Quotable: “[Dean] has tapped into pure hatred by rank-and-file Democrats of the reigning Republican that I have never seen in 44 years of campaign watching. Not Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan or even Bill Clinton generated such animosity.”
 Columnist Robert Novak

 Quotable: “With Lieberman still narrowly leading in the national polls, his strategists still seem to be running in a non-existent national primary.”
 Novak

Quotable: “This time, labor leaders say, simply being on labor's side on issues such as trade won't be enough to get their endorsement. They want to be convinced they have a winner. In particular, they want a candidate who's likable.”
– Detroit Free Press report on AFL-CIO endorsement

Quotable:  Edwards “seems like a nice young man, but I'm not sure he has the clout to perform. He's a neophyte, a nice neophyte, but I don't see him having the clout Kerry would.”
-- Mary Boland, a recently retired English teacher from Salem after hearing both wannabes at the National Education Association of New Hampshire convention

Quotable:  “In presidential politics, the only thing worse than not getting the AFL-CIO's endorsement is getting it.”
– Chicago Tribune columnist Steve Chapman, writing that Gephardt’s obsession with union support is a losing strategy

Quotable: “What the former governor doesn't say is that he raised hundreds of millions of dollars in higher taxes, including sales taxes, cigarette taxes, property taxes and corporate taxes, to balance the books while paying for his social welfare proposals.”
– Report in Washington Times by Donald Lambro on Dean’s claims he was a “fiscal conservative” as governor.   

GENERAL NEWS:  Among the offerings in today's update:

• Novak writes that Dean “is the Anti-Bush.”

• Dean gains and Moseley-Braun loses

• Michigan Poll: Lieberman slipping as Dean moves on up

• In New Hampshire – at NEA session yesterday – Kerry defended his vote for “No Child Left Behind”

• After Kucinich attack, Dean concedes change in stand on Social Security benefits. In fact, Kucinich hammers two big wannabes – Dean and Gephardt

• Also in Iowa – ironically taking on the same targets as Kucinich – Lieberman also singles out Dean and Gephardt for criticism. DSM Register says Smokin’ Joe’s attacks are “most direct” of the campaign

• At Iowa State Fair, Graham draws comparison between Bush operation and a previous GOP administration – Nixon’s

• More from Sharpton’s Sioux City stop – The NY activist says he’s not writing off Iowa, tells Harkin-sponsored forum Iowa and Brooklyn share a “commonality of economic pain”

• Washington Times’ Lambro blows up prevailing theme that Dean was a “fiscal conservative” as VT gov

• Gore saga gets stranger and even stranger: Washington Post’s Balz writes that Draft Gore group launches “a write-in campaign for the thus-far non-candidate in New Hampshire.”

• Different situation, same split: Washington Times today reports division on North Korean problem – Rummy favors “regime change” while Powell wants diplomacy

• Chicago Tribune columnist Chapman says Gephardt is reviving “a losing strategy” – if it worked he would have been elected in ’88 and he would now be writing his presidential memoirs

• Detroit report says “likability” will be a key in deciding AFL-CIO endorsement

• Great Missouri flow feud continues: Chaos on the Missouri River – Sioux City warns boats could be high and dry, Omaha utility official says “we’re going into territory we’ve never been in before”

• Iowaism: Iowa & Illinois teams ready for tomorrow’s cross-Mississippi Great River Tug Fest. (Yes, traffic on the river is shutdown for two hours during the event.)

All these stories below and more.

Morning Reports:

… Morning newscasts and Des Moines Register say former Gov. Branstad will be named today as 14th president of Des Moines University. Branstad, who served 16 years as guv, was chosen after an eight-month search during which about 150 applied for the job…Morning reports say California guv players at 372. CA Supreme Court rejects Davis bid to move election to next March. What a surprise: The court’s made up of six Republicans and one Democrat

… WHO Radio (Des Moines) reports that Pepperoni – a crossbred boar owned by Gene Stoltzfus of North English – has been named the winner of the Big Boar contest at the State Fair. Pepperoni weighed in at 1,118 pounds – after a couple other promising competitors dropped out due to the August heat.  

