How is John Kerry's campaign like Noah's Ark? Both have two of everything.
In Kerry Campaign, Overlaps Chafe
Staffs in Washington and Boston Have Different Visions
By Paul Farhi
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, October 9, 2003; Page A01
washingtonpost.com.
Almost everything was set early last month for Sen. John F. Kerry's official announcement that he would seek the Democratic presidential nomination. The late summer weather was hot but clear. The backdrop -- a Vietnam War era aircraft carrier, anchored off Charleston, S.C. -- was in place. The candidate was ready to go.
All that was lacking was the speech.
Kerry didn't like the tone of the announcement address co-written by his campaign manager, Jim Jordan, and communications director, Chris Lehane. Not bold enough, suggested the four-term senator from Massachusetts. But instead of sending his two aides back to the drawing board, Kerry had an alternative already in hand. Bob Shrum, another top adviser, had been working on his version of Kerry's speech at the same time as Jordan and Lehane.
The tale of the two speeches says much about the internal dynamics of Kerry's run for the nomination. Kerry is surrounded by an all-star team of political professionals, including Jordan and Shrum, a top consultant to Al Gore's 2000 presidential campaign. But it's also a campaign of uneasy factions and overlapping assignments. Kerry, for example, is advised by two pollsters, two media and advertising experts, and two speechwriting consultants. He also has two inner circles: one composed of hired hands in Washington; the other of old friends, family members and longtime loyalists in Boston.
This has made Kerry's operation the punch line of a joke in political circles: How is John Kerry's campaign like Noah's Ark? Both have two of everything.
The rivalry and duplication may also help explain the persistent criticism of Kerry -- both from Democratic Party operatives and from the media -- that his campaign lacks focus, speed and discipline.
Kerry was the early front-runner for the Democratic nomination, but his campaign idled for much of the summer as former Vermont governor Howard Dean galvanized liberal Democrats with his opposition to the war in Iraq. More recently, retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark entered the race with momentum, grabbing media attention and standing in the polls. At critical moments, Kerry has seemed hesitant, cautious, even programmed. He has struggled to articulate why he is the centrist alternative to the surging Dean, and why, as an avowed antiwar candidate, he voted last year for a Senate resolution that paved the way for President Bush's plans to invade Iraq.
All of which has left Kerry -- the man whom fellow Bostonian and former Democratic nominee Michael S. Dukakis calls "the [candidate] the White House fears most" -- dogged by a question: Will his campaign ever catch fire?
People both inside and outside the Kerry brain trust say Kerry himself ultimately bears the responsibility for his sometimes fuzzy message. But they also suggest that he has not always been well served by his multiple advisers and consultants, who are arrayed in the two cities that frame Kerry's professional life -- Boston and Washington.
The overlapping nature of the Kerry campaign is not only unusual in a primary election race but potentially problematic for a candidate, says James A. Thurber, an American University political science professor who studies political consultants.
"In the heat of the campaign, when you're running and gunning every single day, managing all the advice you're getting can be a very distracting thing," he says. "It's desirable to have a central core of authority that can help [a candidate] shape a clear strategy, theme and message. When you don't have that central core, you can run into trouble."
Two of the campaign's key figures, Jordan and Shrum, have had a prickly relationship that predates Kerry's current run. Several people say Jordan, who is in his maiden voyage as a presidential campaign manager, was unhappy with Shrum's hiring in February.
Shrum and his partner, media consultant Michael Donilon, had discussed working for another candidate, Sen. John Edwards (N.C.). Shrum's services were so highly coveted by Democrats that the competition for them became known in political circles as "the Shrum primary."
Shrum earned Kerry's loyalty with his handling of Kerry's come-from-behind Senate campaign against former Massachusetts governor William F. Weld in 1996. But Shrum is suspect in some quarters of the party for his role in shaping Gore's losing presidential campaign three years ago. Sen. Ernest F. Hollings (D-S.C.) voiced this sentiment at a Democratic debate in Columbia, S.C., in May. Greeting Kerry before the debate, Hollings nodded at Shrum and asked jokingly, "John, do you want to win or do you want to lose?" Shrum did not return calls seeking comment.
Since joining Kerry earlier this year, Shrum has played multiple roles. He is Kerry's principal speechwriter, his media consultant and what Jordan calls his "message guru." Jordan also notes that Shrum is "a personal friend of [Kerry] and his wife."
