...thus far, Dean's sharper message, his blunt, matter-of-fact manner, and his status as non-Washingtonian have struck a more resonant chord in iconoclastic New Hampshire. So much so that some perceptive politicos wonder if Kerry, with his qualified, caveated stances and a speaking style that is ever prone to lapsing into Washington Baroque, is even capable of bouncing back.
Can Kerry bounce back in N.H.?
boston.com
By Scot Lehigh, 10/31/2003
FOR THOSE following the presidential campaign closely, Iowa is interesting for what has happened recently and New Hampshire for what hasn't.
Iowa, which holds the first contest in the nominating process, is US Representative Richard Gephardt's must-win state. A victory there would give Gephardt, who hails from neighboring Missouri, momentum, while a loss would likely doom his candidacy.
But in late summer, Gephardt's redoubt increasingly looked like a fortress that could be stormed, as former Vermont governor Howard Dean rose from nowhere to a lead in Iowa polls while Gephardt's numbers sagged.
With Dean's Internet operation shattering fund-raising records -- and far outpacing Gephardt's more modest efforts -- the veteran congressman seemed vulnerable.
In the last month, however, Gephardt, by dint of tenacious campaigning, has brought the once rocketing Dean back closer to Iowan earth.
Senator John Kerry faced a similar situation in New Hampshire, a state where he began as the favorite and where a loss would likely devastate his candidacy. There, as in Iowa, Dean rode a summer wave of pleasant press to a double-digit lead.
However, Dean has kept the lead in New Hampshire. The latest Boston Globe poll shows the former Vermont governor with a solid 37 percent, to 24 percent for Kerry.
So why has Gephardt been more successful than Kerry in protecting his putative launching pad? Part of the reason, of course, is that Dean has a neighbor's familiarity in New Hampshire that he lacks with Iowans.
But in defending his turf, Gephardt has also displayed a determination that Kerry has not. The congressman has repeatedly gone after Dean, most notably on his past support for efforts to limit the growth of Medicare. That seems to have worked in a state where a disproportionate share of the population is over 50.
"It is a very important issue a lot of places, Iowa included," says Bill Carrick, a Gephardt consultant.
Thus in Iowa, where the time-consuming caucuses tend to bring out the tried-and-true Democrats and where labor will be pulling hard for Gephardt, he has now rebounded to overtake Dean in the polls, albeit narrowly.
Not so with Kerry in New Hampshire. Throughout the fall, candidate and campaign have suggested they were steadily whittling Dean's lead down.
"The story that has yet to be written is that Kerry is closing in on Dean," Kerry offered, hopefully, in a late-September conference call with reporters.
But three weeks later, the Globe poll pegged Dean's advantage at 13 percentage points; other surveys put his lead in the same range or higher. Now, Kerry retains some real strengths in the Granite State. He is well regarded even by voters who back other candidates. He has the support of the vaunted Jeanne and Billy Shaheen machine. And unlike Gephardt, who spent a considerable amount on Iowa TV in his effort to bounce back, Kerry has not logged comparable dollars against the New Hampshire cap.
"The bottom line is that John Kerry is very much in the game in both of the two states," says Jim Margolis, a Kerry media consultant. "I think we made the right decision in terms of keeping our powder dry and recognizing that most people are not going to focus on the race until about now."
Perhaps. But thus far, Dean's sharper message, his blunt, matter-of-fact manner, and his status as non-Washingtonian have struck a more resonant chord in iconoclastic New Hampshire. So much so that some perceptive politicos wonder if Kerry, with his qualified, caveated stances and a speaking style that is ever prone to lapsing into Washington Baroque, is even capable of bouncing back.
"I think he has a much harder job of beating Dean in New Hampshire than Gephardt does in Iowa," says one astute observer.
Just watch, vow the Kerry operatives. It's primarily a matter of spending more time in New Hampshire, getting TV ads on the air, and emphasizing "the important distinctions between John and Howard Dean, particularly on the issues most important to Dean's liberal base," says campaign manager Jim Jordan.
The latter task, however, is something Kerry has been trying to accomplish since late summer. If Kerry is to bounce back -- and the view here is that he can -- it won't be with simply more of the same.
Instead, in critiquing the former Vermont governor who has become the New Hampshire front-runner, the Massachusetts senator will have to emulate the discipline the Missouri congressman has displayed in Iowa.
Scot Lehigh's e-mail address is lehigh@globe.com.
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