The American Spectator

p> TWO OF A KIND br> Former senior White House adviser Dan Bartlett is joining forces with former Bush media campaign consultant Mark McKinnon , which is raising lots of eyebrows around town. Not that two old Bush hands would work together, but that Bartlett would sign on with McKinnon, who is increasingly becoming an embarrassment to the Bush Administration he helped put in power. /p>

McKinnon signed on early with the McCain campaign in 2007 as a media consultant, but has announced publicly his intention to leave the McCain camp if Democrat Barack Obama wins the Democratic nomination. McKinnon has never hidden the fact that he was a lifelong Democrat before working for George W. Bush in Texas. McKinnon may also have been a facilitator in getting one of Sen. Harry Reid’s closest advisers nominated by the White House to an influential job with the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors. Susan McCue, Reid’s longtime chief of staff in the Senate, was nominated on Friday to the BBG. She currently serves as CEO of the global anti-AIDs ONE Campaign, where McKinnon also serves in a senior capacity.

Bartlett’s signing on with McKinnon isn’t as surprising to others, however, who have worked with both men. “Dan Bartlett wasn’t a conservative, not in the sense of what most of us think is a conservative,” says a longtime White House staffer who worked with Bartlett. “But more important, he wasn’t very good at what he tried to do. Perhaps both of them will go to work for Obama and it will end up helping Republicans win the White House.”

p> BOPP’S BLOWUP br> Mitt Romney ‘s paid-for social conservative adviser