YouSaid · the spoken record

Peter Hart

lines on the record
75
first
2016-09-12
most recent
2016-09-12
sittings or episodes
1
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podcast

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  1. “But now I'm No, what I would tell you is that as a friend, but as somebody that views you from afar, two things. One, the sense of depth and feeling of issues that make a difference and how society moves. You look at the country is so good and you get to the small towns and you get everywhere and you start to understand the future. You represent sort of where do you go and how do you put things together. And now that you've moved into the public affairs area, what I like so much when you're on television is you give me the truth, but at the same time you never go in in a negative way towards somebody with invective. I wish I could learn that from you. Listen, I appreciate it.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “and forever grateful because it changed my life and it gave me the opportunity to come here and to talk about all the issues of the day which has been just fabulous.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “South Carolina, North Carolina. And that's the reason that the South changed over the years. But I've had so many clients that I've just been very, very fortunate. And I can't exit without saying that, look, Al Hunt, who gave me the chance to work on the NBC Wall Street Journal.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “Former governor of Mississippi, one of the truly fine people and really represented how you change a state and the growth and change.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “That's a great question. Obviously, in some respects, I'd love to be marooned with Bill Clinton because he'd be a great conversationalist. He'd be marvelous. He catches all areas. He's a fascinating individual. But if I were picking my pastor or my rabbi, I would tell you William Winter.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “Well, and more importantly, it gives an opening to Donald Trump because I don't see how he gets over fifty percent, but can he get over forty percent, forty two percent possible?”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “It's never been close to that. I mean, when a candidate had 40 to 45 percent unfavorability, we considered them in terrible shape, but to be 55 to 60 is unparalleled.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “I didn't think it was going to happen, but I want to see a couple more polls before I feel certain right now. You do have two.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “And my point being, watch the third and fourth party, because if they continue to pull up in the high, in the mid-teens, that's going to mean.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “Oh, I'd have to say seven to one odds, I wouldn't take anything less than that if you wanted to bet. But having said that, the race is ahead of us, not behind us. I mean, essentially, we don't know what events are going to happen for a country that's gone through everything from San Bernardino to Mississippi to Minnesota, et cetera. We have no idea whatsoever. And that doesn't count international events. And then beyond all of that, what are the political events? So seven to one odds against them, but at the same time, I still think the race is ahead of them.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “Well there are many problems as you say the minorities then you look at women and you look at millennials all those are disqualifying for winning the presidency but against it you've got a third party candidate and a fourth party candidate and you have to watch that very carefully and if that vote stays up in the 15 level then does he have enough room to be able to beat Hillary Clinton? Yes he does what”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “Well he's playing to the group that he needs to play to which is the Republicans and so what he's trying to do as much as anything is reach the Republican base those people who have said I just can't see myself voting for him but they all agree I don't like Hillary Clinton and I never like Barack Obama. Remember his ratings with Republicans are still down in the teens and low twenties. So that's what Trump's doing, playing to the base.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “We see it in our research the NBC Wall Street Journal poll shows that the American public say he deserves credit for bringing the economy back. So when Trump makes him the first.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “Which historically goes against That's correct. Secondly, I think that what's happened is people see the economic revival in America. There may be hard times and may be hard to see how the future plays out, but people recognize that this has been from a historic low to a period where we see that.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “How much difference, right? It makes a huge difference because when a president is over fifty percent, we know that there is a great chance that that same party will win. We know that even in a third country.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “to tell the American public about Donald Trump that they don't already know and understand. And so my theory has always been that against Bernie Sanders and against Donald Trump, it's all about Hillary. We all wanted just to defeat Trump. I think it is about electing Hillary Clinton. And I think if I can make one more point. The second thing that relates here is governance. And the one thing that we know is that out of 2008, we knew where Barack Obama was headed. We didn't necessarily know all the tent poles, but we had a very good sense of how it was being directed and what it meant for government. And by the way, I think he's had the best seventh and eighth year of any president in my lifetime. I mean, it's not even close.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Yeah, I mean, everything about Donald Trump, the American public fines both fascinating but ultimately way too scary. I mean, and we focus on foreign policy, but in so many ways it is his ability to get along with people. He has only one way of dealing with people, and that's threats. If he hasn't been nice to them or they're not nice to him, then the threats come out and has no sense of what the political process is about. And people have analyzed this and done a great job. But what I have to ask myself is, with all the advertising and everything that's been written in this campaign, if he's still within a handful of points of Hillary Clinton, what is it that we have?”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “Hillary Clinton, you know the complexity at which he looks at issues and understands what government is all about. But you don't understand what is the motivating factor for her. This, I believe, and I think if people had an idea of what she really believes, they'd have a much easier time voting for her.