Jordan, who formerly ran the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, a fundraising group, says Kerry's chief advisers have a "collaborative, constructive and collegial" relationship. But he does not fully dismiss reports of internal tension. "I'm not saying that we agree on every issue," he says.
In fact, meetings of Kerry's top consultants and advisers can be stormy affairs that leave some sore feelings. The strategy sessions typically involve a large cast -- including Washington handlers Jordan, Shrum, Donilon and media adviser Jim Margolis, as well as a Boston faction that includes Kerry's younger brother Cameron and former Dukakis aide John Sasso.
Shrum is often the most assertive personality in these meetings, several people say. A former debating champion, Shrum has been so forceful at times that rivals within the campaign gave him an unflattering nickname, "the Bloviator."
The internal tensions briefly spilled into public view last month when Lehane -- a former spokesman for both the Clinton and Gore campaigns -- quit, making no secret of his frustration.
Among other issues, Shrum and Lehane had clashed over a key tactical matter: How to address the threat posed by Dean. Lehane had spent much of the summer arguing the Washington-centric line that Kerry needs to speak out forcefully to blunt Dean's rise. He was overruled by Shrum, among others, who sided with the view from Boston -- that Kerry should stress his legislative record and personal history, and stay away from direct attacks.
"The Boston view has been 'Don't throw elbows. Run as John F. Kennedy did in 1960 by giving big speeches and laying out 10-point plans,' " says one person who was involved in the discussions. "But that's like sticking your head in a hole. No one ever wins the nomination without a fight."
Boston sources suggest the Washington faction does not know Kerry's habits and history well; the Washington crowd counters that the Boston group does not appreciate the day-to-day complexities of running a primary race with nine jostling contenders.
Despite Shrum's reputed touch, Kerry has struggled to master the art of the sound bite on specific issues. He has said, for instance, that he voted for a Senate resolution that endorsed Bush's war plans because he favored the "threat" of war but not the war itself. In a response one close aide called "disastrous," Kerry offered this convoluted elaboration during a nationally televised debate on Sept. 9:
"If we hadn't voted the way we voted, we would not have been able to have a chance of going to the United Nations and stopping the president, in effect, who already had the votes and who was obviously asking serious questions about whether or not the Congress was going to be there to enforce the effort to create a threat."
In an interview in Kerry's campaign headquarters, a modest corner townhouse on Capitol Hill, Jordan, the campaign manager, acknowledges that "John has been on an upward learning curve. It sounds trite, but it's a matter of him finding his voice. . . . The rhetorical habits you pick up in the Senate aren't always an asset out on the campaign trail."
In recent days, however, Jordan says Kerry "has been getting tighter, more disciplined and more focused."
Kerry has certainly come around to his Washington staff's consensus on challenging Dean. In campaign stops and in the most recent Democratic debate in New York, Kerry has suggested that Dean has changed his positions repeatedly on a variety of issues. He has also echoed the charge of Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (Mo.) that Dean supported the plans of then-Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) to cut the growth of Medicare spending. Dean denies any association with Gingrich.
The Kerry campaign turns conventional wisdom on its head when it argues that Clark -- rather than hurting Kerry, a decorated Vietnam War veteran -- helps him because he puts the focus on national security, a field in which Kerry feels he has superior policymaking experience as a longtime member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Kerry has also launched broadsides against Clark's "credentials" as a Democrat.
Several advisers say Kerry has talked intermittently about moving his campaign headquarters to Boston, duplicating the move to Nashville that Gore made in 2000, in an effort to streamline the campaign's bureaucracy. Jordan, however, says that such a move is unlikely, but that the campaign has added another senior adviser, former New Hampshire governor Jeanne Shaheen. Shaheen, who narrowly lost her race for the Senate last year, serves as a popular representative in a state critical to Kerry's chances of winning the nomination.
Shaheen says she is not exactly sure yet how she will fit into the large cadre of advisers that Kerry has assembled. "My role is still evolving," she said late last week.
Kerry's staffers note that the first important tests, in Iowa and in New Hampshire, are still 31/2 months away. Although most polls show Kerry bunched behind Clark and Dean in a tier that includes Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.) and Gephardt, they say he is still within reasonable striking distance of the lead in both states. In a recent CNN-ABC News poll, Kerry beat Bush in a theoretical head-to-head race.
Kerry has played underdog before, coming back several times to win races that appeared lost. "John is like Seabiscuit," says Dan Payne, a longtime Kerry media consultant who is not involved in the current campaign. "He runs better from behind."
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