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Iowa primary precinct caucus and caucuses news, reports
and information on 2004 Democrat and Republican candidates, campaigns
and issues
IOWA
DAILY REPORT Holding
the Democrats accountable today, tomorrow...forever.
PAGE 1
Monday,
July 28, 2003
Quotable IV: “Party
leaders know these underperforming candidates
are dead men walking. They
can't raise money, gain traction or develop
compelling messages.”
-- Kerry campaign strategist, quoted in
Washington Times report Quotable V: :
“We just
can't endure another
four years of this kind of governance.”
–
AFSCME president Gerald McIntee, at a union
conference in Urbandale over the
weekend.
GENERAL
NEWS:
Among
the offerings in today's update:
Washington
Times report says that the “Dead men
walking” urged to quit the ’04 race. Dem
advisers say the field must be significantly
decreased – and hope it happens soon, like
around Labor Day
Don’t mess
with Howard Dean or the Dean
Defense Forces – the volunteer outfit of
campaign commandos blasts media, including
NBC’s Russert, when reports (according to
Dean campaign standards) unfairly
hammer or portray Dean
New poll
from New Hampshire
– where surveying on the Dem wannabes seems
to be a nonstop enterprise – shows Dean &
Kerry deadlocked. But the Boston Herald
sampling indicates more believe Kerry
has better chance of beating Bush.
Lieberman (11%) & Gephardt (9%)
barely in picture, rest might as well pack
bags and head on to IA, SC and elsewhere
Most
overlooked, underreported wannabe story of
the weekend: Union decision to endorse – or
not endorse – could have “state labor
federations frozen in place” during the Dem
nominating season.
But
individual unions could still play –
increasing pressure on decision about
AFL-CIO endorsement prospects
In Iowa,
Edwards keeps up the anti-Bush drumbeat
on Iraq, but stops short of saying he’d
change vote on Iraq resolution
LA Times
report: After months of pounding on each
other, the wannabes broaden their target to
“sniping at each other”
Sharpton
rallies South Carolina blacks – where
300,000 are eligible, but not registered, to
vote in Dem primary
It’s just
$60 billion here or $60 billion there to
Kucinich, who – during an Iowa forum –
proposes shifting 15% of the Pentagon budget
for another new preschool program
Despite
significant bipartisan House support
(243-186), legislation authorizing U. S.
residents to import low-cost drugs faces
tough Senate contest. Fifty-three
senators already sign letter in opposition
Cox News
Service report says Dean not the common
political insurgent because he’s a “true
outsider.” Dean says he’s not as liberal
as believed, but that perception just shows
how far right American politics has drifted
Edwards
–
needing new rhetoric and new speech writer –
goes with standard rhetoric in Michigan, but
at least Dem Rep. Conyers attends his
Detroit event
If at first
(or second) you don’t succeed – Senate
Republicans to try a third time to end
filibuster of Priscilla Owens nomination
Iowaism: At
Iowa State Fair this year, a hog – a
full-scale Harley motorcycle – will join the
traditional butter cow
All these stories below and more. Morning
Report:
… Print and
broadcast reports this morning headline the
death of a 12-year-old Roland boy –
Isiah Peter—who fell to his death while
climbing with three others at a grain
elevator. Reports said he fell more than 50
feet when he tumbled through an open roof
hatch early yesterday.
… Kerry
coming back. Although he was just here
over the weekend (Friday and Saturday),
morning news reports in western Iowa say that
Kerry will be back in the state
tonight. According to the reports, he is
supposed to be in Sioux City tonight
and then visit Fort Dodge and Boone
tomorrow. (Iowa Pres Watch Note: The
reports say he is expected to criticize Bush’s
economic policies during this visit – which
would be a distinct change from his attacks on
GWB’s Iraq policies, his attacks on GWB’s
education policies, his attacks on GWB’s
foreign policies or his general attacks on GWB
just living in the White House.)
… Democrat Dreaming: A
wannabe field that includes only frontrunners
– probably Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, Lieberman –
in the foreseeable future. Weekend
headline from the Washington Times: “’Dead
men walking’ urged to quit ’04 race”
Excerpt from report by Times’ veteran
political reporter Donald Lambro: “Strategists
for the Democratic front-runners for president
are suggesting that the weakest rivals should
consider dropping out of the race to help the
top contenders build support in the primaries.
