Shrum and the Consultant Class

Finally, Yglesias’s review of the new apologia from Bob “Losing Pitcher” Shrum is out. Its subtitle (“Memoirs of the man who thrice saved us from a Democratic presidency”) suggests a kinship with Jon Chait’s classic Nader demolition “The Man Who Gave Us Bush,” and if there’s not quite that acidic it’s still very much worth reading. Particularly good is linking Shrum to the Democratic consultant racket:

This is where the story gets both weird and all too typical. After working for years on Kennedy’s staff, Shrum decided he wanted to become a political consultant.

The consultant’s racket, especially on the Democratic side, is a good one to break into. Clients who lose wind up leaving office, losing power and stature. The D.C. power structure, meanwhile, is composed of winners, some of whose campaigns you probably worked for in the past. Even better, it’s fairly rare for an incumbent to lose, so once you have some significant politicians in your Rolodex you don’t need to be especially good at your job to rack up wins. Challengers who hire you and win are in your debt. Challengers who hire you and lose are yesterday’s news. And challengers who want credibility with the big-dollar fundraisers and other party kingmakers need to demonstrate that credibility by hiring someone from the circle of established consultants.

It’s nice work, if you can get it. And having a powerful senator like Kennedy in your corner is a good way to get it. Never mind that there’s no reason to think a person well suited to the job of writing speeches for Kennedy’s booming voice, outsize personal story and legacy, and passionate brand of politics would actually be good at a generic political strategist’s job. The point, however, is not that Shrum was especially unqualified for his consultant’s gig, but that his story stands in for that of his entire profession. Campaign operatives who succeed in any subfield reach for the prize of consultanthood, whether or not there’s reason to think they’ll be good at it. More to the point, once they reach that prize, it’s extremely difficult to dislodge them from it.

In limited defense of Shrum, I do think Matt somewhat underestimates the Catch-22 facing Gore. The media narrative (Matt, regrettably, doesn’t mention the War on Gore) of him as a phony is endlessly plastic, and had he given a speech about global warming in Michigan could have (and, I’m quite certain, would have) been portrayed as false passion (“like the Tipper kiss!”), pandering to the Chardonnay and Volvo environmentalist set over good honest Michigan heartlanders, etc. Given an a priori assumption that you’re inauthentic, anything can be adduced as evidence for your inauthenticity. Still, it’s hard to argue that Shrum (especially before the convention) ran a good campaign, and I think that Gore’s choosing Shrum as pique against Clinton merits some criticism as well.