 CANDIDATES & CAUCUSES: 

… Wannabes in Iowa: Graham dominates the weekend before other wannabes return next week to visit Iowa State Fair and for other campaign appearances. Today, Graham will be at the National Balloon Classic in Indianola and make appearances in Lucas and Chariton. On Saturday, he will stop in Ottumwa, West Point, Fort Madison and Burlington. Sunday’s schedule includes Mount Pleasant and Eldridge. Next week – Graham continues “vacation” touring IA, four wannabes (Dean, Edwards, Gephardt, Kerry, Kucinich) – as well as Graham – in Iowa next Thursday.

… Carol Moseley-Braun’s Campaign Manager, Andra “Andi” Pringle jumped ship to the Dean campaign. The announcement was made by Democrat Presidential contender Howard Dean, Thursday. There was no response from Moseley-Braun’s camp. Political observers view the switch as shoring up Dean’s weakness with Black voters, and indicating an early demise for Moseley-Braun. Pringle’s record includes: two of Rev. Jesse Jackson's presidential campaigns; worked with Jackson for a brief time in his Rainbow/Push Coalition; served as deputy campaign manager for John White, Jr.'s race for mayor of Philadelphia; served as communications director for the NAACP's National Voter Fund; and recently joined the political consulting firm Whistle Stop Communications as a partner

… Headline from this morning’s Des Moines Register: “Graham likens Bush administration to Nixon’s” Coverage – an excerpt – by the Register’s Thomas Beaumont: “Democratic presidential candidate Bob Graham on Thursday compared the Bush administration's reluctance to release information about terrorism and war intelligence to Richard Nixon's White House. Graham, a U.S. senator from Florida, said Bush was on track to eclipse Nixon as the most secretive president. ‘There's not been a president since Richard Nixon who has practiced secrecy, withholding from the American people important information,’ Graham said while campaigning at the Iowa State Fair. ‘Most recently that has been in the area of terrorism.’…’It may, at the end of the first term, have even surpassed Nixon,’ Graham said later. Graham, the former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, has been the leading critic among the 2004 Democratic presidential candidates on the Bush administration's handling of intelligence before the war with Iraq and the handling of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.Graham chaired the joint intelligence commission that investigated federal agencies' handling of pre-Sept. 11 information. Thursday he said the Bush administration was wrong to keep confidential parts of the report that linked officials in the Saudi government to associates of the hijackers who carried out the attacks on New York and Washington, D.C. ‘Those are just some of the more recent chapters in a thick book of using secrecy to deny the American people the right to know,’ Graham said at the official opening of his Iowa campaign headquarters on Locust Street in Des Moines. Republican National Committee spokesman Chad Colby said Graham's comments were ridiculous. ‘Those kinds of statements are eroding his credibility every single day, not only in Iowa, but in his home state,’ Colby said. Joined by his family, Graham toured the Iowa State Fair Thursday morning and participated in The Des Moines Register's Political Soapbox, where presidential candidates can address fairgoers.”

… Michigan poll reflects results elsewhere – Lieberman drops, Gephardt levels off and Dean gains. Numbers now: Lieberman 19%, Gephardt 19%, Kerry 14%, Dean 13%. Headline from yesterday’s Stamford (CT) Advocate – “Poll: Lieberman down, Dean up in Democratic presidential race” Excerpt from report in the Detroit Free Press: “Support for presidential hopeful Joseph Lieberman has dropped among Michigan Democrats while support for Howard Dean has increased, according to a poll released Wednesday by Lansing-based EPIC/MRA. Lieberman, the U.S. senator from Connecticut who was the vice presidential nominee in 2000, had 19 percent support in the survey, down from 27 percent in May. Support for Dean, the former Vermont governor, jumped from 4 percent in the spring poll to 13 percent in the latest survey. Dick Gephardt had the support of 19 percent of the 300 voters who said they usually vote in Michigan's Democratic caucuses, the same percentage the Missouri congressman received in May.  U.S. Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts got 15 percent in the May poll and 14 percent in the latest one. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 6 percentage points, meaning Lieberman, Gephardt, Kerry and Dean were roughly tied.” Note: Fifteen percent were undecided with the other five wannabes splitting the remaining 20%.

