Posted on 01/10/2004 3:54:04 PM PST by kennedy
ES MOINES, Jan. 10 2004; Eight days before the Iowa caucuses that will start the voting for the Democratic presidential nomination, Howard Dean and Richard A. Gephardt are battling for dominance in what many Democrats describe as the most contested and potentially decisive caucus campaign their party has seen here in 16 years.
Dr. Dean, the former governor of Vermont who has spent two years methodically campaigning through all 99 counties in Iowa, heads into the final week here in the unlikely position of leading the Democratic field in national polls in his very first bid for national office.
The transformation of Dr. Dean's candidacy was underscored by his scheduled appearances in eastern Iowa on Saturday with two faces of the Democratic establishment: Senator Tom Harkin, the dominant Democrat in this state, whose endorsement on Friday provided a big boost to his campaign, and Al Gore, the 2000 presidential nominee.
But Mr. Gephardt, who emerged the victor in the caucuses in 1988 and still has a strong base of support here, moved aggressively to block a Dean victory in Iowa, which his own aides said would almost certainly spell an end to Mr. Gephardt's second bid for the presidency.
At an appearance in Waterloo on Saturday, Mr. Gephardt, a congressman from neighboring Missouri, lambasted Dr. Dean for being "all over the lot" on issues ranging form the war in Iraq to Medicare. Here in Des Moines, representatives from nearly two dozen unions spent the weekend putting the finishing touches on a get-out-the-vote operation that Mr. Gephardt's advisers said would counter what even they described as the phenomenal enthusiasm of Dr. Dean's supporters.
"It is a very tight race," the Iowa governor, Tom Vilsack, a Democrat who declined to endorse a candidate, said in an interview.
And Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, as he moved with Senator Edward M. Kennedy at his side through an exhaustive sprint across a state that might well determine whether his campaign survives this month, said, "We're going to have a hell of a fight going into the last week."
The competition here has been complicated by spirited bids by Mr. Kerry and Senator John Edwards of North Carolina, each of whom has calculated that coming in second, or perhaps third, in Iowa would lift his candidacy going into the New Hampshire primary a week later. Gen. Wesley K. Clark and Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut are not competing here.
The Iowa caucus contest is ending in an electoral environment quite different from what Democrats expected when planning for this moment a year ago. At the time, the nation was embroiled in a debate over whether to go to war, and the economy was in a downturn.
But by a number of measures, the economy appears to be recovering, and it is certainly less of an issue than Democrats had hoped it might be now. In a poll of likely Democratic caucusgoers conducted by The Chicago Tribune and The Los Angeles Times and released on Saturday, a third said the economy is now doing well.
And with Saddam Hussein captured, the subject of the war, which more than anything else has framed this contest, accounting for Dr. Dean's rise and the difficulties of Mr. Gephardt and Mr. Kerry, appears to be commanding less attention. Thus, the candidates and their aides were more likely to be focusing on tactics and strategy than, say, the problems facing the next occupant of the White House.
In this frenzied environment and given the number of candidates, Democratic leaders predicted a turnout exceeding the 125,000 caucusgoers who voted the last time the Democrats had such a crowded and competitive fight, in 1988. But they said that many Iowans remain unenthused with the field and undecided over whom to support. That sense was supported by interviews with Iowans over the week, and the Tribune-Times poll, which found that 40 percent of caucusgoers who said they had chosen a candidate said they could still change their minds.
"It's going to be a fight to convince the undecideds," said Jeff Link, a long-time Democratic strategist and adviser to Mr. Harkin.
And in endorsing Dr. Dean on Friday, Mr. Harkin specifically said he was trying to sway "those who are undecided." That appeal reflected concern among Dr. Dean's advisers about a last-minute rush of support to other candidates by these voters.
To muddy matters more, Democrats said it has been increasingly clear that any success by Senators Kerry and Edwards at coming in second or third could draw votes from Mr. Gephardt or Dr. Dean, pulling them out of first place. That dynamic has become particularly apparent with Mr. Edwards, who is making a concerted effort to draw votes from Mr. Gephardt, to the concern of Mr. Gephardt's advisers and to the delight of the Dean camp.
In an indication of how Byzantine the maneuverings here have become, Mr. Harkin, in endorsing Dr. Dean, went out of his way to praise Mr. Edwards, in what Democrats saw as a not-too-subtle effort to build up Mr. Edwards's vote total at the expense of Mr. Gephardt.
Given the fluidity of the race, the focus of the campaigns has turned to the rudiments of what it takes to triumph in the arcane caucus system that inaugurates the Democratic nomination process.
