by Mark Penn, Chief Strategist

in News
5/7/2007 8:20 PM

Hillary's lead is widening.

That's what a new round of polling in the wake of South Carolina's Democratic debate
makes clear. These new polls show that voters around the country - and in the key early
states in particular - are looking for a candidate with the right experience to lead America.
Americans got a chance to see that candidate when Hillary participated in the first debate
about two weeks ago in South Carolina. Because the debate was seen by a small
audience, it took a while for the full impact of her winning performance to be felt.

Clearly, the debate reframed the race - people were looking at who could be the best
president, and I think the result is driving a lot of the polls coming out today: America
saw that Hillary is ready to lead.

NATIONAL

USA Today/Gallup (May 4-6)

This poll shows Hillary with a 15 point lead over Obama: Hillary 38, Obama 23. Hillary
is the only candidate whose numbers improved after the debate. She is up 7 points from a
survey taken three weeks earlier and Obama is 3 points lower than before.

CNN (May 4-6)

Hillary 38, Obama 24, Gore 12, Edwards 12
- Since CNN's pre-debate poll on April 12 Hillary's lead has gone from 4 to 14:
Hillary has gone up 8, Obama has gone down 2, Gore has gone down 3, and Edwards
has remained steady.
Hillary 41, Obama 27, Edwards 14
- In this horserace without Gore, Hillary's lead has gone from 8 to 14 since the April
12 pre-debate poll.

Quinnipiac (April 25-May 1)

Hillary 32, Obama 18, Gore 14, Edwards 12

STATES

New Hampshire: ARG (April 26-29)

Hillary 37, Edwards 26, Obama 14

New Hampshire: Survey USA (May 4-6)

Hillary 40, Obama 24, Edwards 22

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South Carolina: ARG (April 27-30)
Hillary 36, Obama 24, Edwards 18

New Jersey: Strategic Vision (April 25-27)

Hillary 40, Obama 23, Edwards 12

Nevada: Mason Dixon (April 30-May 1)

Hillary 37, Edwards 13, Obama 12

Alabama: InsiderAdvantage/Majority Opinion (April 30-May1)

Hillary 40, Obama 19, Edwards 18

And I won't generally report the Rasmussen polls since they are IVR but some journalists
made a big deal of their poll showing it having closed and today reversed the trend to
have her up 8.

Rasmussen (April 30-May 3)

Hillary 34, Obama 26, Edwards 16
- The latest Rasmussen shows the same trend as CNN: Hillary has gained 4 points and
now leads by 8, Obama has lost 6 points, and Edwards has lost a point.

Discuss (7 comments)

Hillary,
Mark Penn is doing a spectacular job of making Hillary (Branding- See article @
bottom) look good Globally. His Global experience with world leaders brings the race 'up
a notch' to counter the negative tactics the Republicans are sure to use in the closing
weeks of the election cycle. A discussion needs to be started and brought into the
forefront early as the “Bill Question" has already been launched during the debates. If I
remember correctly, the question was posed to the Republican candidates as "Do you
think it will be good for the country to have Bill & Hillary Clinton in the White House
together?"

The obvious slimy implication is that the polarizing attack made on Hillary while first
lady on Social agenda's like Universal Health Care and “The World is a Village" will be
used again to "divide and conquer" by using Bill as a pawn to enrage the Conservative
Right and start the "Horror Story" PR machine of all his "nasty deeds" and supposed
gaffs and errors and that the power and expertise of a former sitting president along with
(Oh my Gosh) a WOMAN (never explicitly stated, but insinuated by the lack of firmness
in military and defense matters being pounded on).

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Robert MacNamara said in the documentary “The Fog of War”, “I rarely answered the
Question being asked, but instead answered the question I WISH they had Asked”. Every
time they hit the inferred issue “Does a woman have the strength and resolve to be
“Commander in Chief”?, I would respond “Senator, (fill in the Blank) Are you inferring
or asking me if I have the WILL and Resolve to defend this Country? If so, I would not
only defend my record of voting to defend this country in a moral and sensible way, but I
would bring Congress, Senate and the American public into a discussion that not only
defends and protects this country in a military way, but creates good will and trust with
all nations to ensure they do not feel threatened, bullied or victimized. To the extent that
might make us look weak in some cultures or nations, we will continue to show swift
recourse and action that backs up our words that we will not tolerate or accept any form
of coersion or terrorism that threatens the International Society and that our resolve in the
United Nations as well as being an independent country who protects the citizens of that
country. This includes the interests of our ally’s both here and abroad.

Since we as a nation attracts more attention as a target due to our standing

economically and politically in the world market place, in the words of Lee Iacooca, we
have to either “Lead, Follow or Get out of the Way”. We choose to lead, and with that
comes the moral obligation of being fair and measured leaders that expresses the interests
of the global community, not just our own goals and interests.
Much of the scale of our success leads our patterns of increased responsibility to
other forming nations and the ability to share our resources of a developed country with
all that currently exist. As a global community we need to be ‘givers’ not just ‘takers’ and
make sure the recipients of democracy do not use our generosity to bite us down the line
with our own military exports and technology.
In this way we lead with the determination to be fair and honest and exercise
authority without total domination and control. We enforce International rule and
expedite matters of discipline in a measured way based on the impact a matter has on our
ability to stay leaders. To the extent that we are looked at as a target to be 'displaced', we
do not seek to be second in any endeavor willingly.

This matter needs to be 'diffused' as early as possible (NOW) to dilute the

intended impact the Republicans will try to use as a 'powder keg' of FEAR in the last 2
months of the election cycle (more CONFUSION of the message and FEAR Tactics).

