Wednesday, November 4, 2009

A Clarifying Moment

The aide who helped turn Rep. Michele Bachmann into a controversial mainstay of cable news has informed colleagues that she’s quitting — just as the firebrand Republican congresswoman prepares for her biggest media moment yet.

[...] A conservative Republican House member, speaking on the condition of anonymity, suggested that Bachmann’s views — and her willingness to state them — make it hard for her to keep staff.

“When your captain’s crazy, it’s time to find a new ship,” the lawmaker said.

[...] “She looks like the type of person who you would invite in to have a cup of coffee at your table,” Marston said at the time. “There are a lot of people who are good, smart, well-meaning, well-intentioned members of Congress, but they speak to the people like they are members of Congress. Rep. Bachmann talks to people like they are people.”

But when Bachmann infuriated liberals with the suggestion that then-Sen. Barack Obama and other Democrats in Congress held “anti-American” views, Marston acknowledged that her boss wasn’t for everyone.

“You either love Michele Bachmann or you don’t love Michele Bachmann at all,” Marston said in an interview with POLITICO last fall.

SOURCE: Politico