None of the leading candidates for the
nomination so far has been willing to openly
call on any other hopefuls to abandon their
bids. But the campaign of Sen. John Kerry
of Massachusetts appears to be sending just
that message in the hopes of substantially
narrowing the field of nine candidates well
before the end of the year. ‘Party
leaders know these underperforming candidates
are dead men walking. They can't raise money,
gain traction or develop compelling messages,’
a key Kerry campaign strategist said in an
interview. The senior strategist did not
mention names, but he implied that it might be
better if those at the back of the pack
acknowledged what the polls are showing:
Their candidacies are not gaining support, the
2004 election year is fast approaching, and
Democrats will have a better chance of beating
President Bush if the party can coalesce
around a candidate sooner rather than later…An
official of another front-running campaign for
the Democratic nomination, who spoke on the
condition that he and his candidate not be
identified, said the party would be helped ‘if
we headed into next year with a smaller number
of candidates, and I think we will.’ At
present, Mr. Kerry and former Vermont
Gov. Howard Dean appear to be leading
the pack nationally, with Rep. Richard A.
Gephardt of Missouri and Sen. Joe
Lieberman of Connecticut behind them. Party
advisers also said this week that the field
must be significantly decreased and that
probably would happen sometime after Labor
Day. There is a growing feeling in the
party's leadership that several contenders
will abandon their races before the end of the
year, said one party adviser, who has worked
with the Democratic National Committee and
with House and Senate Democratic leaders on
election strategy. Those candidates have not
been able to break out of single digits in
most polls for next year's state primaries. At
least five contenders were stuck in the low
single digits in polls for the Iowa caucuses
and the New Hampshire primary: Sens. John
Edwards of North Carolina and Bob
Graham of Florida, Rep. Dennis J.
Kucinich of Ohio, former Sen. Carol
Moseley Braun of Illinois and the
Rev. Al Sharpton of New York. Among
them, only Mrs. Moseley Braun has said she
will reassess her candidacy in September. ‘Everyone
talks about Graham [dropping out] because he
is not anywhere in terms of money,
endorsements. He's clearly in the tier of
trailing candidates,’ the DNC adviser
said. Mr. Edwards has not been able to
get his campaign off the ground, and there is
wide agreement among party strategists that he
will not be among those standing when the
primaries begin in January. He draws 6 percent
or less in national polls and 5 percent or
less in New Hampshire. The Edwards campaign
insisted this week that ‘he's in this for the
duration.’…’It's going to take time,
particularly with one who does not have high
name recognition,’ Edwards spokeswoman
Jennifer Palmieri said. ‘I think it's too
early to suggest that some candidates should
get out of the race.’ Meanwhile, Mr.
Gephardt's significant lead in Iowa has
vanished, and he is a distant third in New
Hampshire. ‘Gephardt is teetering on the
verge of dropping down to the bottom tier,’
a party official said. Democratic
strategist Donna Brazile said she, too, has
heard a lot of talk in party circles about
urging some candidates to pull out to build
early support for the strongest
front-runner. ‘At some point, we are going
to have to winnow down the field, but it is
too early to coalesce around a candidate.
In the fall, that's when you will see the
candidates begin to thin out,’ she said. ‘I
understand [the front-runners´] frustration,
but this is why we have a primary system.
Let's see what happens after Labor Day and
then determine whether the bottom tier should
pack their bags and go home.’”
… Dean’s
Internet commandos – call them the Dean
Irregulars -- fight back against media
slights. Weekend headline from the
Washington Post: “Dean Defense Forces:
Lobbing E-mail at the enemy” Excerpts from
a report by Post media guru Howard Kurtz:
‘When Dotty Lynch, CBS's senior political
editor, wrote a column criticizing Howard
Dean on foreign policy, she was deluged
with e-mails defending the Democratic
presidential candidate, often in similar
language. ‘They were all rather insulting: Why
don't you do your research?’ Lynch says. ‘When
anything's orchestrated, you sort of smell a
rat.’ The letters were indeed generated by
Dean Defense Forces, a volunteer outfit
affiliated with the doctor's campaign. Day
after day, the DDF Web log, which is linked to
Dean's official site, hammers reporters deemed
critical of Dean and urges its followers to
flood the in-boxes of offending journalists.
