Penn laid-out N.H. strategy in memo

Weeks before the New Hampshire primary, U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton's senior strategist Mark Penn wrote a campaign memo that outlined a path to victory for the former first lady.

The memo, published by The Atlantic, proposed a series of steps the campaign should take depending on how well Clinton did in the Iowa caucuses.

Penn's memo argues that the campaign should target independent women, portray Clinton has the "new beginning" candidate and suggested various ways the campaign could use an endorsement from The Concord Monitor. Clinton's New Hampshire campaign co-chair argued that Clinton won the Granite State because of "voter to voter contact."

"If Iowa is the play-nice primary, New Hampshire is the play-rough primary," Penn wrote. "Contrast campaigns have often succeeded in New Hampshire primary politics and, more importantly, they have dramatically reversed difficult spots."

Penn also argued that Clinton should be portrayed has the "new beginning" candidate.

"To win in NH, we have to convince people that Hillary does not just have the experience, but she is the ‘new beginning' candidate they have been looking for. That she is just as much as new ideas candidates as anyone, and much more of the president they are looking for."

Reacting to the memo, Clinton's New Hampshire campaign co-chair, former state party Chairwoman Kathy Sullivan, wrote in an e-mail: "I don't know that Mark Penn had a heck of a lot to do with the winning New Hampshire strategy."

Sullivan said Clinton won the New Hampshire primary because of Clinton herself and Clinton's New Hampshire campaign manager Nick Clemons.

"She [Clinton] understood that New Hampshire voters make their minds up late in New Hampshire, and so she continued to do town hall meetings, staying and answering every question she could, showing an incredible breadth of knowledge on very substantive issues."

Sullivan also said the campaign's get-out-the-vote effort was critical.

"New Hampshire was won on the ground, through voter to voter contact, in those last five days," she wrote.

The memo also contains thoughts on how Penn hoped to use an endorsement from The Concord Monitor. The paper endorsed Clinton a day before the memo was written.

"The Concord Monitor can be used as the same kind of credibility builder as the Des Moines Register to throw off the character attacks that they dismissed as 90s talking points and press our case forward.

Under the titled "other out of the box ideas," Penn floated the idea that the campaign approach the Monitor's editorial board and suggest that they write an editorial documenting that U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and former U.S. Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) has changed their positions on various issues.

"Go to Concord Ed Board with the case that Obama and Edwards have changed all their positions, document the case and see if they will do a Romney editorial on either of them. Find someone else who will do it. This info matters to NH voters."