… “Only the Dean camp perceived early on that Democratic voters wanted no optimistic messages of growth, but attacks on the president who has been demonized ever since the Florida recount.” – Sentence from following column by Robert Novak. Headline from yesterday’s Chicago Sun-Times: “Dean tapped into pure hatred by rank-and-file Democrats of the reigning Republican” Excerpts: “Not until Howard Dean, the 21st century candidate of the Internet, achieved old-fashioned 20th century laurels of simultaneous Newsweek and Time cover stories did the skeptical realize he really may become the Democratic presidential nominee. The party's establishment, however, still cannot understand the phenomenon, which is perfectly clear to his own managers. Dean utilizes the technology of 2004 to solve the insurgent's usually fatal fund-raising shortcomings, while his opponents are mired in 1992. He also benefits from the institutional memory of campaign manager Joe Trippi, who understands the historic importance of the Iowa and New Hampshire tests that his opponents have downgraded. But the former governor of Vermont is now the Democrats' recognized front-runner mainly because he is the Anti-Bush. Dean's campaign is a remorseless assault on George W. Bush, far exceeding his opponents'. Humorless and unsmiling, the country doctor with upper-class roots pummels the president. He has tapped into pure hatred by rank-and-file Democrats of the reigning Republican that I have never seen in 44 years of campaign watching. Not Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan or even Bill Clinton generated such animosity. Dean stays far in front of the nine-candidate pack in Bush-bashing. His latest coup was a television ad, run in the president's home state of Texas, showing Dean on camera denouncing Bush (‘The only way to beat George Bush is to stand up to him’). That feeds Dean frenzy among Democrats. Every other candidate, even the pleasant Sen. Joe Lieberman, bashes Bush regularly. Nobody, however, does it with Dean's relish. Only the Dean camp perceived early on that Democratic voters wanted no optimistic messages of growth, but attacks on the president who has been demonized ever since the Florida recount. Sen. John Kerry and Rep. Richard Gephardt caught on belatedly, and Lieberman less vigorously. While Trippi is celebrated for harvesting big money through contemporary technology, he is also a 47-year-old politician who remembers the recent past. I first interviewed him in 1984 when he worked for Walter F. Mondale in his second presidential campaign. Trippi had not been engaged in such an effort since 1988, but he is a rare political operative who always appreciated the potential of New Hampshire and Iowa. Those early states have not been determinative since 1988, but Trippi knew that second place in Iowa and first in New Hampshire would put Dean in front and a win in both states probably would nominate him. Dean's strategists sensed that quite apart from the 2004 front-loaded primary election schedule, the campaign was off to a very early start. This nomination could be clinched by Feb. 10, and slow starters are doomed. With Lieberman still narrowly leading in the national polls, his strategists still seem to be running in a non-existent national primary…Dean is actually in the mainstream of the party, with all candidates enunciating the same liberal line. Although Lieberman calls himself a centrist, his liberal rating in the Senate last year was measured by Americans for Democratic Action at 85 percent (actually higher than the 80 percent for Iowa's supposedly ultra-liberal Tom Harkin). What makes Dean so distasteful to his Democratic detractors is that he is not part of the establishment and unlikely ever to become part of it. The native New Yorker has become a flinty Vermonter, looking a little like a Calvin Coolidge of the left. But how to stop him from being nominated? Former Clinton (and current) Lieberman pollster Mark Penn predicts Dean would lose 49 of 50 states to Bush, while a former Clinton colleague (unwilling to be quoted by name) told me: ‘Mark is wrong. Dean would only lose 40 states.’ This ‘he can't win’ argument did not stop Barry Goldwater, George McGovern, Ronald Reagan or Jimmy Carter from being nominated, and the last two actually were elected. The party faithful liked the purity of those candidates and did not care about electability, and the same might be proved true of the Anti-Bush.”

