DISASTER FOR DEAN IN IOWA

New York Post ^ | 1/20/04 | DEBORAH ORIN, VINCENT MORRIS and BRIAN BLOMQUIST

[kattracks]

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.

[maggief]

[Cuttnhorse]

This is great theater...GOP party operatives couldn't have written a better, or funnier scipt. It will be hard for the silly media to take Dean seriously after this act.

[blam]

Is that John Lennon dancing with Dean?

[YaYa123]

"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"

It's unanimous this morning..everyone is after Dean. "Kind of disturbing", Imus says. The pundits and pukes at MSNBC were all over him too. Dean is dangerous, crazy.

I submit, Dean was just doing an impression of Tom Harkin at Wellstone's Memorial Service...or Ted Kennedy when he gets fired up and starts speaking in tongues. I submit, Dean's followers will be even more determined. They saw their guy didn't fold, they see the media attack him, I think they will be inspired now for sure.

[Benrand]

He looks to me to be a singer for the Sex Pistols...Howard Rotten.

ANARCHY IN THE UK! YOU SIT DOWN, YOU'VE HAD YOUR TURN!!!

[reg45]

Dean missed his calling. Put him on a football sideline as a coach where the fans would eat that wildman routine up.

OR Crazy Howie's Used Cars - Imagine the TV ads.

[YaYa123]

Chris Mathews' first impressions are always wrong. He thought Governor Bush made a fatal mistake by naming naming Jesus Christ as his favorite philosopher.

Pukes and pundits falling for Edwards is what's really scary. He's a lawyer for gosh sake. To him, voters are just more dumb jurors, and he knows how to charm their pants off.

[Poohbah]

Pretty soon the good Doc can take a powder, go off to Aspen and take to the powder!

Which powder? The stuff under the skis, or the stuff that goes up the nose?

[leadpenny]

Crawford says he is most impressed with the showing of Edwards.

Imus says that Scarborough said that Dean's behavior is the most bizarre since Dan Quayle was introduced by GHWB.

[Ronin]

What party will have him? Will he have to start his own?

Whatever...

It promises to be a good show.

[thesummerwind]

Ha! ....... under the skis. I think Howie may be too timid to try coke. He was a drinker at Yale, and liked to polish off the kegs with the boys at 3 and 4 in the morning.

But, last night, when he was showing off his geography knowledge by naming all the states, he looked like he may have had a toot or two.

[Ronin]

Probably up close and personal.

[LongsforReagan]

I cant wait for the Slate article today: "Why Howard Deans "meltdown" isnt a big deal" by Timothy Noah. I predict they will have one.

[BlackRazor]

In the final days before the Iowa vote, the momentum shifted to Kerry, a Vietnam vet who appeared this week with a Green Beret whose life he saved

The Green Beret's name is Jim Rassmann. He's a registered Republican who reportedly gave some very moving speeches that helped reinforce Kerry's image as a war hero in the waning days of the Iowa campaign. Something tells me we're going to be seeing a lot more of Mr. Rassmann in the coming days, weeks and perhaps months.

[PJ-Comix]

Support mental health or I'LL KILL YOU!!!

[samtheman]

Madman.

[YaYa123]

what happened to the Canadian wannabee slut on Imus? Can't remember her name

[chronic_loser]

Lifted from a Yahoo Post

They "energized" the "Core" of the dem party by their screaming hate filled tirades against Bush. They brought a few misty eyes to all their cronies at NPR, dreaming nostalgically of the days when they took over campus admin buildings and wandered aimlessly through the streets floating on four way hits of purple haze while singing "if I had a hammer." Boy, were they "energized." They found a fellow screecher. Howie Dean seemed just as pissed off as they were. It seemed they had finally found a leader who shared their hatred for the moneyed elite, who understood that the rich were evil and needed to be punished, and agreed that the biggest job for the US Military was to apologize for its past atrocities.

The problem is, the voters NEVER buy this crap. It may play well with social work bureaucrats and other government leeches, coffee shop managers and used bookstore owners, college students and professors isolated in the fever swamps of academia, and a few nutcase towns like Santa Cruz. However, even the crazy left Democratic party has a sizeable bunch of people who WORK for a living. They recognize that 1)Dean will never win and 2) if he did, it would spell disaster.

For a while, you guys could talk only to yourselves and worked yourselves up into a sort of frenzy. You did not have anything except a generalized hatred for middle america, which by and large either despises you or relegates you to the fringe. Bush iconifies this LARGE group of people for you. Decent, religious, hardworking, unapologetic for and unembarrassed by success, he is a symbol for everything you are not and never will be. Moreover, he symbolizes the group which has marginalized you, and you hate THEM thru HIM.

Last night, in rejecting Dean, you saw that even YOUR OWN PARTY has a bunch of that type in it. In reality, the bourgeoise masses rejected YOU......., again. Must be a pisser for ya.

[nicmarlo]

Voter turnout was huge - double what it was four years ago - and 46 percent told pollsters they were going into the caucuses for the first time. Those newcomers were split evenly between Kerry and Dean - a surprise for Dean, who was counting on young, new voters to give him a win.

Gephardt was right, there were LOTS of new voters, but he thought they were all going to vote for him.....seeing as he had such a low percentage of votes, why would he have believed that? (Thinking out loud.)

[leadpenny]

Janice. She moved on. That's what he does, he brings fresh talent on to show them off. Chrissie Musameshi (sp? of course) started that way. Matthews is on now.