Norman Ornstein
Political Scientist
American political scientist who is known for his work as a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. He is also known for having written and published several books on the subject of politics including It's Even Worse Than It Looks: How the American Constitutional System Collided with the New Politics of Extremism.
He graduated high school at the age of 14 and went on to earn his BA from the University of Minnesota at the age of eighteen. He then earned his PhD in Political Science from the University of Michigan in 1974. He started gaining further attention as a contributor for The Washington Post, The Atlantic, and National Journal.
He was named by Foreign Policy as one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers for his work "diagnosing America's political dysfunction" in 2012.
He was born and raised in Grand Rapids, Minnesota. He married Judith L. Harris who is a litigation attorney.
He is a long time friend of US Senator and comedian Al Franken and even appears as a character in Franken's novel Why Not Me?.