… Chicago Tribune columnist Chapman says Gephardt’s union-based strategy is a loser – as Gephardt already proved in ’88. Headline from the Trib – “One more time: Gephardt revives a losing strategy” Excerpt from Chapman’s column: “Rep. Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.) has a theory of how to become president. It starts with being the most protectionist candidate in the Democratic field, which he hopes will lead to his endorsement by the AFL-CIO, lifting him to victory in the primaries and the general election. But if it were such a great plan, Gephardt wouldn't be running. He'd be writing his presidential memoirs. He tried this approach in 1988, campaigning on a bill to punish countries that ran trade surpluses with the United States. But after winning in Iowa, with the advantage of being from neighboring Missouri, he soon fell out of contention. The guy who beat him in the Democratic primaries, Michael Dukakis, was strongly in favor of free trade. So was the guy who beat Dukakis in November, George Bush. In presidential politics, the only thing worse than not getting the AFL-CIO's endorsement is getting it. The last two candidates to get its blessing early in the race were Walter Mondale and Al Gore, neither of whom spent the following four years being serenaded with ‘Hail to the Chief.’ Bill Clinton won even though the labor organization didn't get behind him until he already had the 1992 nomination sewn up. The support of organized labor would be nicer if it didn't force a candidate to take positions that alienate so many other Americans. Gephardt has already gotten the endorsement of both the Teamsters and the United Steelworkers. But pandering to labor, though it may help him now, will probably doom him once actual voters get involved. The AFL-CIO endorsement wasn't enough to save Mondale in 1984, when union members made up 19 percent of all workers. Since then, organized labor's share has shrunk to 13 percent of all employees--and just 9 percent in the private sector. Gephardt, who brags that he has been fighting free trade for 20 years, is offering top dollar for a dwindling asset. Mondale lost partly because he was perceived, fairly or not, as the slavishly obedient son of Democratic special interests. Gephardt makes Mondale look like the soul of independence. Trade is a make-or-break issue with unions, which regard imported goods the way Californians regard earthquakes. Most Americans, however, don't share that fear. To the contrary, they like being able to buy a range of economical products from all over the world, and they understand that foreign competition makes American companies more efficient and more attentive to consumers.”

… Kerry defends education vote in New Hampshire – and hits GWB for inadequate funding. Headline from this morning’s The Union Leader: “Kerry faces skeptical teachers at NEA conference” Excerpts from coverage by AP’s Holly Ramer: “Facing a skeptical crowd of teachers, Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry defended his vote for the federal ‘No Child Left Behind Act’ on Thursday while criticizing President Bush for underfunding the far-reaching education reform law. Speaking at the National Education Association of New Hampshire convention, the Massachusetts senator repeated his promise to ‘hold this president accountable for making a mockery of the words no child left behind." But some in the audience wanted to hold Kerry accountable for supporting the 2002 law, which requires states that accept federal money to broaden academic testing, triple spending for literacy programs and meet new standards for pupil performance. Cathie Partridge-White asked Kerry how he could say a 1,200-page bill preserves local control over education. Kerry responded that states do not have to accept federal money. He defended his support of the bill's goals, saying it wasn't his fault that Bush has not provided enough money. ‘We can't sit here and pretend there wasn't something to address,’ Kerry said of problems plaguing the education system. ‘Regrettably, this administration turned its back on the deal it made.’ Administration officials and Republican lawmakers have insisted that the law is adequately funded. Kerry acknowledged that the law needs to be changed. ‘I'm on your side,’ he said. ‘I don't want you to have to teach rote. I don't want testing to be the be-all and end-all.’ The answer didn't satisfy Partridge-White, president of the Derry, N.H., teacher's union, but Mary Boland had a more favorable impression. ‘I understand what he's saying. We have to make a start somewhere. And I think if he gets elected, he has enough clout that he could fix it,’ said Boland, a recently retired English teacher from Salem, N.H. Both women were among 250 educators who also heard from Kerry rival, Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, a day earlier. Noting that Edwards didn't face the same grilling as Kerry, Boland suggested that the group may not have taken him as seriously. He ‘seems like a nice young man, but I'm not sure he has the clout to perform,’ Boland said. ‘He's a neophyte, a nice neophyte, but I don't see him having the clout Kerry would.’”

