has done it again. Now he puts Macho John in a fatigue jacket while someone else carries the late goose. I feel another Purple Heart application coming on. Joe Biden, the man who was forced out of the 1988 primary because he plagiarized his own life story from British Labour Leader Neil Kinnock, now informs the rest of us he thinks the president is "brain dead." Clinton is enroute to Philadelphia, Gore going to Florida, and attorneys flying every...

From "Kerry's Brain," an article by Ken Auletta in The New Yorker: Page 67: "Last week, the Vietnam War became an issue again. Democrats seized upon new evidence that seemed to show that George W. Bush had used political influence to be assigned to the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War."

Kerry and Shrum got it backward. If they'd sliced up Bush this summer, they could have used the debates to seem presidential. After Labor Day, the political calendar goes into a time warp. Everything speeds up. With voters finally starting to pay attention, a week is about the equivalent of a normal month in political time. In late October the intensity can be so great that creative campaigns sometimes accomplish in a single day what it might once have taken three months to imprint on the minds of the voters. We don't know yet if we'll see such inventiveness this...

DEMOCRAT challenger John Kerry’s election campaign is in turmoil. The presidential hopeful is in trouble and is running out of time, while President George W Bush presses ahead in the polls.In a desperate attempt to claw back the slide, Kerry decided to revamp his team by bringing in veteran Clinton operatives such as Joe Lockhart, John Sasso, Michael Whouley and Mike McCurry to oversee key parts of the campaign. But the move has caused more division and chaos in the campaign and the arrival of the Clinton team means Kerry’s original campaign strategist, Bob Shrum, has seen his influence diminished....

By: Kip Oren In a recent post, I generated my first world exclusive when I unearthed a copy of "The Kerry Gospels," the Bob Shrum-produced big screen adaptation of "The Gospel According to John (Kerry)." After recounting my discovery, limits of time and space prevented me from finishing my analysis of The Kerry Gospels. So far, my review has been largely negative. . . .That’s not to say that The Kerry Gospels is devoid of highlights . . .

Robert Shrum, a senior adviser to John Kerry, tells Ken Auletta that despite the drop in his candidate's national standing after the airing of attack ads by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, "I believe the campaign responded in a timely fashion to the Swift Boat attacks. And I believe the public believes that Bush is behind the attacks and that they are not true." Shrum, who talks to Auletta extensively in "Kerry's Brain," in the September 20, 2004, issue of The New Yorker, also says , "I think we did see the negatives coming. I think we were fully...

Democratic adviser is a loss leader At 0-7, Bob Shrum is well-acquainted with the concession speech Each day at the Democratic convention in Boston, a team of 10 speechwriters would convene in a windowless office behind the Fleet Center podium to help compose and polish that night's speeches. In the spirit of camaraderie, the speechwriters discussed making T-shirts for themselves. One suggested a design featuring the slogan "Reverse the Curse" over a picture of Bob Shrum, the Democratic strategist whom many perceived to be presidential candidate John Kerry's closest adviser. "The Curse" referred to Shrum's career-long slump in presidential campaigns,...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 7 - Just last week, Stanley Greenberg was the polling mastermind guiding the way three liberal groups spent tens of millions of dollars attacking President Bush and registering voters. But he quit that position to be an unpaid adviser to the Kerry campaign as it presses to sharpen its message in the final 56 days before the election. Mr. Greenberg is just the latest in a procession of top strategists who have moved between the campaigns and advocacy groups called 527's - the very organizations that are not supposed to coordinate their activities under campaign finance rules. The...

... Now Mr. Shrum is in the thick of another crucial campaign announcement: Mr. Kerry's selection of a running mate. ... Officially, Mr. Shrum's job is to produce Mr. Kerry's campaign commercials. But after three decades in presidential politics, where most stars burn out far more quickly, Mr. Shrum has an unusual amount of sway. "I've been doing this longer than anybody," Mr. Shrum says. Aside from Mr. Kerry himself, no one person will have more influence on the Democratic ticket's message between now and Election Day. ... But he also brings strong ideological convictions and a volatile temperament that...

To praise Kerry... or to bury him? by Mia T, 1.27.04 After spending the best part of a year listening to the Democrats' strolling minstrels strumming their way round the White Mountains, I'm staggered by how little any of them have to say. If you go to a Kerry rally &endash; something of an oxymoron, but let that pass &endash; the senator's stump speech is a karaoke tape of floppo populist boilerplate. If he'd downloaded it for free from the internet, that'd be one thing. Instead, he paid a small fortune to hotshot consultant Bob Shrum, who promptly faxed...

The liberal Democracy Corps, founded in 1999 by Democrat operatives James Carville, Stanley Greenberg, and Bob Shrum, released a poll of Democrats in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina last week that is interesting, to say the least. The poll of approximately 500 likely Democratic voters in each of the three states revealed the typical Democratic views: Bill Clinton -- good; George Bush -- bad; Democrats like labor unions, the NAACP, and the United Nation; Democrats don't like the NRA, big corporations, or John Ashcroft. None of this comes as a big surprise, but a couple aspects of this poll...

UNFASHIONABLY LATEWhile Sen. John Kerry will deny that he has little in common with former President Bill Clinton, there are a group of kids in Charleston, S.C., who would probably disagree. Clinton was famous for running sometimes more than an hour late for events and meetings, keeping guests and sometimes foreign dignitaries cooling their heels. In the case of Kerry and his coterie, it's the little people -- literally -- who came in for rude treatment. Several weeks ago, when the Kerry braintrust decided to shift the candidate's "official" announcement that he had been running for president for the past...

Clinton Assigns BlameAnd, no, it’s not his fault.By Kevin M. Cherry, a writer living in Alexandria, Va..November 8, 2001 11:30 a.m.   n a speech at Georgetown University, President Bill Clinton blamed, in part, the United States for the terrorist attacks of September 11. Speaking to a group of about 1,000 students, the former president said that our nation is "paying a price" for slavery and for its treatment of the "significant number of native Americans" who "were dispossessed and killed."Osama bin Laden certainly has given no indication that he was concerned about the American sin of slavery —...