Mark Penn: The Blogosphere's New Karl Rove

The man they love to hate.

This:

#1. States that have a lot of black people are insignificant and are not quality. (sorry Alabama, DC, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland and South Carolina).

#2. Small states are insignificant and are not quality. (sorry Alaska, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, North Dakota and Utah).

#3. States in the middle of the country are insignificant and are not quality. (sorry Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska and North Dakota).

#4. States that have a lot of Mormons are insignificant and are not quality. (sorry Utah)

#5. States that run caucuses are insignificant and are not quality. (sorry Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Nebraska, North Dakota and Washington)

This:

You've seen my continuous barbs at Mark Penn, Clinton's 'chief strategist'. The last couple days have shown very clearly I think that Clinton could do nothing better for her campaign than to throttle this clown and let her get down to the business of making a case to voters for her candidacy. Perhaps good spin is an oxymoron, moral if not linguistic. But good spin is clever and forward-leaning pitches of actual realities, facts. ... So now you have Penn successively saying caucus wins don't really count, small state wins don't really count, medium state wins don't really count, states with large African-American populations don't really count, all building up to yesterday's gem: "Could we possibly have a nominee who hasn't won any of the significant states -- outside of Illinois? That raises some serious questions about Sen. Obama."

This:

Clinton's "insult 40 states" strategy

And this*:

Even as Sen. Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign was blasting Sen. Barack Obama for his ties to the Exelon Corporation, the firm of Mark Penn, Clinton's chief strategist, was earning hundreds of thousands of dollars from the very same nuclear energy giant.

*Thanks for the catch. And, yes, should have linked to Ezra as well:

Imagine the fury in the African-American community if Barack Obama leads in delegates but is denied the nomination because the Clinton campaign is able to change the rules to seat delegates from Michigan, where no other candidates were even on the ballot, and from Florida, where no one campaigned. Imagine the anger among the young voters Obama brought into the process, and was making into Democratic voters. Imagine the feeling of betrayal among his supporters more generally, and the disgust among independents watching the battle take place on the convention floor. Imagine how statesmanlike John McCain will look in comparison, how orderly and focused the Republican convention will appear.