The candidates have splurged on television advertisements and attack mailings and are have built huge and ambitious get-out-the-vote operations. Their efforts, apparent this weekend in bustling campaign headquarters filled with people who clearly are not from Iowa, reflect the calculation that the outcome could prove pivotal in determining whom the Democrats nominate in Boston.
Mr. Gephardt has embraced traditional methods of winning this contest, putting to service veterans of the Iowa caucuses and importing labor leaders to replicate the get-out-the-vote operation he used in winning here in 1988.
Dr. Dean has the benefit of his own union support, but his candidacy is distinguished by the excitement he has stirred among his supporters and by 3,500 reinforcements from out of state that the campaign says will help recruit caucusgoers, and get them to caucus sites on Jan. 19.
"We have more people on the ground than any presidential campaign in the history of Iowa caucuses," said Dr. Dean's campaign manager, Joe Trippi, who worked on Mr. Gephardt's 1988 effort here.
"In the last 10 days, it's organize, organize, organize," Mr. Trippi said. "It's get-out-the-vote, get-out-the-vote, get-out-the-vote."
Mr. Gephardt's campaign manager, Steve Murphy, offered a mirror view of the state of play here. "It's a very close race, and organization is going to make a difference, and Dick Gephardt has by far the best organization in the state," he said.
Mr. Kerry's campaign manager, Mary Beth Cahill, said on Saturday that Mr. Kerry was in a strong position going into the final week of the campaign. She predicted that Dr. Dean would be hurt in these final days by the confluence of a series of missteps by the candidate, including the release of a four-year-old television interview in which he disparages the Iowa caucuses.
"There's a lot of negative information about Governor Dean in the news coverage, and it's coming at a critical time," Ms. Cahill said.
By the measure of campaign polls including the Tribune-Times survey of 640 likely Democratic caucusgoers, Mr. Gephardt and Dr. Dean are fighting for the lead. In the Tribune-Times poll, conducted Monday through Wednesday, 30 percent said they would support Dr. Dean, and 23 percent named Mr. Gephardt. That difference falls within the poll's margin of error, and thus in theory, at least, the two men might be tied
Mr. Kerry was named by 18 percent of the respondents, followed by Mr. Edwards with 11 percent.
Representative Dennis J. Kucinich of Ohio is also making a spirited run here, and he has pockets of support across Iowa. Former Senator Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois is running what many Democrats described as a perfunctory campaign here.
General Clark, Senator Lieberman and the Rev. Al Sharpton of New York, for their part, are focusing on New Hampshire and the other states that follow Iowa.
General Clark in particular has moved aggressively to turn his absence to his advantage, campaigning intensely through New Hampshire and, as many Democrats said, benefiting from being out of the line of fire in Iowa.
On Friday evening, General Clark's advisers said he was scaling back what was supposed to be a national fly-around to spend more time in New Hampshire.
Here in Des Moines, the sense that the long build-up was over and voting nearly at hand could be found in a tour of some of the campaign headquarters here in the state capital. Dr. Dean's campaign headquarters has grown to encompass nearly a full block of Locust Street, an electric, warehouse-size expanse filled with Iowans, out-of-staters wearing knapsacks and organizers from New Hampshire.
Mr. Kerry's office was less crowded and slightly more somber, reflecting what his own advisers described as the difficult, though hardly impossible, task he faces in trying to resuscitate his once high-flying campaign. Across town in west Des Moines, Mr. Gephardt's campaign headquarters was nearly as quiet as an insurance company; unlike the free-flowing Dean and Kerry headquarters, a receptionist checked guests at the door.
From the start, the contest here was framed by turmoil over the war in Iraq, starting with the debate in Congress over authorizing Mr. Bush to go to war and culminating late last week with reports that 12 members of the Iowa National Guard were injured in a mortar attack in northern Iraq. The anti-war sentiment largely accounted for Dr. Dean's quick rise and solid base of support here; it has also proved to be a continuing hurdle for Mr. Gephardt, one of the authors of the war resolution, and Mr. Kerry, who voted for it.
(Mr. Edwards, who also voted for the resolution, has encountered less criticism.)
Although the discussion of the war is no longer as prevalent as it once was, its influence on the race was clear again this week. "When the war goes badly — we had bad war news today — I think that just fires up the people who are Dean supporters," Mr. Link said. "The war is still more of a motivating factor than the economy."
But Governor Vilsack said that at this point in the campaign, what the candidates were saying could prove less decisive than what their campaigns were doing to prepare for next Monday.
"I think you're going to continue to see shots taken at Dr. Dean, but I think over the next couple of days, those shots will be less effective," Mr. Vilsack said. "You get to the point where people tune it off and tune it out. And then it's not really about the public message, as it is about the behind-the-scenes efforts to get people to the caucuses."
The NYT just can't bring itself to acknowledge that the Clinton recession is over and the economy is now booming.
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