… Kucinich forces Dean to concede position change on Social Security retirement age – and then takes on both Dean and Gephardt on trade. Headline from yesterday’s Des Moines Register: “Kucinich takes aim at Dean” Excerpt from coverage by the Register’s Lynn Okamoto: “The presidential campaign for former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean on Wednesday acknowledged that Dean has changed his position on whether to raise the age at which retirees qualify for full benefits under Social Security. ‘Governor Dean in 1995 was open to the idea of raising the retirement age to balance the budget,’ said Sarah Leonard, a spokeswoman for the Dean campaign. ‘He then learned from Bill Clinton that it was not necessary to do so. Now, in this campaign, Governor Dean has never proposed raising the retirement age and has no plans to do so.’ The statement came in reaction to criticism launched Wednesday by Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich. According to Kucinich, Dean said on ‘Meet the Press’ that he would consider moving the retirement age to 68 or 70. He later denied it. ‘We must find out what his real position is on Social Security,’ said Kucinich, speaking at a Des Moines union hall. Kucinich's economic plan calls for moving the retirement age from 67 back to 65…Kucinich also criticized Dean and U.S. Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri for their positions on trade. America has lost 2.4 million manufacturing jobs in the past two years, but none of the other candidates would cancel the North American Free Trade Agreement and the United States' membership in the World Trade Organization as Kucinich would. ‘Our trade laws have permitted and even encouraged a race to the bottom,’ Kucinich said. Bill Burton, a spokesman for the Gephardt campaign, confirmed that Gephardt was the key negotiator for the World Trade Organization. ‘He thought it would be a powerful force in raising labor standards throughout the world,’ Burton said.”

… Sharpton Revisited: Although most of the coverage yesterday focused on Sharpton’s comments about the white-dominated media, he actually said something else along the way – he’s not going to write off Iowa. Excerpts of coverage – under the headline, “Sharpton seeks to tap into ‘economic pain’ – by Bret Hayworth in yesterday’s Sioux City Journal: “The Rev. Al Sharpton is not writing off Iowa in his run for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination. Iowa may be whitebread compared to the melting pot of Brooklyn from where he hails, but there is a ‘commonality of economic pain’ nationwide that Sharpton hopes to tap into. "I want to talk about the commonality of small entrepreneurs, Ma and Pa shop owners in urban areas, that are affected the same way as family farmers in Iowa,’ Sharpton said. ‘If we can get that commonality of economic pain, that will be the key to winning in 2004.’ Continuing, Sharpton said, ‘(President) Bush has benefited by a divide-and-conquer strategy, so if he tells people in the suburbs or people in the heartland that you have nothing in common with the people Al Sharpton is talking to, then we are divided. If we start talking and understanding the same tax cut that hurts a family farmer here hurts a guy in the South Bronx, then Bush is toast. That's what I intend to do, help put him in the toaster.” Sharpton said he brings a core constituency in minorities and labor that many Democrats prize. But he said the Democratic Party needs to broaden its base in order to be victorious. ‘We must expand and correct the party on our way,’ Sharpton said. Young people in particular need to be brought into the party tent, Sharpton said, adding he will bring in some hip-hop performers who ‘know young people's ear.’ Said Sharpton, ‘I don't think we have done enough to try to capture and energize the young vote.’”