‘When negative press gets written, we'll
ensure that letters to the editor get printed
in response…The last couple of months have
proven the effectiveness of our efforts at
media response,’ the DDF says. Sometimes this
is rough stuff. When New York Daily News
columnist Zev Chafets slammed Dean's
appearance on Tim Russert's ‘Meet the Press,’
the DDF denounced the piece as ‘crap,’
declaring: ‘So here's what we're gonna do.
First, we're gonna write Zev ()
and let him know what we think of his
vitriol.’ Suggested themes: ‘Russert used
Republican lies for his policy research…
Anyone who saw Dean's performance knows it
wasn't his best, but it was a hell of a lot
better than Chafets's columns.’…Campaigns
have always tried to gin up letters to news
outlets, but the Internet's hyperspeed, which
has helped Dean raise truckloads of
money, has also made it easier to organize
such campaigns. And in an age when online
commentators blast their critics around the
clock, the Dean Defense Forces site
uses comparable artillery, unloading on
selected targets with a clever, cynical,
sometimes sneering tone. ‘The NY Post
Proves Its Worthlessness Again,’ says a
typical headline. ‘Associated Press Spinning
for Kerry,’ says another. ‘Perhaps we
should write Slate.com and tell them we want
political coverage, not psychobabble musings
from their writers?’ Dean spokeswoman
Kate O'Connor referred questions to DDF chief
Matthew Gross, who works out of the campaign's
Vermont headquarters. Gross did not respond
to three requests for comment. He appears
to run a shoestring operation, with a dozen or
so volunteers posting items and six donors,
who have contributed a grand total of $585.
DDF has achieved some success with its
letter-writing appeals, such as getting
supporters' words read on CNN's ‘Crossfire.’
This followed an ‘action alert’ that said:
‘Tucker Carlson called Howard Dean a far left
and fringe candidate on Crossfire the other
day. Please send short snappy comments into
the show in hopes that they'll be read in
response. One or two sentences max.’”
… In Iowa,
Edwards blames Bush for “what is happening on
the ground” in Iraq. Headline from
yesterday’s Des Moines Register: “Edwards
criticizes president on Iraq” Excerpt from
coverage of Edwards visit to Clinton by
the Register’s Thomas Beaumont: “Democratic
presidential candidate John Edwards called the
Bush administration's postwar policy in Iraq
irresponsible Saturday, as four more U.S.
troops were reported killed by Iraqi
insurgents. But the North Carolina
senator, who voted last fall to give Bush
authority to order the invasion, stopped short
of saying he would vote differently today.
‘What I believe is this president is
responsible for what is happening on the
ground in Iraq right now,’ Edwards said
after a midday meeting with about 40 Democrats
in Clinton. Edwards, a member of the Senate
Intelligence Committee, also called on White
House officials to fully disclose their role
in the release of flawed intelligence reports
about Iraq's weapons capability prior to the
war. The White House has admitted Bush was
wrong when he said in his State of the Union
speech in January that Iraq tried to buy
nuclear material from an African nation to
build a nuclear device. A British report Bush
cited had been already determined to be based
on forged documents. Central Intelligence
Agency Director George Tenet took
responsibility for the error in the speech.
But Edwards said intelligence committee
hearings this month, during which Tenet
testified, left other questions unanswered.
‘Since the Tenet hearings, a lot of
information from the White House has come out.
I still think there's some information that
needs to be known,’ he said. ‘What
happened at the White House? Who was
responsible? Who at the White House put the
language in the speech to begin with and who
signed off on it?’ Intelligence questions have
prompted some Democrats, including Edwards,
to question whether Bush manipulated reports
publicly to support a case for war…Edwards
also touted a proposal to add 100,000 nurses
nationwide. The proposal is part of a
health-care plan he plans to unveil Monday in
New Hampshire. ‘We have a serious nursing
shortage in this country. It's obvious. All
you have to do is go to a hospital, go to a
nursing home,’ Edwards said. The $3
billion nursing proposal would pay for about
1,000 nurses in Iowa.”
