Word: strategist
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Most seasoned operatives know not to take Morris personally. He has helped Clinton focus, and if they want Clinton to win again, that should be all that matters. Stephanopoulos, for example, has good reason to resent Morris, who replaced his war-room comrade Carville as chief strategist. But Stephanopoulos found common ground with Morris, slipping into the same role he played for Carville as an antidote to the resident genius' screwier ideas. He saves Morris--and Clinton by extension--from crashing and burning. On the night of the Israeli election, when the race was too close to call but exit...
...shows that on some level, the egotist remains insecure. As a pro, White House colleagues say, Morris should know that his reputation can be scrubbed only by a Clinton victory. He's the next political millionaire: Carville '96. He should be content that people think he's a great strategist. And they will--as long as Clinton wins...
...hired Morris during his upset 1987 victory over Edwin Edwards for Louisiana Governor. "We used another pollster. With Dick, numbers were never the point. Ideas were." Though Morris denies cooking his figures, he too may have realized that poll taking wasn't his strength. He became a general strategist and let professionals like Penn and Schoen do the polling...
Candidates find him odd but endearing--he tells them they can win, knows all about their state, cites chapter and verse on their careers. Roemer calls him "the weirdest guy I ever met in politics"--and Roemer is friends with another eccentric, Clinton's strategist, James Carville. "A wild man, yelling and screaming, all over your back. I said, 'Give that man a machete! I want him on my side.'" But sometimes candidates wonder whose interests come first with Morris. Roemer's campaign against the scandal-plagued Edwards was based on Roemer's pledge to reject all PAC money...
...raise their kids inside an amoral culture. Using presidential symbolism, Executive actions and old-fashioned exhortation, the Morris-driven campaign has pulled 10% of Republican-leaning voters into the Clinton camp--enough to make Morris talk about "the geology of the New Clinton Majority." Says former Clinton strategist Carville: "Morris is running a different campaign than I would. He thinks the way to go is to trivialize big issues and harp on small stuff. I think that's stupid, but you notice who's running things...