So how do you like them apples? John Kerry comes up big in Iowa (38%), John Edwards places a very viable second (32%)…and the once seemingly-insurmountable Howard Dean falls to a distant third (18%). (For his part, a broken-hearted Gephardt came in fourth (11%) and will drop out tomorrow…so much for Big Union.)
An interesting evening, all in all, and one that’s in effect limited the Democratic race from eight to four:
First off, I think Howard Dean added insult to injury tonight with his cringeworthy (non-)concession speech — that hoarse, high-pitched yelp at the end of his angry roll of states is going to be played-for-laughs by the punditocracy hundreds of times this week (In fact, it took all of two hours for Drudge to post it as his headline…it’s since been removed.) It was a display that could seriously hurt him among undecideds who’ve never really seen the guy before. That being said, the prognosis for the doctor isn’t necessarily terrible, if he can weather the initial post-Iowa dip. For one, the rise of Kerry and Edwards is going to seriously complicate the anti-Dean question: Both Kerry and Clark will now be vying for veterans, as Clark and Edwards fight over who’s the electable southerner. And Dean’s still got the money and the movement, which isn’t going to just wither away because of a bad night in Des Moines. That being said, Dean’s in for a race now, and if that’s the case, I for one am pleased that the candidates pushing him are as of tonight more likely to be John Edwards and John Kerry than they are Wesley Clark, Joe Lieberman, or the now-defunct Dick Gephardt.
John Edwards is a candidate I’ve been looking to see more from this whole cycle, and, if a long primary haul is our party’s fate, I’m very glad he’ll get a chance to strut his stuff on the main stage. He’s got real populist cred and a trial lawyer’s argumentative savvy, and, well, the Southern accent doesn’t hurt. He definitely looked the best tonight in terms of tone and message. And I think that, not unlike our current president, he’s often “misunderestimated.” Go Edwards.
I’ve been relatively agnostic about John Kerry for awhile (in part because he stumped so blatantly for Gore over Bradley last primary cycle), but I’ve liked him more recently since he lost Chris Lehane and started loosening up. Despite the fears of Dukakis-redux, I think Kerry could make a very strong candidate in the general, given his (perhaps too-overtouted of late) military record and debating skills. If he carries this bounce to a Democratic victory, I won’t be overly disappointed.
As for Wesley Clark…well, let’s just say the bloom is off the rose in these parts. Running a Lehane-style campaign isn’t helping him, but the real problem is, well, he’s not a Democrat. He voted for Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Reagan, and Bush, he’s been a member of the party for less than a year, and he’s on tape praising the Dubya administration at a GOP fundraiser. I really don’t think the Democratic Party should be getting behind a fellow who’s said “I’m very glad we’ve got the great team in office, men like Colin Powell, Don Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Paul O’Neill — people I know very well — our President George W. Bush. We need them there, because we’ve got some tough challenges ahead in Europe.” Because, y’know, that particular soundbite would singlehandedly throw the election to Dubya, and we need to make Karl Rove spend at least some of his massive war chest on formulating his own advertisements.
So Clark, Dean, Edwards, and Kerry…the board is set, the pieces are moving.
FWIW, the chances that at least one guy I interviewed for a speechwriting gig with will win the nomination just went up. weird, i’m still 99% cool with leaving that world behind, but i just had a little flash of what might have been. course i never would have survived the kamp kerry purges. i think law school is making me more competitive.
not that anyone else cares about this.
Good entry, Kevin — right on the money. I’ve long been lukewarm on John Kerry as well. If we’re parsing the thing out, I think you have to say that Edwards was the big winner in Iowa, and in more ways than one. He looked and sounded good, dare I say, presidential? The second big story is the Dean hilarity. I can only hope they play that again and again and again throughout the week. My girlfriend said he looked and sounded like a professional wrestler. The third big story is — sadly — Gephardt. Be curious to see where his support goes, though I think we can all openly acknowledge the death of Big Labor. Kerry winning the thing is actually the fourth story out of Iowa. And does it give him momentum into N.H.? His problem now is he’s raised the expectations game for himself. He’s got to win New Hampshire.
I think our developing big story, now, will have to be New Hampshire itself. This raises the stakes on the Granite State, and though Gephardt’s out, it adds Lieberman (sure to be out after N.H, no?) and Clark.
In the end, it seems there are more questions than answers, and I guess they’ll be answered sooner rather than later. Does Dean get a boost because a setback has often meant just that for him? Are the Kerry expectations now set too high? And does a lagging Lieberman split the Kerry vote? Will New Hampshirites see through the phony Lehane-style campaign of Clark? Is Edwards too “southern” for those yankees?
Who knows. Guess we’ll find out sooner rather than later.
Clinton placed third in Iowa in ’92, Dukakis placed third in Iowa in ’88. Dean placed third last night. And he has the coffers to keep going. We’ll see what happens in New Hampshire, but I still believe Dean has a good shot.
Oh, definitely. Dean’s got the most loot, and that has to count for something. To be honest, I think Dean did himself more damage with his Wild Man concession speech than he did by placing third in Iowa…if anything, the latter just positions him as the “Comeback Kid” in New Hampshire.
It seems inevitable that Dean is done. Now it must be made clear who has the most ammo to make a serious bid for to take the place of that redneck in the White House in November. I live in North Carolina, but I think that Kerry would have a better shot than Edwards. Kerry has the ‘patriotic’ aspect of having been a war hero–something that Bush can’t touch, despite his gloating about having captured Hussein. And who says we can’t have what the republicans would call a ‘liberal yankee’ as president? We sure as hell have a conservative southerner as president now, so why can’t the pendulum swing our way again?