Relax! The worst things happening in campaigns are done out of goodwill, hope and despair. So just don't be nervous. yes, not only did Dean call Bush a "moderate guy", he even admitted openly in an interview he "liked" Bush as a governor and was disappointed by him as a president. Who honestly cares? Please do not expect someone, to have had the same views for the last 10 years. That would scare me. Additionally, while Gephardt is complaining about Dean volunteers even coming to Iowa, George Bush announces he is planning a settlement on the moon: maybe that will be a good place to hide from creditors for future presidents.
Today is about Character, Second Thoughts, Clark, Iowa, New Hampshire
First, the Matea Gold is stating, "Dean exudes Pragmatism, Not Personality":
Up close, Dean's persona belies the passionate, full-throated nature of his grass-roots campaign. He speaks in functional rhetoric, glad-hands efficiently and maintains a detachment that keeps some of his most fervent fans at arm's length.
"I tend to know that I can be most useful for somebody when I'm trying to sort through their problems, and that empathizing is really important, but that solving their problem is more important," he said in a recent interview between campaign stops in Iowa, his shoeless feet propped up against the door of his minivan. "So I tend to do less 'I feel your pain' than 'What can I do about your pain?' "
In many ways, Dean is the anti-Clinton on the campaign trail -- the antithesis of a politician who uses charm and a powerful personality to woo voters.
Then, there is also
Richard Goldstein's Dean Profile, the cover story of this weeks "Nation". Goldstein says, Dean is the only candidate in the race able to win the "machismo"- race against Bush:
Dean is the only major Democratic candidate to evade the sissifying barbs of the GOP's shock-jock surrogates. First, comely John Edwards was labeled "the Breck girl." (He trimmed his hair, to no avail.) When Edwards flagged and John Kerry emerged, he was dubbed "Mr. Ketchup," implying that his wife's fortune, and by extension Teresa Heinz Kerry herself, wears the pants in their manse. (Kerry hauled out a bomber jacket to signal his war record, but it resonated with the image of Michael Dukakis peering haplessly from the hatch of a tank.) Then came Wesley Clark in mufti barely concealing his stars and bars. After this writer compared Clark favorably to Ashley Wilkes, Rush Limbaugh jumped on the analogy, braying on about Clark's wimpery while the theme from Gone With the Wind played in the background. As for Dick Gephardt, he has long labored under the burden of lacking eyebrows, making it hard for him to perform the requisite Dirty Harry stare. If he should somehow prevail, look for the Republicans to draw comparisons between his currently ample brows and their formerly faint state. If there's one thing wussier than lacking body hair, it's a transplant.
The butch issue explains why Dean's military record is such a hot potato. If it's true that he avoided service by pleading a bad back and then spent the next year skiing, that would be a ruse worthy of a weasel. Of course, Bush managed to overcome a shifty military record. Why are Republicans able to get away with the very flaws they pin on Democrats? The answer speaks to the enormous success GOP strategists have had in reaching voters on a symbolic level. The Republicans have adapted their Southern strategy to the new terms of sexual politics. What they once did with race, they are doing today with gender. [...]
We may resent the fact that Americans regard the penis and its symbolic projections as synonymous with strength. But psychic reality cannot be denied. At this moment, most voters are looking for a leader who reassures them with a manly presentation. The trick is to be a man women admire, blacks find credible and white guys bond with. It's a hard job, but someone's got to do it or Bush will ride the backlash to the White House--with a real mandate this time.
E.J.Dionne has the "Balance sheet for Dean" in todays Washington Post:
Lots of Democrats are petrified of coming out against Dean precisely because he has built one of the few formidable organizations the Democratic Party has. Thanks to his troops, Dean -- like the bosses of an earlier age -- has earned the power to intimidate people [...]