… It may be difficult
for any one Dem wannabe to secure AFL-CIO
endorsement, but failure to endorse could
freeze considerable resources in place through
the nominating process. Headline from
yesterday’s Newsday online: “AFL-CIO
Endorsement of Democrat May Wait”
Excerpt from report by AP Iowa caucus watcher
Mike Glover, reporting on union confab in
Urbandale during the weekend: “Because
of the large Democratic field in 2004, it will
be difficult for a presidential candidate to
win the AFL-CIO's endorsement before a nominee
is determined, a top union leader said
Saturday. Even if the federation of 65 unions,
which represents more than 13 million workers,
makes no endorsement before the primary
season, individual unions will be active in
choosing sides, said Gerald McIntee, president
of the American Federation of State, County
and Municipal Employees. His union, the
second-largest in the AFL-CIO with 1.4 million
members, gave $9.5 million to Democrats in
2002, more than any other union. In an
interview, McIntee urged Iowa activists to
pick a favorite in the state's leadoff
caucuses but said: ‘Electability is important.
We just can't endure another four years of
this kind of governance.’ McIntee said
unions have suffered because of the stumbling
economy, but AFSCME has been hit hardest
because President Bush's tax cuts have hurt
state and local governments, which has led to
budget cuts and layoffs. Most top Democratic
candidates are ardently seeking the AFL-CIO's
endorsement, and McIntee is an important
player in that decision. He is chairman of
a committee of union political directors
scheduled to meet next month in Chicago to
discuss the candidates. He said the
meeting probably will do nothing more than set
a date for member unions to vote to decide if
they want to endorse. An endorsement requires
the backing of unions representing two-thirds
of the AFL-CIO membership. With a large and
active field of contenders and several
candidates getting support, it will be
difficult for a single candidate to reach that
threshold, McIntee said. Al Gore got the
AFL-CIO's endorsement before the primary
season in 2000, but that was a two-person race
- his only opponent was former Sen. Bill
Bradley of New Jersey - and many in labor were
leery of opposing a sitting vice president.
One 2004 contender, Missouri Rep. Richard
Gephardt, has long nurtured ties with
organized labor and probably would be best
positioned for an endorsement, McIntee said.
‘Gephardt has the most labor support, but I
don't think he's got to the two-thirds level
yet, and I don't know that he can get there,’
McIntee said. Sens. John Kerry of
Massachusetts and John Edwards of North
Carolina and Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich have
carved out some labor support, McIntee said.
In addition, former Vermont Gov. Howard
Dean got the attention of labor with a strong
fund-raising performance last quarter. If
the AFL-CIO should decide against making an
endorsement before the primary season, it will
have a ripple effect. State labor
federations would be frozen in place, and
their considerable assets would be denied to
any candidate. Once the AFL-CIO makes a
decision, however, individual unions would be
free to endorse on their own. Getting the
AFL-CIO decision out of the way relatively
quickly would free those unions to get
involved in the primary fight.”
… Edwards,
faltering everywhere, stays on message in
Michigan with well-worn “values” attack on GWB.
Somewhere along the way at least one Edwards
supporter should point out to him that he
themes aren’t working – or inspiring Dems.
Headline from yesterday’s Detroit Free Press:
“Presidential hopeful blasts Bush during
Detroit visit” Excerpt from freed.com
report: President George W. Bush's
values are not ones shared by the majority of
Americans who have to work for a living, Sen.
John Edwards of North Carolina said
Saturday during a campaign stop in Michigan.
Edwards is one of nine Democrats who
have announced their bid for the party's 2004
presidential nomination. Touting a message
aimed at appealing to key Democratic
constituents such as blacks, working class
families and labor groups, Edwards stressed
that key issues confronting the United States
are a looming health care crisis, the economy
and the need to ensure access to a quality
education. Speaking to a small audience at
the New Providence Baptist Church in Detroit
that included U.S. Rep. John Conyers,
D-Detroit, Edwards said Bush has been
seeking a debate on values and that come 2004,
the request should be granted. ‘His values are
not our values, they're not the values most of
us grew up with, they're not the values that
make this country what it is today,’
Edwards, who spoke earlier in the day at a
steelworkers picnic, said of Bush.”
…
Kucinich, who apparently has never seen a
federal budget cut or tax cut he likes, says
cutting Pentagon budget by 15% would provide
the $60 billion he needs for a universal
preschool program. Excerpts from coverage
– in this morning’s The Union Leader (New
Hampshire) -- of Kucinich’s turn
yesterday at a Harkin-sponsored forum
in Ottumwa by Associated Press’ Glover:
“Rep. Dennis Kucinich called for a $60
billion effort to provide universal preschool
and proposed paying for the plan with a 15
percent cut in Pentagon spending. ‘The
Pentagon budget has just gone through the
roof,’ Kucinich said at a forum on
Sunday. ‘We need a critical analysis and a
real effort to claim back money from the
Pentagon.’ The Democratic presidential
candidate from Ohio didn't specify all the
spending cuts he would push, but did single
out a missile defense program that would have
a dim future should he win the White House.
