He gave Clinton the chance to lose him without the NYT crowing that her campaign is imploding.

Per the New York Times, ..
"His polling firm, Penn, Schoen and Berland Associates, will continue to provide polling and advice to the campaign, the statement said."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/06/us/pol itics/06cnd-penn.html?hp

and, ..

"After the events of the last few days, Mark Penn has asked to give up his role as Chief Strategist of the Clinton Campaign; Mark, and Penn, Schoen and Berland Associates, Inc. will continue to provide polling and advice to the campaign. Geoff Garin and Howard Wolfson will coordinate the campaign's strategic message team going forward."

but just has a "new title".

He needs to go PERIOD!

If she had fired him a year ago, she might be the nominee today.

I can only imagine how happy Ickes and Wolfson are not to have to cover for this moron on conference calls anymore...

Damage control -- Penn does the "right thing" by stepping down, and hopefully that's how it can be spun.  The reality is that Penn's still there under a different title and taking the same paycheck as before.  Ugh.  

Advising the campaign though.  He needs to go. Mark Penn eats too many cheeseburgers and is full of fail.

More very bad news for Hillary.

Its not like they need more strategic help here. I bet someone can write a perfectly fine concession speech.

It's funny that this did it, rather than the fact that he's a complete moron.

Yay!

Maybe now she can start running the campaign she should have been running from the beginning.

Wolfson's OK, she needs to bring in younger, more sensitive more internet-savvy and 2008 news media-savvy talent.

It's not like she's notpaying top dollar...The Clintons have always been loyal to a fault, and in this case it really cost them big-time.

What amazes me is it took Rendell's call for Penn to be fired today to get him out, after months of his ties to the McCain campaign, to Blackwater, and to Colombia.  What was going through their heads to cause this to take this long?

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/ 2008/04/clinton-chief-s.html

Great news.

This could be the Penn-ultimate resignation of the Hillary campaign.

Shaun, a punster; who knew? :):)

I think she fires very considerately and likes everyone to save face. did the same thing with Patti Solis Doyle.l

and minus 170 delegates later, light finally dawns, sort of.  And we're supposed to trust Hillary with the most powerful office in the world?

Geoff Garin is terrific, glad to see he's in the center now.

let's wish him the worst

I thought they may have ousted Penn when they brought Garin on March.  Garin has a lot of credibility...The damage may be too much now.

That this hits today - right after Pennsylvania Governor and Clinton surrogate Ed Rendell criticized Penn this morning on NBC's Meet The Press - indicates that it really was a sudden move by Penn himself. He knows it's over. Why stick around to receive the blame as the ship goes down?

Okay, Mark Penn has done some truly dumb things in this campaign and he has said some really regretable things.  

But.

If Hilary runs this campaign against anyone else, but Barack and his boots on the ground strategy, she wins.  Further, the NH firewall held because of Penn's microtrend focus on the women of southern NH.  If Hilary loses NH, she isn't even here.  With the way the momentum swung to Obama after SC, his delay until Ohio/Texas also kept her in.

I think that the loss of Iowa and Obama's survival on Super Tuesday upset the initial battle plan.  When Obama survived Super Tuesday (and drained her in CA), she had no bullets left.  The fact that most of the press consider her still in it owes something to Penn and his microtrends.

If anything Obama is winning because Penn and Hilary's initial strategy was to dry up the money.  When Obama made it rain, his flood overwhelmed the microtrend.

Four years ago, Penn is a Karl Rove boy genius.

(Last, it seems that, like her husband, Hilary needs a strong Chief of Staff)

B

(Obama supporter)

will Hillary trend the micros?

i guess it's not that huge of a surprise seeing what went down with Columbia and also the fact that the Hillary campaign wasn't being the nasty organization it had been since after the 2nd to last debate.

but this is for the best, even if he isn't completely out of the picture. I'm feeling my frustration for Hillary simmer down a notch.

too bad these pages hadn't called for his resignation months ago.

From the moment this story came out, I said Penn needs to leave.  He resigned his position, which is good.  But I wish he would really distance himself from the campaign.

But at this point, it's about ego for Penn because he thought he had this all under control.

I'm glad Hillary was able to tell Penn it's time to go and let him step down by himself, like that foreign policy woman stepped down after her "monster" comments.  

I love the fast that Hillary took control and is cutting off the excessive baggage.  She needs to run lean and fast now.

Hillary '08!

Does this mean she will have to pay-up to his firm?

Sure, Penn was a disaster for Clinton but I don't think he made a difference.  Outside of a few, very few, insiders is there really anyone who voted for or against Hillary because of Mark Penn?  There are only two people who have really mattered in the Clinton Campaign, Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton.  The "chief strategists" like Penn like to think they are very important and that the candidates are just clay in thier hands.  Baloney.  The last time one of these insider bigwigs was really important was Mike Deaver with Reagan and maybe Atwater with old Bush.  Carville's importance was overrated.  I think even Rove is much less important that his reputation.  Schrum was bad, but he didn't lose it for Kerry.  They are mostly legends in thier own minds.

rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Isn't this the part where the band starts playing "Nearer My God to Thee"?

Polls in PA have been closing (tonight's ARG poll has a tie http://www.americanresearchgroup.com/pre s08/padem8-704.html) and team Clinton had to make some sort of change.

However, there will be a few days of stories about upheaval in the campaign, including some fueled by leaks about Penn and how this came to pass.  So it interferes with any new message team Clinton wants to deliver.

Actually, it may help the public be more aware of Mark Penn's role an a world-wide grocery list of unsavory PR campaigns designed to "enact public Policy".

His tactics include just what we've seen in this campaign.

Obama is not running on lobby money, and he hasn't parsed his tax returns.

Unions begged Clinton not to involve Mark Penn in this campaign.  He works for McCain, too.

I watched Hillary's speeches this weekend and she looked more happy and in control than ever (she always looks in control).

She got rid of Penn and SHE'S HAPPY!

She probably wanted to get rid of him a long time ago, but you have to do these things carefully.  But now, HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN!

I love that he's still part of the campaign.

Clinton supporters can rest easy knowing that their hard-earned campaign contributions will still be lining Mark Penn's pockets.

www.hillaryclinton.com -- donate now!  lol!