How do Democrats resolve their dilemma? Here are some tests for Dean, care of Stanley Greenberg, the Democratic pollster who just published "The Two Americas," an important book about the current deadlock in American politics. Greenberg believes the deadlock can be broken by a Democrat who combines John F. Kennedy's sense of national strength with a vision of a "100 percent America" in which opportunity and success are not confined to the privileged.
In an interview, Greenberg posed these questions about Dean: "Can he speak of faith, can he speak of God, can he speak of the culture of rural and working-class America in a way that is natural? Does he transcend the culture of the secular information world that he's part of and speak in a way that people outside that world can see as accessible?"
Those are the right questions, which Dean's awkward forays into theology and Confederate memorabilia did little to settle. Dean won't become president unless he deals with them successfully.
Howard Fineman tells us today, Dean is in the Danger Zone oops, no one noticed that :
Joe Trippi was on my mobile phone. I had called him for some poll numbers and he sounded, understandably, hassled. Not frantic, but stressed. He should be.
As Howard Dean's campaign manager, Trippi has masterfully guided his man to the brink of the Democratic nomination. But Trippi has been around a long time, and he knows that in any campaign, especially a presidential nomination race, things can change faster than you can shout "Hart Upsets Mondale." If you're the front-runner at this point in a campaign, time seems to slow down to an agonizing crawl. Election Day can't come soon enough for you. Trippi knows that leads can crumble, an unexpected rival can rise up suddenly and that voters do what they want, not what pundits expect.
And finally, Jonathan Finer of the Washington Post writes about gun control and one should give him extra credit for the headline: "On Gun Control, Dean Aims for the Center"
As governor of Vermont -- a small, rural state whose gun laws are among the least restrictive in the country -- Dean earned a national reputation as an opponent of gun control and worked closely with the NRA, a requirement for survival in this state's politics.
But he also feuded with some of Vermont's most ardent gun rights advocates, who saw him as unwilling to take strong stands on firearms issues, attend their candidate forums or respond to their questionnaires. The Burlington Free Press recently described his support for gun rights while governor as "more platonic than passionate." That was enough to earn the NRA's backing -- and A rating -- in eight consecutive elections, but it disappointed other gun enthusiasts.
Now, as the gun-friendly front-runner in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, Dean is again walking a fine line on firearms issues, staking out a position he hopes will be palatable to liberal primary voters while winning him support among conservatives as he looks to the general election. [...]
In response, Dean said: "In a rural state, the NRA is not what it is in Washington. I think NRA members in rural states often do not engage in the kind of extreme rhetoric that sometimes the national NRA engages in."
But his critics in Vermont say his ambivalence on gun issues has long been evident.
"It is not that he is anti-gun," said Bill Leipold, former president of the Vermont Federation of Sportsmen's Clubs. "It's just that he so clearly isn't a defender of the Second Amendment. For a lot of us that's not good enough."
A number of papers are running today a story about "second thoughts" about people going form Dean to Clark. Adam Nagourney of NY Times reports of a "Tide of Second Thoughts" he may have added: after my masterful reporting in the last days. Jodi Wilogren also contributed to this effect :
Democratic leaders in Iowa say that in a contest that is notoriously difficult to measure with polls, Dr. Dean is the dominant candidate, and they are struck by the powerful commitment of his supporters.
Still, in dozens of conversations with voters across central Iowa over the past three days, it became clear that some Democrats are taking a second look at the doctor from Vermont whose candidacy has transformed the Democratic presidential contest.
Such qualms could benefit Senator John Edwards of North Carolina and Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts. Both were often mentioned by voters as strong alternatives to Dr. Dean.
"I don't know why, but there is just something that makes me uncomfortable about Dean," Laura Sims of Webster City said on Thursday.
In Baxter, after a town hall meeting with Representative Richard A. Gephardt, Al Flyer, an I.R.S. agent, said that among Democratic voters, there was a "little bit of mistrust there" toward Dr. Dean. In Des Moines, a stronghold for Dr. Dean, Nick Colacino, 80, a retired postal worker, dismissed the attacks on Dr. Dean and said that if anything, they made him more likely to turn out for his candidate.
