POLITICAL CREATIVE and ADVISORY

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IT STARTED IN APRIL 1997 WITH A SYNDICATED WOOLF EDITORIAL CARTOON WHICH LANDED ON THE DESK of U.S. Senator Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), who was the subject. A phone call to Marie from Hatch's press secretary, Paul Smith, asking for a signed print for the senator began an unlikely, close friendship that lasted until his death in April 2022.

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Senator Hatch accepted an invitation, extended by Marie on behalf of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, to keynote the major Saturday night event at the organization's upcoming 1997 national convention in Orlando, Florida.  At the convention, the senator asked Marie if he might correspond with her.  Their conversations led to ongoing projects for Senator Hatch including writing for him and others, among them the Reverend Jesse Jackson; cover design, art direction, photo editing and manuscript review for several books including his 2003 memoir, Square Peg, ongoing political advisory, and commissioned illustration for his collaborative music CD with singer Santita Jackson, Put Your Arms Around the World.

 

Having discovered that Marie was in the forefront of Internet innovation as an online creator, the senator retained Marie in June 1999 to serve full-time as creative and Internet director and senior advisor for his late-entry presidential primary campaign, on all aspects of campaign branding, design, collateral and writing including for speeches, and advisory.  Woolf singlehandedly created all content for the campaign, including the "Skinnycat" character from Senator Hatch's idea to raise $36 million in single $36 donations from ordinary Americans (as opposed to "fat cats"). The campaign set a record for online campaign donations at that time.  After Senator Hatch left the presidential race in January 2000, Marie was retained to continue in this role for his successful U.S. Senate reëlection campaign through the rest of that year. She continued to selectively work with members of Congress and state houses for years before opting out of the professional political sector, including editorial cartooning.

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In 2000, Marie and newly minted Stanford grad CEO, Internet

entrepreneur and social activist Steve Rosenbaum launched

Politikos (no connection to the media enterprise Politico which was

launched years later), an interactive, customizable website, online

fundraising and contribution reporting product. The template

product was scaled for all levels of U.S. political campaigns from 

presidential, Senate and Congressional to state, mayoral and local

issues.  Marie, who is politically unaffiliated, worked on this and

other projects over the years with Senators Edward M. Kennedy,

Barbara Boxer, Joe Biden, Jay Rockefeller, Max Cleland, Barbara

Mikulski, Gordon Smith, Robert Bennett, Mike Crapo and members

of the House of Representatives of both political parties. Woolf and

Rosenbaum enjoyed showcasing Abraham Lincoln as their "winning candidate." The presentation holds up remarkably well long after the nascent Internet's "webmasters," "search engine positioning," and page "hits."  Not much has changed, though—it always comes back to the candidate.​

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The George Washington University invited Marie to contribute two chapters and cover design for The Political

Consultants' Online Fundraising Primer (The George Washington University, 2004), and to speak at its university

conclave that year for political consultants, agencies and government relations professionals. ​