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What We Learned from Walker’s Exit

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First Read: “Scott Walker and Rick Perry both learned a hard lesson this cycle: If at first you don’t succeed – you don’t get a second look anymore. There are too many other alternatives in this GOP field, and the news cycle moves too fast for all but the most skilled candidates to claw their way out of a deficit. Individual stumbles and flip-flops aside, Walker’s fatal mistake was that he tried to be all things to all conservatives. In a year when the party wants anything but a traditional politician, Walker got caught being, well, a traditional politician: Trying too hard to give answers to appease supporters; trying to be politically perfect at the expense of being fresh or defiant; trying too hard to use a state budget to make a presidential statement.”

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About Political Wire

goddard-bw-snapshotTaegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.

Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.

Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.

Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.

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