He promised broad cuts. ‘I'm not talking
about trimming around the edges here,’ he
said. Kucinich, who said he would
reverse that trend of cutting funding for
education, called for a new care program
for children 3 to 5 years old to help prepare
them for school. He said his plan also
would ease the financial burden of working
parents bearing the high cost of day care. ‘I
intend to put forward a plan for universal
pre-kindergarten, a day care program that
would provide quality day care five days a
week, year-round,’ he said.”
… The
uncommon insurgent: Dean. Cox News Service
report says comparing him to McCarthys and
McCains would miss “an important point.”
Headline from the Austin American-Statesman:
“Dean trying to beat odds against insurgent
candidates” Excerpt from Cox News Service
report – datelined from Manchester, NH – by
Scott Shepard: “Self-styled insurgent Howard
Dean has captured the political limelight
after an impressive second quarter of
fund-raising, prompting favorable comparisons
to such political mavericks as Gene McCarthy
and John McCain. Like McCarthy and McCain,
Dean has energized a younger bloc of voters
through no-compromise rhetoric and innovative
campaigning for the 2004 Democratic
presidential nomination. But insurgents
seldom win, and some political experts already
are wondering whether Dean has peaked too
soon, spent too much money — he has less cash
on hand than many of his rivals — and
portrayed himself as a liberal at odds with
his moderate record as governor of Vermont…
But comparing Dean's campaign to McCarthy's
and McCain's misses an important point,
said Fran Egbers, a Manchester resident who
follows presidential politics closely. ‘Howard
Dean is a true outsider,’ she said. ‘He's
not part of the Washington establishment.’
When McCarthy ran for the Democratic
nomination in 1968, he was a senator from
Minnesota and had been in Congress for 19
years. He did not win the nomination, but his
anti-Vietnam war campaign achieved enough
success in New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation
primary to force Democratic incumbent Lyndon
Johnson out of politics forever. When McCain
ran for the Republican nomination in 2000, he
had been in Congress for 18 years… It is
questionable how much of a political outsider
Dean truly is. When Dean left the governor's
post in Vermont earlier this year, he was the
nation's longest serving governor, with
nearly 12 years in office. Before that, he had
served six years as lieutenant governor and
four years in the Vermont legislature. He
is running an insurgent campaign more like
that of Jimmy Carter, the then
little-known former one-term governor of
Georgia, who captured the nomination in 1976.
Dean is rallying grassroots Democrats
and members of a long-ignored wing of the
party: where Carter reached out to moderates
and conservatives in the wake of George
McGovern, Dean is rallying long-shunned
liberals and progressives…Like Carter, who
in 1976 had to battle an ABC movement
(‘Anybody But Carter’), Dean has
begun to rattle the Democratic political
establishment in Washington. In May, the
centrist Democratic Leadership Council (DLC),
which spawned Bill Clinton's successful White
House campaigns, released a scathing memo
singling out Dean for betraying ‘the
mainstream values, national pride, and
economic aspirations of middle-class and
working people.’…The DLC [held] its annual
‘National Conversation’ with members this
weekend in Philadelphia, in part to determine
whether the party's White House hopefuls are
heeding the group's warning. Dean's
campaign officials repeatedly argue that the
former governor is not the liberal his critics
suggest. The criticism focuses on his
opposition to the war in Iraq, his push for
universal health care coverage and his support
for gay civil unions while ignoring his fiscal
conservatism, they contend. And Dean
himself, in trying to broaden his appeal to
moderates, has asserted that portraying him as
the liberal in the top tier of Democratic
presidential candidates reflects how far to
the right American politics has drifted.”
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Quotable I::
“So with a sudden need to recalibrate their
strategies, several candidates have seized on
the same approach — attack.”
– Los Angeles Times reporter Mark Z. Barabak,
writing about the Dems’ decision to begin
engaging each other
Quotable II::
"We've been
treated like a political mistress."
– Sharpton, saying black voters in
South Carolina should stop settling for
“sharing the booth and not sharing the power.”
Quotable III:
“Edwards
and Florida Sen. Bob Graham are mere blips in
the race - in the same class with fringe
candidates such as the Rev. Al Sharpton, the
poll finds.”