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “I think it's a huge barrier. It's a barrier in two different ways. Obviously in terms of getting elected, what this is really about is the ability that people want to see who she is and what she's going to be like. And all of the integrity questions creates the doubt and uncertainty. And without some sense of her character and what she motivation is a great word, what are her motivations? And I think if I ask that question in a focus group, I would get a very negative answer. And she can talk about all the programs she has, but what she really needs to talk about are the fights that she wants to take on. And if there was one thing that Bernie Sanders did in his campaign, you knew what he wanted to do and you knew the fights that he was going to take on.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “charges she should have been at the headquarters and saying this is what we're fighting against, these are the people who are hurting our children, who are taking things away.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “Maybe he would win the presidency, but it's hard to me for me to see thirty days, and I don't think the debate will just be the defining moment. I think it will be maybe a situation where we will see Donald Trump doesn't care and understand enough about American policy or that we see him as too irrational, too outside the mainstream. But for Hillary Clinton, the same challenges. She has to be able to not only demonstrate her knowledge of the issues, but to show her character. And we always think her character relates to integrity. I think the thing that they've left out is the fights that she takes on. To me, if I had one thing to have told the campaign is the moment that EpiPen happened and the outrage of their”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “And the other side is the economy, and these two forces are clashing against one another. One is the sense, how do I get ahead and the other force is how do I hold my position or how do I plan my future. So those two things together, and it's that element that allows the Donald Trump to, one, win the nomination to exist at this stage of the game. And were he a different candidate or were he to have 30 days of what I call rational dialogue with the American public, then”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “Oh you bet he would be. So his is all based upon either this sense that I don't know what he'll do, I don't really care if you're a supporter, but he represents the things that I'm railing against. America is going through exceptionally hard time at this stage of the game and it has to do with immigration, it has to do with race, all the basic issues.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “Because it's like Daytona five hundred. People say they're there for the race they aren't, they're there for the crash, and some race fans will tell me I'm absolutely dead wrong, but in reality it is that people want to see this crash. And he is the straw that stirs the drink. And if you took him off television for one week and said, we're going to have radio free Trump, the audience ratings would just drop to net. He would be the first one.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “In many cases, but in some cases, we actually have people that are in camps. But what we're learning about Donald Trump, and I ask people if he were a relative in your family, who would he be? Well, it turns out not to be anybody's brother or really an uncle or a father. He turns out to be sort of the crazy uncle or the distant father in law, somebody who you don't respect you don't like and you don't know. Hillary Clinton turns out to be an aunt, one of two kinds either the stern, disapproving one or the one that you look up to and admire. So people give us a sense in terms of Donald Trump, every projective question that we ask, Donald Trump turns out as somebody that people want to avoid and Donald. I really call him as much as anything sort of he's the flame and the moth. And so there's a sense that people are so attracted to him.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “It's true all we have are a dozen people around the table and we don't suggest that they're a cross-section of anything. But what we get from these people.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. “For a plane that they absolutely had to be on, what would they do? And so when I said about Bill Clinton, they said, oh, well he would woo his flight attendant and he would get his way on. And they talk about other people as getting somebody to kneel and pray and they would walk around. And they talk about a Michael DeCaucus as somebody who would wait patiently in line. So what you're trying to do is to understand where they're at or what they would be like as a next door neighbor or if you were to see them, if you were in a forest loss. Each of these things are aimed at sort of understanding the perceptions and where people come from.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  28. “Well, focus groups to me are a chance to get down below. What numbers do is they give you a statistical sense of where the public's at. Focus groups are qualitative. They are not a cross-section. They can't be looked at numerically in any respect. But what I'm trying to get to is not what's in their head, but what's down in their gut. Because I think if you understand what's in their gut, you'll understand more about how they're going to vote and what they're going to do. So to me, it's not an intellectual quest as much as it is a human quest. And I ask questions that are unusual and people say, well, why would you ask this? I asked several years ago if blank were the sixth person in line.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  29. “I mean, the voters have been magnificent throughout all of this, and I've really been fascinated, and this is, as you said, done for the Annenberg Center for Public Policy at the University of Pennsylvania.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  30. “You look at election night in California where she clearly won the nomination, you could see a joy and an ecstasy in her. The other day, at the other time we saw it so well was the moment that she came out with Barack Obama after the president had given his speech at the Democratic Convention. You could see a just a joy and a relaxation and a true relationship between the two.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  31. “Hey, my point is if you were the campaign manager, would you be doing things differently? Well, and that's the thing. They've had one campaign from beginning to the end. If you could say something to the campaign team, what are the two things that you would tell them that they need to do over the last 15 years? Well, first of all, let me just...”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  32. “I think that has come from all of the problems that she has dealt with over the last 30 years with the press and sort of being torn apart in one way or another. The irony is the American public just needs to know we can live with her. And that's what they're trying to answer.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  33. “Well, certainly for me, I look at events that are personal, like when she hugged the little girl who was being bullied. I mean, that just says so much more than a four-point program on bullying or whatever it may be. And it is the ability to get to that human side. That's all voters are looking for. So you look.