"He's the favorite and they are trying to bust him down," Mr. Colacino said. "I made up my mind a long time ago that I was going to vote for him."
USA Today has a similar report, again stressing the importance of their own poll for voters decision making processes:
Clark's unexpected surge in this week's USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll, twinned with Dean's constant battering from rivals, has put them just 4 percentage points apart, within the poll's margin of error. Clark also moved into second place Wednesday in a New Hampshire poll. As a result, several candidates expanded their attacks Wednesday to include the former NATO commander.
"I was somewhat impressed with Dean, but I think progressively I have changed my mind because he seems to be so angry. I'm much more impressed with Clark, his demeanor," said Sharon Nollette, 57, an engineer from Spokane who plans to vote for Clark in Washington's Feb. 7 primary. "Unlike Dean, he comes across in a manner that is respectful."
Ken White, 64, of Hampton, N.H., was a Dean supporter but is leaning toward Clark in his state's pivotal Jan. 27 primary. "I still like (Dean), but I don't think he can beat (President) Bush," said the retired market research executive
You have to give these guys some credit; they are doing a hard job reporting from the campaigns and they have to produce s.th. that sells. Yes, people are turning out at Clark events now, because he is running a standard campaign with standard timing. This is no surprise. What was a surprise was hoe early the Dean campaign was able to permanently mobilize their supporters. But it is no news anymore when Dean gets somewhere and the room is full. That's how a news circle creates "momentum". Add some strange polls and there comes a story that sells: a two man race for the democratic nomination. The good thing about it is: it finally finishes off any chance for Gephardt to get positive media attention.
Still, the Boston - Globe reports about Gephardt's allegation against the Dean:
Dean's heavy reliance on out-of-state campaign volunteers has raised eyebrows in Iowa, and the campaign is predicting some 2,000 such volunteers will swarm the state in the final four days of the race. Their activities will include voter canvassing, providing rides to caucus locations, and helping run phone banks, according to the Dean campaign. Caucuses are open meetings and can be attended by anyone, but only Iowa voters registered as Democrats can participate. There is no length-of-residency requirement, however, and voters do not have to show identification at caucus sites, largely leaving attendees to police themselves.
Mark Daley, a state party spokesman, said any nonresident who participates in a caucus is committing a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison and a $7,500 fine. If anyone's residency is questioned on caucus night, a team of legal specialists will be assembled at party headquarters in Des Moines to make judgments.
Gephardt said yesterday that it would be difficult for a large number of out-of-state residents to vote in the caucuses, particularly in rural areas.
"A young person from California who came in here and tried to vote, I don't know if they would get by with it," Gephardt said.
Yeah! Is the "young person from California" latte-drinking, Volvo-driving?
The Des Moines Register has an angry story today about the old Dean comments on the Iowa caucuses:
Whether the comments will damage Dean's campaign was unclear.
"It may knock Dean off-stride and off-message for a day or so, which could hurt his chances to pick up new supporters," University of Iowa political science professor Peverill Squire said.
Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin said he would decide whether to throw his coveted endorsement to any of the candidates by the weekend.
Harkin, who had been weighing backing Dean, said Thursday the longer he waited to decide, the less likely an endorsement would be.
Harkin said he didn't think his endorsement would make Democrats who have made up their minds rethink their decisions. But it might influence those who remain strategically uncommitted, awaiting signs of momentum.
I have always been convinced that hearts and minds of the electorate are won - and lost - with broarder themes, not specifics. President Bush offers this vision: Settlement on the Moon and a manned mission to Mars, reported by todays Washington Post:
The sources said Bush will announce a new "human exploration" agenda in Washington on Wednesday, six days ahead of the final State of the Union address of his term and just as his reelection campaign moves from the planning stage to its public phase.
Poor Marsians! They should have a primary-vote, too. Watching at the new images, their planet looks as if they had a Bush administration before.