– From report on latest New Hampshire poll in
yesterday’s Boston Herald
…
If the Boston Herald poll is right, all the
wannabes except Kerry and Dean – who are
deadlocked – might as well pack bags and leave
New Hampshire. Dean 28%, Kerry 25%, Lieberman
11%, Gephardt 9%, others – including Edwards –
polled 1% or less. But respondents see Kerry
as better able to take out GWB. Excerpt
from poll report by David R. Guarino in
yesterday’s Herald: “Vaulted into the top
tier of Democratic presidential hopefuls by
his tough, anti-war rhetoric, Howard Dean
still can't convince New Hampshire voters he
can beat President Bush, a new Boston
Sunday Herald poll shows. Democratic
primary voters in the Herald poll put Dean,
the former Vermont governor, and U.S. Sen.
John F. Kerry of Massachusetts in a deadlocked
race for the first-in-the-nation primary - set
for six months from today. Voters say
Kerry, boosted by strong foreign-policy
credentials, is far better equipped to reclaim
the White House, the poll shows. ‘Although the
Dean message is a popular one, Kerry
is perceived as having more experience in
foreign policy and is seen as more electable,’
said Herald pollster R. Kelly Myers.
Forty-four percent of voters say Kerry is more
electable than Dean - only 17 percent say Dean
has a better shot against Bush, the poll
found. Dean, while surging nationally,
has had to battle a nagging sense among
Democrats that he is too liberal, poorly
funded or lacks the stature to take on Bush in
the general election. While Dean could
take some solace that New Hampshire voted for
Republican John McCain over Bush despite
similar electability concerns, Myers said
Kerry should exploit the clear opening
against his toughest opponent. ‘It's certainly
something for the Kerry campaign to
emphasize and remind people, putting subtle
messages out there that, when it comes to
November, I'm the candidate that will send
Bush back to Crawford, (Texas),’ Myers said.
In the Herald poll of likely New Hampshire
primary voters, Dean takes 28 percent of the
vote and Kerry 25 percent while a second tier
of candidates lagged behind, U.S. Sen. Joseph
Lieberman of Connecticut at 11 percent and
U.S. Rep. Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.) at 9
percent. The other candidates, including U.S.
Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.), polled 1 percent
or less. ‘It's basically a two-candidate
race, with Dean and Kerry in a
very close contest,’ said Myers, of RKM
Research and Communications. ‘There are the
two second-tier candidates, Lieberman and
Gephardt, but all the other candidates are
basically not registering six months out.’
The poll, of 402 likely Democratic primary
voters, was conducted July 22-24. It has a
plus or minus 4.9 percent margin of error. The
results are bad news for a rash of third-tier
candidates who continue not to register in
polls. Edwards and Florida Sen. Bob Graham
are mere blips in the race - in the same class
with fringe candidates such as the Rev. Al
Sharpton, the poll finds.” …
“Sharpton says ‘share the power’…Democratic
party treats blacks ‘like a political
mistress,’ he tells S. C. crowd” – Headline
from The State in Columbia, SC. Excerpt from
report by the State’s Aaron Gould Sheinin: “Black
voters in South Carolina should stop settling
for ‘sharing the booth and not sharing the
power,’ the Rev. Al Sharpton said Friday.
Sharpton, in Hopkins to speak to the
annual banquet of the Lower Richland branch of
the NAACP, said Democrats use black voters
without sharing the benefits of power. ‘We've
been treated like a political mistress,’
Sharpton said…Sharpton is one of
nine Democrats seeking the national party's
presidential nomination. South Carolina,
‘As God would have it,’ Sharpton said, will
play a major role in choosing that nominee as
the state Democratic Party hosts the first
Southern primary Feb. 3. Sharpton
is campaigning hard for South Carolina, where,
he said, there are 300,000 blacks who are
eligible to vote, but are not registered. He
wants to get those people registered and to
the polls, whether it's for him or another
candidate. ‘It's good for the party,’ he said.
