They also tried to force McCain on us in 2000. But yeah, the Deaniacs DID spam the internet and people discount that now claiming that it was the scream that was his undoing. It was just a convenient excuse to rush him off the stage.
Yeah, I remember that brief McCain surge in 2000 (especially when he gave tacit support to Black Dem Detroiters being bussed to vote in the MI primary to vote en masse for him). I was supporting Alan Keyes (since it didn’t appear that casting a principled vote would hamper the outcome), but was forced to shift to Dubya to stop McCain. That was some scary crap.
As for Dean, his problem was that he actually thought there was that much support for him, but we know that it was all fantasy. When you start to believe your own propaganda, you’ve completely lost touch with reality. His scream (which I got to watch live on tv) was that break from reality. For a moment there, I thought he was gonna bite the head off a live chicken onstage. I did so want him to be the nominee. He woulda scared the hell out of the straights in a way Kerry couldn’t.