… The ongoing saga of the Reluctant Wannabe – Draft Gore zealots now planning a New Hampshire write-in campaign.  In his political roundup – under the headline “Reinstating the Draft” – the Washington Post’s Dan Balz reported yesterday on the latest from the Gore Non-campaign. An excerpt: “A 10th Democratic presidential candidate? Draft Gore 2004, one of a handful of groups trying to lure former vice president Al Gore back into public life, will announce today a write-in campaign for the thus-far non-candidate in New Hampshire. The effort will largely consist of a publicity campaign intended to rally voters there, the site of the first presidential primary, to support the only person the committee says can defeat President Bush. ‘The desire for a rematch is a very powerful motivator,’ said one of its organizers, Mac Hathaway, referring to the 2000 election. ‘I think the Democratic Party is tremendously remiss in ignoring that.’ The group will send letters to the Granite State Democratic Party, along with its town committees around the state. Later, Hathaway said, the California-based group will probably place newspaper ads there and open a local campaign office. The group got a bit of moral support yesterday from former New York governor Mario M. Cuomo.”

… Smokin’ Joe Lieberman comes out of the corner again to – according to the Des Moines Register – unleash the “most direct” attacks of the campaign on Dean and Gephardt. His comments would probably be more credible and believable if Lieberman would get better numbers in IA and/or NH. Headline from yesterday’s Des Moines Register: “Lieberman assails Dean, Gephardt” Partial coverage of coverage by Register’s Tom Beaumont: “Democratic presidential candidate Joe Lieberman accused Howard Dean and Dick Gephardt Wednesday of favoring raising taxes, leveling his most direct attack on the two rivals to date. The Connecticut senator, while campaigning in Iowa, also said Dean's opposition to the war in Iraq means he would have ‘a hard time’ beating President Bush, should the former Vermont governor win the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination. ‘This whole business of Dean and Gephardt wanting to repeal all the Bush tax cuts would mean an increase of middle class taxes at a time when the middle class is really stressed,’ Lieberman said. ‘To me that's wrong and not what the economy needs.’ The comments came as Lieberman, a moderate Democrat and early supporter of the war, has begun criticizing the field's more-liberal members' positions on taxes, trade and national security, saying they represent the Democratic Party's previously unsuccessful efforts to win back the White House. ‘I'm not going to sit back and let other candidates advocate positions that look a lot like what Bill Clinton was arguing against in 1992,’ he said after a noontime campaign event at state Rep. Mark Davitt's house in Indianola. ‘It's really a debate for the heart and soul of the Democratic Party,’ he said. Lieberman, a 2000 vice presidential candidate, leads the Democratic field in recent national polls. Meanwhile, Dean, who was campaigning in southwest and central Iowa on Wednesday, has emerged as the frontrunner in Iowa after gaining early support from anti-war activists and raising the most second-quarter money among his rivals...Dean and Gephardt, a U.S. House member from Missouri, have proposed repealing all of the income tax rate cuts enacted since President Bush took office, calling them failed attempts to ignite the sluggish economy. Dean and Gephardt would spend the money to provide universal access to health insurance. Both campaigns rejected Lieberman's accusation that they favor raising taxes. Lieberman supports keeping in place all of the tax cuts except those that apply to the top two income brackets, saying Wednesday cuts for moderate- and low-income earners are good for the economy.”

