Howard Dean...lol! Thank you! Thank you! Now perhaps the party will take a long and serious look at it's only electable candidate-John Kerry!! Moderate Republican women will put him in office.
As Dean Slips, The Democrats' Drama Rises
By Dan Balz, Washington Post Staff Writer, Tuesday, January 20, 2004, (here)
DES MOINES, Jan. 19 -- Iowa Democrats dealt a serious blow to the once front-running campaign of Howard Dean here Monday night and to predictions that the Democratic presidential race might end as quickly as it began.
With the big victory of Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), the party faces an open and potentially protracted contest to find a nominee to challenge President Bush in the fall.
Dean's vaunted grass-roots movement, which fueled the former Vermont governor's rise to the top of the Democratic field with money and energy in 2003, failed its first test at old-fashioned politics, falling far short of the bold claims of its architects.
Dean now has a week to regroup for what will be a critical test in next Tuesday's primary in New Hampshire, where retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark has been gaining ground on him and where Kerry will now be a major factor in the outcome.
...Not only did Dean's army fall short. Organized labor, the backbone of the Democratic Party's get-out-the-vote machinery, did not come close to delivering here for its most loyal warrior, Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (Mo.). Gephardt, who won the caucuses here in 1988, signaled an end to his campaign in an address to his supporters Monday night.
...The entrance poll also underscored Kerry's breadth of support. He won among men and women, among moderates and conservatives and those who described themselves as moderately liberal, among those with college degrees and those without. That kind of broad appeal for Kerry -- Dean won among those who described themselves as very liberal -- was evident in earlier polls in Iowa, though at a lower level, giving Kerry strategists confidence that if they invested heavily in the state, he could come out with a finish that revived his candidacy. Kerry also beat Dean among younger voters as well among those who say they frequently use the Internet to get political news, two groups considered core supporters of Dean.
********
How the Iowans Wised Up to Dean
By George F. Will, Washington Post, Wednesday January 21, 2004, (here)
Markets are mechanisms for generating and disseminating information. The term "market failure" denotes instances when markets behave inefficiently, preventing optimal outcomes because of barriers that prevent new products from competing, or because consumers receive insufficient information about competing products. Iowa's political market, called caucuses, where barriers to entry were negligible and information was abundant, worked well.
As with some other American arrangements (e.g., the electoral college, judicial review), no deliberation planned Iowa's system to function as it now does. But Monday night the nation's vetting of Democratic candidates began efficiently because a critical mass of information about Howard Dean, most of it impulsively and imprudently supplied by him, had reached that state's Democratic consumers. They responded by slowing the slide of the world's oldest party toward nominating a political novelty unsuited to the national market.
Dean is a problematic product because the fuel that launched his rocket -- a combustible brew of anger, pugnacity, moral vanity and intellectual condescension -- severely limits the apogee of his trajectory. Television enforces intimacy with candidates and presidents -- they are in America's homes nightly. Many intense Democrats have had the fun of picnicking on Dean's ideological red meat but are now flinching from the prospect of having, or of asking less-partisan Americans to have, prolonged intimacy with Dean's sandpapery personality and equally abrasive agenda. Gratuitously abrasive. Not only does he promise to raise middle-class taxes, he breezily acknowledges that because of his protectionism, "prices will go up at your local Wal-Mart."
*******
**********
DISASTER FOR DEAN IN IOWA
By Deborah Orin, Vincent Morris and Brian Blomquist, Tuesday January 20, 2004, (here)
January 20, 2004 -- In an Iowa meltdown, Howard Dean got socked with a disastrous third-place finish last night, as John Kerry pulled off a stunning political comeback to win the first-in-the-nation Democratic contest for president.
Dean's collapse, combined with the combined surge of Sen. Kerry (Mass.) and Sen. John Edwards (N.C.), who finished second, threw the race wide open.
It also raised fresh questions about Dean's temperament when he launched into a screaming, clenched-teeth rant before his supporters after the vote count.
Anything less than a win in Iowa was a clear disappointment for longtime front-runner Dean, but the distant third-place finish was a huge blow.
With 98 percent of the vote counted in last night, Kerry led with 38 percent, Edwards was in second place with 32 percent, Dean had only 18 percent, and Richard Gephardt had 11 percent.
Rolling up his shirt sleeves and shrieking so loud that his voice cracked, a raging Dean rallied his supporters with forced optimism and a pugilistic tone that stood in contrast to the formal upbeat speeches by his opponents.
"I'll see you around the corner, around the block," Dean said, sounding like a bully taunting Kerry and Edwards, whom he'll face in the New Hampshire primary Tuesday.
Why I love this photo of Dean going nuts ^
Victors Show Wide Party Appeal
By Ronald Brownstein, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer, Tuesday January 20, 2003, (here)
DES MOINES ? Sens. John F. Kerry and John Edwards reshaped the Democratic presidential race in the Iowa caucuses Monday night by demonstrating broad appeal across the party, while former Gov. Howard Dean and Rep. Dick Gephardt saw their base of support crumble, according to a poll of voters.
Kerry, lagging behind Dean and Gephardt in Iowa until last week, beat them among virtually every major group of voters. Kerry displayed remarkably consistent appeal to men and women, working-class and more affluent voters, liberals and moderates, and those with and without college educations, the survey of caucus-goers found.
Edwards, in finishing a strong second, also showed an impressive reach, winning significant support from the same groups.
Although the Iowa impact on the New Hampshire primary has been uneven over the years, Monday's results could unsettle that contest. In recent polling, Dean's once-formidable lead in New Hampshire has eroded, with retired Army Gen. Wesley K. Clark, who chose not to compete in Iowa, a close second. Kerry, meanwhile, has surged to a virtual dead heat with Clark.
Both Kerry and Edwards are likely to receive a boost from the Iowa results, increasing the pressure on Dean and Clark and creating the potential for a tight four-way race in next Tuesday's New Hampshire vote.