But the party needs to appreciate and
respect his work and his candidacy. He said
some have called his candidacy ‘bad for the
party.’ But with Republicans in control of
the White House, Congress, the S.C. Governor's
Mansion and State House, Sharpton is
perplexed. ‘Bad for the party? How can I
kill something that's already dead?’ he
said. More than 200 people crowded into
Hopkins Park on Lower Richland Boulevard to
hear Sharpton and to raise money for
the NAACP scholarship fund…Sharpton has
just returned from Africa, where he met with
representatives of embattled Liberian
President Charles Taylor, as well as rebel
groups from that war-torn country. President
Bush has sent troops to the coast of Liberia,
where civil war has left hundreds dead. Taylor
has promised to resign if American forces come
to the country's aid, and rebel leaders have
also asked for U.S. intervention. But Bush has
said he wants Taylor to step down before the
American troops become directly involved. And
if that happens, Bush said, the U.S. will only
be involved to keep the peace, not to take
part in any fighting. Sharpton believes
that's a cop-out, and a double standard.
‘It's a lame excuse,’ Sharpton said Friday.
Bush ‘didn't wait for (Saddam) Hussein to
leave’ Iraq. ‘When you're asked to come
in, and you don't go in,’ Sharpton
said, ‘I can't believe this would be done
anywhere else except for Africa.’”…
“Democratic Contenders Take Aim – at Each
Other…Skirmishes among the presidential
hopefuls are seen as a way to ‘create conflict
and drama’ and break up a nine-candidate
muddle.” – Los Angeles Times headline. Excerpt
from coverage by the Times’ Mark Z. Barabak:
“For months, they pounded away at President
Bush over the sagging economy. More recently,
they have challenged his truthfulness about
the case for war with Iraq. Now the
Democrats who hope to replace Bush are
broadening their target: They're sniping at
each other. Connecticut Sen. Joe
Lieberman is assailing Missouri Rep. Richard
A. Gephardt's health- care plan. Gephardt is
criticizing Massachusetts Sen. John F. Kerry
on trade. Kerry faults former Vermont Gov.
Howard Dean for his lack of defense and
foreign policy experience. The fratricidal
fire comes — not coincidentally — after the
July 15 release of the latest campaign finance
statements, which served as a kind of midyear
report card on the presidential hopefuls.
Dean surprised many analysts by collecting
the most money during April, May and June.
Kerry finished second in fund-raising —
and has the most cash on hand — but he and
Dean now are squaring off for support from
many of the same voters. Gephardt
fared poorly in the money-collecting contest,
falling short of his second-quarter goal by
about $1 million. Lieberman met his
fund-raising expectations, but only after a
last-minute scramble that ended with a
shuffling of his campaign staff. So with a
sudden need to recalibrate their strategies,
several candidates have seized on the same
approach — attack. It is a way to ‘create
conflict and drama,’ said party strategist
Jenny Backus, who likened the candidates to
contestants on reality television…There have
been earlier skirmishes. In May, at the
candidates' first formal debate, Kerry and
Dean went at it from the start, resuming a
fight Kerry had picked a few days
earlier over Dean's readiness to serve
as commander in chief. Lieberman and
Gephardt also mixed it up, along with North
Carolina Sen. John Edwards, in a
back-and-forth over Gephardt's $2-trillion
health-care proposal. The reviews were largely
negative, though, with some party leaders
saying the tussles only diminished Democrats
while leaving President Bush unscathed.
Most of the candidates reverted to more
gentlemanly form in the weeks that followed.
Recently, however, that reserve has eroded,
as the contenders feel increasing pressure to
break from a nine-candidate muddle. ‘It's
an inevitable part of the process,’ said Steve
Elmendorf, a Gephardt strategist.
‘You've got a bunch of people running for
president and you've got to convince people to
'vote for me.' And part of that process is
explaining how you're different from the other
individuals. In some ways, I'm surprised it's
taken this long.’ At a recent Gephardt
appearance in Iowa — widely viewed as a
must-win state for him — he assailed Dean
and Kerry for backing the North
American Free Trade Agreement. The setting was
a union hall, which was no accident — NAFTA is
anathema to organized labor, a key to
Gephardt's success in Iowa's Jan. 19 caucuses.
A few days later, Lieberman took up the
trade issue at a manufacturing plant in New
Hampshire, criticizing ‘some Democrats’ —
clearly Gephardt — for ‘trying to build
walls around our economy.’…In an interview,
Lieberman said his criticisms were part of
‘a healthy discussion and differentiation’
among the Democratic hopefuls. ‘These
nominating contests are truly struggles for
the heart and soul of the party,’ he said. ‘We
would be irresponsible if we didn't air our
differences.’”
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