About Schmidt

No, not the Jack Nicholson movie, but campaign strategist Steve Schmidt.

For the past couple of years, Schmidt has built up a very good reputation as an objective analyst on television, particularly for his scathing, almost Shakespearean criticisms of Trump, leading him to leave the "morally corrupt" Republican Party.  Even before his outrage bubbled over at the GOP, I'd found his commentary strong and often impressive.  This came as a notable achievement, reclaiming his good name after his part in Sarah Palin's temporary but troubling rise to prominence as John McCain's ill-advised vice presidential running mate.  However it one swift move he's come close to throwing that all away, when he signed on to be an adviser to former Starbucks' CEO Howard Schultz who has bandied about a possible independent run for president.

The criticism of Schmidt has been harsh, and MSNBC also cut ties with him as a regular contributor now that he was officially advising Schultz as a potential candidate.  But the reaction was most notable when he was politely but harshly interviewed by Nicolle Wallance on her MSNBC show, given how she and Schmidt are especially-close political friends -- among other things, working on the McCain-Palin campaign together.  In fact, at the end of her show when handing the broadcast over to the next host, Chuck Todd, Ms. Wallace quipped -- "If you want to attack Steve, I will turn the floor over to you,”

That interview begins at the 1:30 mark --

And here's that hand-off clip --

And now comes the story that Schmidt stormed off his own podcast that he co-hosts with Elise Jordan and Adam Levine and threatened legal action if the segment got posted.  It got posted.

According to a Daily Beast article, Schmidt is known for having a short fuse, and showed it off when he got upset at having his own podcast "hijacked" as he put it, by Jordan and the show's executive producer Adam Levine..  

"Schmidt railed at having to defend himself on his podcast with a stream of curses a source present in the studio said consumed six minutes," the article noted.. Told that listeners were castigating him for joining an effort that could help re-elect President Trump and that he owed them answers, Schmidt finally settled down enough to take about 30 minutes to questions from Jordan, normally his co-host, and Levine, the executive producer."

You can get the article, along with the embedded podcast by clicking here.