Bill as "First Husband" and Ex-president of the White House:

Pros: The experience and skill necessary to advise on historical matters. Context of
‘hindsight’, not to rule, but to advise in a way that allows Hillary to be the most effective
President that ever existed. Instead of polarizing forces and institutional changes in
Power structures with the revolving door of Washington Politics, the benefit of seasoned
professionals and a staff that can have the unprecedented advantage of knowing how the
first game was played and learning from that 'scrimmage' and 'game day' tapes to get to
the "super bowl" of leadership. Having learned from their mistakes and doing like any

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other job or corporate function: improving from hindsight, having eight years to 'digest'
successes and failures and time to understand the processes and politics that drove the
whirlwind when in that office.
Bill would act as a powerful and vital policy advisor in an unofficial capacity to
aid and inform in a cooperative way that no other U.S. President has had the advantage of
or used in such a beneficial way.
George W. Bush inherited his father's staff and agenda eight years later (but
obviously rejected direct advice from dad) the same staff of George Bush Sr. effectively
re-instated the former objectives and 'game plan' of the "New World Order" that George
Bush Sr. had put in place eight years earlier.

BUSINESS LIFE: Wanted: branding agent for self-googling job at Me, Inc

By Lucy Kellaway, Financial Times

Published: Mar 26, 2007

Ten years ago Tom Peters wrote an article entitled "The Brand Called You" in the then-
hip magazine, Fast Company. I read the piece at the time and thought it one of the
ghastliest, most irritating articles on management ever written.

Peters' idea was that people are brands - just as corporations and goods are. Each of us is
chief executive of Me, Inc and it is our job to manage our brand actively. The article
ended on a hysterical, threatening note: "You are in charge of your brand. Start today. Or
Else."

Yuk, I thought. We are not cans of baked beans. We are complicated human beings and
therefore not suited to crass branding activity. So I didn't start that day to create the Brand
Called Me. Nor on any of the 3,500 days that followed. However, a lot of other people
did: in the past decade personal branding has become a big thing.

I still think it's ghastly, but now, belatedly, I have decided that I am a can of baked beans
after all. There are some differences in terms of size (I'm bigger) and colour (I'm less
orange) and uniformity (my quality is more mixed). But like beans, humans can be
branded. We each have a name, an image, a reputation and something to sell. Which
means it is sensible to think about how these things could be managed better.

This realisation has come slowly through the steady drip, drip of proof. Every day I am
exposed to the marketing activity of Brand Someone Else. A man I've never met has just
sent me an e-mail saying "Lucy, watch me on Bloomberg TV today!" Readers endlessly
direct me to their personal websites. Even quite normal people boost their brands by
routinely forwarding any complimentary e-mails to their bosses.

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I used to think this sort of thing was not only naff but unnecessary: that talent would
always out in the end. This is fantasy. Talent might out, but only after a lot of huffing and
puffing.

I look at what is happening to some of my friends - clever, hard-working people of a

certain age - who are stubbornly refusing to unleash Brand Them. They do no self-
promotion at all, and are finding that, like cold, congealed baked beans, they are being
left at the edge of the plate as a prelude to being put in the bin.

With a rather more open mind I re-read Peters' article last week and found most of it
perfectly reasonable. Branding, he says, is about three things: "To grow yourself, to
promote yourself and to get the market to reward yourself."

It is hard to argue with that. The trouble is that I have some hang-ups that are getting
between me and Brand Me. The first is a linguistic hang-up over the idea of me growing
myself: I might be a can of beans but am not a tomato.

My hang-up over promoting myself is more profound. Tom Peters is an American, which
means self-promotion for him is as easy as breathing. But I am an Englishwoman born in
1959, brought up to think that self-promotion boils down to boasting and there are at least
four things wrong with that.

1. It is bad manners, as it makes the person who hasn't done so well feel bad.

2. It is pushy and therefore vulgar.

3. To boast is to let your achievements get out of proportion. We should never forget that
we are small cogs in a big machine.

4. Boasting clashes with the public-school English idea that everything is effortless. Any
success must be taken in one's stride.

Some of this baggage is irrational and outdated, but it weighs heavy on the psyche
nevertheless.

Still more profound is the hang-up over money. Peters says we must get the market to
reward us, which can be hard to achieve when you were taught that to ask for more
money was greedy and undignified.

I remember one occasion when I plucked up courage to ask for a rise but then felt such a
rush of self-loathing I retracted the demand. I have no idea if I would have got more,
though I expect I would have. In this area, those who ask, get.

I realise all this sounds ridiculous as I have a named column with picture, which implies
some pretty determined behind-the-scenes promotional activity. Yet fortunately, the
newspaper undertakes much of this on my behalf, leaving my own brand-building efforts

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amateurish and patchy. Recently I had to compose a paragraph about myself saying why I
deserved to win a prize. "Lucy Kellaway's hilarious Monday columns . . . ", I began,
deleted it and started again. "Lucy Kellaway is one of the most. . . ", I paused, lost for
appropriate adjectives. And so it went. It was most painful.

To make it clear: my aversion has nothing to do with being nice or modest. It doesn't
mean that I'm not vain or grasping. My ego is quite large and ugly. All this means is that I
can't do certain things without bending myself out of shape.

I realise that there are any number of career coaches who (at a price) can teach one how
to boast, and loads of therapists to help on the hang-ups. But I have a better idea: to
outsource it altogether to a branding agent.

My agent would handle all discussions about money. They would be responsible for
saying nice things about me so I didn't have to say them myself. They would advise on
brand building. They would manage my web presence, designing a website and
undertaking my self-googling activity. They would have their ear to the ground for job
moves and do tiresome networking on my behalf.

This is what it boils down to. Ten years on, I am ready to take office as chief executive of
Brand Me. Task number one: recruit a brand manager.