… So much for the recent flurry of news reports and columns contending that People Powered Howard was a “fiscal conservative” during tenure as Vermont governor. Headline from yesterday’s Washington Times: “Dean’s budget-balancing act left taxpayers in red” Excerpt from report by Times’ political ace Donald Lambro:   “Vermont had one of the highest per capita tax burdens in the country when Howard Dean left the governorship in January to run for president. Mr. Dean, a Democrat who calls himself a ‘fiscal conservative,’ says he balanced all his state budgets by cutting spending. And allies and critics alike praise his budget-balancing record. Vermont enjoyed a budget surplus this year while most states were in the red because of the recession that began three years ago. What the former governor doesn't say is that he raised hundreds of millions of dollars in higher taxes, including sales taxes, cigarette taxes, property taxes and corporate taxes, to balance the books while paying for his social welfare proposals. After 11 years under Mr. Dean's governorship, Vermont now ranks in the top tier of high-tax states, a fiscal legacy that President Bush's campaign strategists say they intend to highlight should Mr. Dean become the Democratic presidential nominee next year. Congressional Quarterly's Governing magazine, based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau, ranks Vermont second highest among the 50 states in the amount of tax revenue collected as a percentage of personal income in 2001 — about 9 percent to 10 percent. In a separate ranking that measured state tax revenue per capita in 2001, Vermont was in second place with six other high-tax states, including Massachusetts and California. Another ranking in June by the Government Finance Officers Association put Vermont in 12th place when state and local tax burdens are combined, well ahead of more populous industrial states such as New Jersey, Michigan and Illinois. Vermont's budget has climbed sharply, too, from $662 million in 1991 to $1.8 billion last year. Between 1997 and last year, inflation and population growth combined totaled 18.1 percent, but spending rose 51.7 percent. Once known for its Yankee thrift, the state has become a mecca for affluent liberals from neighboring New York. Vermont's sole congressman, independent Rep. Bernard Sanders, is an avowed socialist. ‘Roughly 20 percent of the population does not depend upon jobs for income, people who are trust funders or independently wealthy,’ says Michael Quaid, executive director of Vermonters For Tax Reform. Tiny, bucolic Vermont, with a population of 610,000 — about the size of Austin, Texas — does not many of the problems of other states. More than 96 percent of Vermont residents are white; only 3.8 percent are immigrants. The unemployment rate is barely 4 percent. The birth rate is the lowest in the nation, which means Vermont requires less spending on education and welfare than other states. With a median age of 37.7, the population is the third oldest among the states, and its under-18 population (24.2 percent) ranks as the eighth smallest. Analysts give a mixed assessment on Mr. Dean's fiscal record. The Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank that rates the fiscal performance of the states, gave him a grade of B from 1994 to 1996. By 2000, his grade had plunged to a D.”

… “AFL-CIO test for ’04 hopefuls: Likability” – Headline from Detroit Free Press. Excerpt from report by Steve Thomma: “U.S. Rep. Dick Gephardt gets along with union leaders, but would working people want him in their living rooms? Would they buddy up to U.S. Sen. John Kerry or find him too aloof? And what about former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean? Is he a warm friend or a hothead? As labor leaders ponder whether the full AFL-CIO should endorse a Democratic presidential candidate this fall and take sides in a primary contest, they're asking these questions along with the usual ones about the candidates' positions on health care and the economy. Both of the AFL-CIO's earlier choices -- Walter Mondale in 1984 and Al Gore in 2000 -- lost the general election. This time, labor leaders say, simply being on labor's side on issues such as trade won't be enough to get their endorsement. They want to be convinced they have a winner. In particular, they want a candidate who's likable. ‘A lot of voters will vote for someone that they can relate to,’ said Andy Stern, president of the 1.5-million-member Service Employees International Union, the largest in the AFL-CIO. ‘George Bush passed that test. Al Gore didn't do as well.’ All nine Democratic candidates courted labor leaders such as Stern at a gathering of AFL-CIO leaders this week in Chicago. Each wants support from the unions that make up the AFL-CIO. Gephardt, a favorite of industrial unions for his long opposition to free trade agreements that they blame for sending jobs overseas, already has won endorsements from 10 of 65 AFL-CIO unions…But what Gephardt really wants is the preprimary endorsement of the full AFL-CIO, which would bring him a lot more money and volunteers in crucial early primary states. A preprimary endorsement would require votes representing two-thirds of the AFL-CIO's 13 million members. ‘We have a significant majority of organized labor supporting us,’ said Gephardt adviser Steve Elmendorf. ‘But we're not at two-thirds yet.’”

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