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  34. “Well, the answer tears my guts out, because if you look at her whole life, it is the ability to connect with people. I have no doubt that you've got ten or fifteen stories of your dealing with Hillary Clinton and anything that dealt with your family or anything that dealt with something that was important. She was there. And she has been, and her relationships are so deep and so personal, and yet when she gets out in public, it is this sense that there is a glass curtain that voters can't get through.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  35. “Prominent of them. Integrity is one element, likability is the other element. And for Hillary Clinton, what the voters just want to know is I can live with her the next four years. They know that she is competent.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  36. “But in reverse, which is interesting, the American public knows they do not want Donald Trump as president. I mean, we've gone from beginning to end measuring Donald Trump. His numbers have never gotten positive. They've never suddenly said he's competent. He knows what he's doing. He's got the right temperament. He's honest. All of the things that people want and expect from a president. And they've never changed. So they know they don't want to elect him. They're not certain about Hillary Clinton. And Hillary Clinton's been a question mark throughout.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  37. “No, I don't believe that Democrats, the American public had decided in nineteen eighty that they did not want to re-elect Jimmy Carter. What they did not know is could they trust or would they accept Ronald Reagan? And it wasn't until the final debate that they made that the only debate”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  38. “Well, we knew pretty early on that it was going to be a long, long road, and it wasn't until New York in April that we started to turn things around. And it was an example of where you had a fractious convention, and obviously Carter lost that year. You look in the Republicans had a fractious convention this year.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  39. “Take Kennedy as a pretty big person and he was a remarkable person and I was talking about the breadth of Hubert Humphrey. What was fascinating about Edward Kennedy is he could go down deep on numbers and I always enjoyed that because he would test you not unnecessarily to tell you the top line, but tell me what it really means and what's going on in the guts of people.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  40. “I'll tell you one little side story. This is upholster's dilemma. Two days before the Iowa caucus, which Kennedy would go on and lose two to one, we were all out at his house, major people. And Senator Kennedy said to us at the end, hey, why don't we all just put in a number of what you think I'm going to get the percentage in Iowa? In Iowa, two days from now. And I'm the pollster. I know what's going to happen in Iowa. Do you put down the accurate number? And we had to sign it that would show you you were on the mark or do you show a sense of faith and inspiration that would make your candidate?”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  41. “That's exactly going back to John Kennedy's people and obviously Robert Kennedy's people. But that race was a very challenging race. And what it told you is early polling there would have given him a direction and an understanding. Instead, we started to measure all the backwash and couldn't really get on top of it. I'll tell you one question.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  42. “Thy had laid some contact, not a lot because it was survey Helter Skelter on the run campaign and got put together quickly. They're much like Hillary Clinton. Ted Kennedy had such a breadth of friends and close alliances. Which just can be a blessing.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  43. “Aren't of a certain age that Well, and for such an amazing orator he came out as somebody who really did not have a sense of why he was running and what it was about.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  44. “It tells you so much about our business, David, and that is they approached me in September of 1979, and instead of having me go out and do a poll exactly at the beginning of this, they sort of waited until November. And by that stage, between September and November because of the Shah and the hostages and all of the things that happened, you know, Carter became a different candidate, but also Senator Kennedy because of his interview with Roger Mudd and sort of”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  45. “Exactly. And then Senator Edward Kennedy was another one of my clients. I worked for him in the 1980 presidential election, stayed close to him throughout the rest of his career.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  46. “And what that's exactly who he was. I mean, that he represented a different era came from a different way, and he was a different part of the Democratic Party and such an important part. And I met him in 1959. I was still in high school. And he said to me, young man, what's your future? And I said to him, Well, Mr. Humphrey, I'm kind of a question mark. He turned to me. You look like an exclamation point. You know, which was just his marvelous way of relating. And so he was a great candidate and great person to work for. I worked for it.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  47. “Well, I had the great honor of working for Vice President and Senator Hubert Humphrey. He had such a tremendous reach in terms of what he would understand if I presented him with an answer from a poll. Instead of having a reach of six feet or eight feet, he could look at 25 feet and see things that other people couldn't see. And his humanity, his warmth was just amazing.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  48. “Definitely the vanguard of a new south, but it was also your new post Watergate era. And so it was the ability to understand sort of how people had gotten disaffected from government and what was going to come back and obviously affect us some 25 years later.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  49. “And she ended up winning and won re election. That was a great raise. In South Carolina in 1974, I worked for a man named Charles Pug Ravenel, who was an unknown candidate and ended up running and winning the Democratic nomination, thrown off the ballot because he didn't meet the residency requirement. But it changed politics in South Carolina and not surprisingly, we went on and we worked for Dick Riley person you know well who is governor for two terms and one of the truly great governors and William Winter Governor in Mississippi all of these people were path breakers and John Glenn in 1974 worked for him he had lost previously in his Senate race and he went on to serve for 25 years with great distinction so I Got to work on a lot of the early most difficult races where you started to change things and you were a lot of those.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  50. “Exactly, and we put a group of men around the table, and each of them asking her, and she was asking them various questions. Where are we going to do about housing? That's not enough. I want to do this. How about crime? No. We're going to go a totally different way. It was just aimed at saying to women she isn't you.”

    2016-09-12 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 78 - Peter Hart · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source