FORKWORTHY FILES

Poll is big uh-oh for Gephardt (DAVID YEPSEN, 08/03/2003, Des Moines Register)

Is Howard Dean on his way to the Democratic presidential nomination? Could be. Today's Iowa Poll of Democratic caucus-goers shows the former Vermont governor has moved into first place in Iowa, knocking Missouri Congressman Richard Gephardt from that long-held perch.

That's more great news for Dean, who's been enjoying a lot of that lately, and another hard blow to Gephardt, whose campaign seems flat. It's also bad news for Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, who is in
third place. Not because he's running third here, but because of what a first-place Dean finish in Iowa is going to mean to Kerry's chances in New Hampshire.

Consider the scenario this poll suggests: Dean upsets Gephardt in Iowa. That could knock Gephardt out of the race. (He's already had trouble raising money, and an Iowa defeat means a rejection by the very people who elevated him to national stature in1988.)

A caucus victory in Iowa is always worth a few points going into New Hampshire. Since Kerry and Dean are in a virtual tie in New Hampshire, an Iowa victory for Dean could push him over the top in the Granite State. Any candidate who wins both Iowa and New Hampshire is going to be hard to stop for the nomination.

It becomes ever harder to believe that the next Democratic presidential nominee is currently a declared candidate. The ambitions of politicians too abhor a vacuum and having Howard Dean as your party's front-runner just sucks.

MORE:
Team touted by Gephardt fades in Iowa (Jon Sawyer, 08/02/2003, St. Louis Post-Dispatch)

When Richard Gephardt announced his "leadership team" of Iowa supporters a month ago he said, "I don't take one bit of support for granted," and touted what he called "a great team of folks behind me."

But in politics, a month can be painfully long, and if Gephardt looks behind him now he'll find that his leadership team is fading in a state deemed crucial to his presidential hopes.

Of the 34 "leadership" individuals listed until Friday on Gephardt's Iowa campaign Web site, 11 say that in fact they are either undecided in the presidential campaign or actively supporting one of Gephardt's rivals.

At least seven of those listed, including three mayors and a county supervisor, say they never intended to be counted among Gephardt supporters to begin with.

Among the 15 individuals who identified themselves as actual Gephardt supporters, several appeared to be wavering.

The Stop-Dean Candidate: Hillary: If Mrs. Clinton wants to save her party, 2008 may be too late. (ROBERT L. BARTLEY,
August 4, 2003, Wall Street Journal)

Hillary, she's the one. It's not exactly my place, as one who joined the vast right-wing conspiracy as soon as she advertised it, to endorse Sen. Clinton. But in recent polls among Democrats she
swamps the announced candidates if her name is included. She's been stumping the country with book signings, and is headed to California to save Gray Davis.

Since her health-care fiasco, too, she's learned something about triangulation. She did vote for the war resolution, and has been cautiously supportive since. Her husband, of course, recently said that when he left the presidency Iraq had unaccounted-for stocks of chemical and biological weapons, and dismissed as minor Democratic complaints about the 16 words in President Bush's State of the Union address.

At a confab of liberal lawyers last week, Mrs. Clinton made an intriguing comment that the depredations of the Bush administration "can no longer be observed from the sidelines." Onetime inside adviser Dick Morris has predicted she'll run this year if the Bush approval rating dips below 50%. It dropped to 56% in the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, down from 62% in May. [...]

Watching Mr. Dean's surge in the primaries, Sen. Clinton may have to rethink her preference of delaying a presidential bid until 2008 to run against Gov. Jeb Bush or some other non-incumbent. By then it may be too late, not for her but for her party. A Dean candidacy would stamp Democrats more clearly than ever as a party that runs hoping for a sour economy at home and rooting for American humiliation in Iraq.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 4, 2003 8:45 PM