Backbiting and second guessing are endemic to losing campaigns.
If my wife hears one more report that I'm joining Hillary's campaign I'm going to have to go in the Pundit Protection Program.
I do not want to be a pawn in a political campaign.
On the issue of Iraq, it is my hope, and my challenge to my colleagues, that our debate will be based on what is best for the future of our nation and for Iraq, not what's best for a political party or presidential campaign.
Our national political campaigns never stop. We seem convinced that majorities exist to impose their will with few concessions and that minorities exist to prevent the party in power from doing anything important. That's not how we were meant to govern.
On the one hand, to suggest that white poll watchers are going to black communities threatening and provocative. On the other hand is to suggest that if that same line of vote is he also resists making a commitment to honor the winner of the campaign, that there is another agenda.
I did not dwell on the issue of Europe during either the 2001 or the 2005 campaigns - despite it being a pivotal personal concern and despite seeing it as something of a litmus test for liberal democracy.
Some comments are within bounds, while some are not. But by whining about every little barb, candidates are trying to win the election through a war of staff resignation attrition, and Americans are losing the ability to distinguish between what is fair game and what is not.
Practical politics is the politics of the coming election.
It's a strategic thing to be in permanent campaign mode.
Anytime James Carville, Paul Begala and David Axelrod hold hands and jump for joy, it's worth pondering how to turn their joy into tears.
I was young. I was 23 or 24. I just wasn't a fan of the politics of campaigning - of going into that environment and competing and trying to get into the good graces of the writers.
