Politico's Mike Allen puts down his Playbook

Mike Allen filed his final Playbook of politics and media notes on Sunday, ending a run that began in 2007 and spawned no shortage of imitators. Allen's last Playbook was emailed out by Politico with the lede: "“ONE LAST TIME,” per “Hamilton” ... Good Sunday morning. It’s 8 days to Cleveland, 15 to Philly, and 121 to Election Day." Later in the newsletter, a personal message:

THANK YOU for all these great mornings ... TODAY is my last Playbook -- #3,304, with about a dozen of those written by Celebrity Guest Playbookers. There were some fun tweets over the weekend about the streak: “#Favre; #Ripken.” I’m fortunate that between the stunning times we’ve lived through together over the past decade, and this incredible, supportive audience, there has never been a single morning that I wasn’t excited to get up and tell you about the day ahead. I haven’t used an alarm clock since college: I just bolt out of bed every morning, humbled and thrilled to have the chance to serve you one more time. I say: “Thank you, God, for this day,” then go make the donuts at my keyboard.

A buddy sent me an email last night (subject line “Godspeed”) that said: “For all of the people who are saying ‘I have read Playbook since 2007,’ I just want to say that when I put your email into my To line, it populated with not just your politico.com address but also your washpost.com and your timemagazine.com address.” And when I wrote him back, HIS email popped up in my iPhone with his name and then “PIN,” the old BlackBerry secret message address. And that’s how Playbook is: a longtime family, and rare meeting place for Rs and Ds, hacks and flacks, smart citizens and people who run the world.

Starting tomorrow, your cruise directors will be the talented trio of Jake Sherman, Anna Palmer and Daniel Lippman, who’ll propel Playbook into a new era. I’ll stay in the Politico family through the election, helping with events and contributing scoops and stories. After that, I’ll start a new media company with Jim VandeHei and Roy Schwartz, Politico’s first chief revenue officer. We’ll be based in the area, so you’ll still SPOT me at the same places you spot me now....

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As my final Playbooks ticked down, people asked me how I’m feeling. It’s a lot like becoming an empty-nester: You have this awesome, needy, all-consuming organizing imperative for your life that suddenly vanishes. You’re happy for your offspring, and just hope you gave it good values and left it happy and healthy for the next season of life. You hope that, as Jim says, you got the big things right and that the lapses – and there were plenty – wound up washing away. Everyone may not have always agreed with your decisions in the moment, but eventually they realize that there was a method to your madness...

Politico's California Playbook remains in the hands of Carla Marinucci and Andrew Weber, whose sheet this morning reports that Bernie Sanders will likely endorse Hillary Clinton on Tuesday, and that Bay Area Rep. Barbara Lee will do so today. Plus a ton of other notes.