January 02, 2004
THIS IS HOW YOU DO A HIT PIECE
Not Just Whistling Dixie; In South Carolina, Howard Dean Warms to His Universal Voter Message (Mark Leibovich, Washington Post, 01/02/04)
In this context, Howard Brush Dean -- who was born on Long Island, raised on Park Avenue and immigrated to Vermont via Yale -- is positing himself as something of an affirmative-action candidate. Give him a chance, he says. Despite his alien background, Dean says he can restore jobs and hope and unity to the South, just as he can in the North (say, in New Hampshire) and in the Midwest (say, Iowa).Posted by David Cohen at January 2, 2004 02:47 PMBut it does matter where you're from if you're running for president. It especially matters if you're an antiwar patrician who has a clumsy recent history of offending Southern voters and promulgating crude stereotypes.
Indeed, one of the subtexts to Dean's tour of South Carolina -- his ninth there as a presidential candidate -- is that he is the man who said this fall he yearned to be the candidate for "guys with Confederate flags on their pickup trucks." Dean apologized, but only after days of browbeating from his opponents and others.
This Tuesday morning, he is on his best behavior. He is almost sheepish, a decidedly un-Dean-like characteristic. The presumed front-runner -- who is leading in some polls in South Carolina -- is being pelted daily across the spectrum, from the Al Sharpton left to the Joe Lieberman center to the Republican right. Dean is evincing the air of a man worn down, if not chastened.
Billy D. Williams, the mayor pro tempore of Florence and a Dean supporter, tries to lead the crowd into a chant of "Dean, Dean, Dean," which draws just a smattering of voices and lasts just a few seconds. Dean musters a forced beam.
But he does not look well. Bloated and fatigued, his graying hair sticks up in the back. His eyes, sharp blue and typically alert, are puffy and red. His maroon tie is crooked. His solid, former wrestler's posture has gone mopey. His cadences, normally brisk, are sluggish.
The crowd of 125 Democratic activists, most of them white, falls short of accustomed levels of Dean-inspired animation. They pick at reheated scrambled eggs, cold hash browns and bowls of unidentified fruit.
Come now....
Why on earth would the Democratic WaPo, scion of the establishment, want to do a "hit piece" on poor Dr. Dean.
AGRWS.... (As Glenn Reynolds Would Say....)
Heh.
Posted by: Andrew X at January 2, 2004 03:13 PMThe end of the article was a little more generous; link 4 (I presume the article is roughly equally divided) is almost glowing.
Posted by: Chris at January 2, 2004 03:14 PMChris --
Do you mean that part where his Southern supporter says he can't connect with the South, the part in which he's compared to Michael Dukakis, or that part where we're reminded that he's faking a Southern accent?
Posted by: David Cohen at January 2, 2004 03:18 PMDavid: I mean this bit:
Dean waves off applause and says he appreciates all the "kind words for a Vermont Yankee." But really, he reiterates, it doesn't matter if you're from the North or from the South. Especially here, in a county whose unemployment rate is 14.5 percent, and in a town where 563 jobs were lost in October when a steel plant closed.
Amen, says Jackie Gore ("no relation to you-know-who"), recently laid off from her job as a buyer-planner at Cummins Engine Co. She drove 45 minutes from her home in Mount Pleasant to see Dean.
"Will Dean connect with Southern voters? I don't think so," Gore says. But that's beside the point when she needs a job. That reality transcends any vague and frivolous yearning for "connection" with a presidential candidate.
"When he talks to you," Gore says of Dean, "he speaks the truth, he talks real. Some people say he comes off angry, but that's just enthusiasm. He has that way of hooking you in. You don't care where he's from."
...
One man hands Dean a check for $77. Another places his hands on Dean's shoulders and looks him earnestly in the eye. "I'm a Southern guy, Governor," the man tells him. "But I like your message. And I enjoy skiing in Vermont."
"Thank yuh, thank yuh very much," Dean says, beaming, relishing another small piece of common ground gained.
That said, I admit, the Dukakis bit was hilarious.
Posted by: Chris at January 2, 2004 03:40 PM