It’s early, but Democrats are active
Checking in on the initial stages of a crowded campaign
msnbc.com
By Howard Fineman
SPECIAL TO MSNBC.COM
WASHINGTON, April 30 — Everybody in my business has his own evidence that the presidential campaign has begun. Here is mine: The college kids I saw in New Hampshire, packing a lecture hall to hear a Democratic candidate (it happened to be Sen. John Kerry); President Bush relishing a dream photo op, a sleep-over aboard the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln. This weekend, the nine Democratic contenders gather in South Carolina for their first debate. It’s a good time to look at the early stages of the campaign. Some observations:
NO FRONTRUNNER: Each of the Big Five can make the claim, which means that there is no real leader of the pack. Joe Lieberman still leads in the general polls, based largely on the name recognition he earned as Al Gore’s running mate in 2000. Dick Gephardt has a strong base in Iowa, where voting begins next January. Kerry was anointed by the media/political insiders, but is only narrowly ahead in make-or-break New Hampshire. John Edwards won the first-quarter fund-raising race. Howard Dean broke into the upper tier as an antiwar candidate, and though he’s lost some media buzz lately, he’s neck and neck with Kerry in New Hampshire.
So what, you might ask? Well, I think it means that things are going to get very nasty very quickly as candidates compete for attention and donations. Dean and Kerry are at each other’s throats, since only one of them will survive New Hampshire. Other fields of fire will develop. Which leads to the next point ...
IT’S ALL ABOUT THE BITE
Few voters will see the debate this weekend. ABC, which is hosting it, had trouble convincing its affiliates to carry it. Junkies can watch on the Internet, and read about it on ABC’s fine political Web site. But what really matters is the one exchange — the one piece of combat — that makes for the best TV. That sound bite will echo through Campaignland for days. I would guess it’ll involve Dean, much of whose campaign is based on attacking his competitors as “establishment” wafflers because they are members of Congress. It’ll be Dean versus someone, perhaps the whole bunch.
HERE COME THE YOUNG
There’s nothing like a war (and the attack on the homeland that preceded it) to grab the attention of young people. They have to live though the war on terrorism, deal with its consequences — and perhaps even fight. On top of that, the anemic economy has them worried about jobs and paying off their loans. As a result, the 18- to 25-year-old crowd, famous for its lack of participation in elections, could have a real impact this time around, perhaps more so than at any time since 1972, when 18-year-olds were first eligible to vote in presidential contests.
That’s my conclusion after visiting Durham, N.H., on a bright, sunny spring Friday last week, just before exam period. I was astonished to see more than 600 students turn out at the University of New Hampshire to hear Kerry. With all due respect to the speaker — a frontrunner in the state at this stage — the students weren’t there because of the electricity he’s generated. I think the students wanted to hear serious talk — straight talk — about serious issues. Most don’t want to hear antiwar harangues, by the way. They want to hear that someone understand their hopes and fears, and has clear answers to their many questions.
THE NET HAS ARRIVED
The 1992 presidential election was the first cable TV campaign. It was something the Clintonites understood, but the slow-moving effort of George H.W. Bush did not. That is what the famous “War Room” was all about: George Stephanopoulos and James Carville understood that cable had created the need for rapid — instant — response on the battlefield of politics.
This time, the Internet is the ground zero in the message wars, and in organizing, too. News Web sites are the place where candidates first launch their attacks and make their defenses. The chatter there makes it way onto cable TV later in the day and into the newspapers the next morning. By which time it’s already old news. It usually misses the broadcast networks altogether.
Organizing is becoming Web-based, too. The innovator is the campaign of Howard Dean. Cleverly using a pre-existing site, hundreds of supporters gather in “meetups” arranged online but carried out in person. It’s totally turned the old idea of grassroots organizing on its head. It’s not the campaign sending out an organizer to get a meeting together; the meeting gathers itself, via the Net, and the Dean organizer shows up to harvest the results.
SURVIVING THE EDSALL PRIMARY
Edsall isn’t a car. He’s a reporter: Tom Edsall of the Washington Post. He’s one of the most important people in the business. One reason is his authoritative knowledge of campaign finance, and passion for uncovering misfeasance, malfeasance and nonfeasance by candidates as they race around the country in the increasingly obscene and absurd effort to raise cash. Edsall pulled Edwards over recently, noting that more than a score of low-level staffers at major law firms had “maxed out” with $2,000 contributions. One donor was quoted as saying she expected to be reimbursed by her boss — a criminal matter if true.
It was front page news, and sent the Edwards campaign into lockdown mode for days while they combed through their records. The Justice Department has started an investigation, which Edwards aides privately grouse could turn into a political fishing expedition, with White House political guru Karl Rove casting the net. But, at least for now, there is no evidence that the campaign knew about the alleged reimbursement promise. Indeed, it regularly warned donors and organizers that such action is illegal. More importantly, the Edsall story didn’t create a feeding frenzy — and may serve to focus attention on the fund-raising practices of the other campaigns. “I think we’re going to be OK,” said one Edwards ally.
INSIDERS EVERYWHERE
Winning campaigns usually, though not always, are led by candidates and managers who haven’t been around Washington and the upper echelons of electioneering. Recent examples include the Reaganites, who came out of California circles, and the Clinton campaign, which was led by a cadre of younger hands who hadn’t managed a presidential campaign before.
That’s not true this time. Each of the Big Five campaigns is being run by a member of the Washington Democratic management elite. That includes the “outsider” Dean, whose main man is Joe Trippi, a savvy veteran who began his career working on Walter Mondale’s campaign in 1984. At least Trippi has moved to Vermont, where Dean was governor for a decade. The rest of the Trippi family is about to follow him north. “I love it up here,” he says. He sounded like he meant it. But the rest of his consulting firm is still in Washington. |
