Howard Dean: He Still Has The Power -Washington Post

[Rose Siding]

ST. LOUIS -- Howard Dean keeps fidgeting onstage. He is spending his Saturday in Salon D of a crummy airport Hilton, joined by six other candidates for chairman of the Democratic National Committee. They are competing for the love of a few dozen DNC members in the audience. There is much noise and raucousness in the air. Great excitement, passion and a palpable sense of mission!

Unfortunately, it's emanating from next door...
...
The audience is rapt only when Dean speaks. Slimmer and more rested-looking than you remember him, Dean is the former rock star in a field of "American Idol" barely-heard-of's. His rhetoric follows closely on the "You have the power" theme that marked his presidential campaign. "I'm not much of a Zen person," Dean says, "but I've learned that the best way to gain power is to give it away."

He comes well known to this race -- and with baggage. He would make a disastrous party chairman, many Democrats believe, for the same reasons he would have been a disastrous nominee for president last year. He is too liberal, too blunt and too unpredictable to be the chief spokesman of the party. The same things that won Dean such a fervent following as a presidential candidate could also violate the on-message orthodoxy that is traditionally demanded of party chairmen. Better to elect a more sober, centrist, non-lightning rod of a chairman -- like former representative Martin Frost of Texas, who is sitting three seats to the left of Dean.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16532-2005Jan17.html?nav=rss_politics

This reporter wants us to know one thing for sure:
While his opponents speak, Dean periodically holds his hands together over his nose and contorts his face....
Dean keeps grimacing. He has a bad back. But it's hard not to wonder if he isn't slightly bored, too....
...He walks with a slight limp from the back problem. He wades into another crowd and poses for a photo, his smile evincing the joy of a man who is back in a comfortable habitat, campaigning for something. And also maybe a hint of pain.

[madfloridian]

1. Here is another link...yours did not work. Good article.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16532-2005Jan17.html

[Rose Siding]

2. fixed- thanks

[madfloridian]

3. And eating 2nd cone of Ben and Jerry's ice-cream. LOL

That is a decent article.

"Hey, what other candidate for DNC chair can get 400 people to come hear him on a freezing night," says Vicki Walker, a former state representative from Kansas City, Mo., who is supporting Dean. Like everyone in that crowd, Walker says she wants her man to run for president again. But Dean says he will not do it if he is elected chairman. If he is not elected chairman, Dean says he will rule nothing out.

He thought long and hard before he decided to seek the chairmanship, Dean says. He contemplated how he could stay most relevant to the process, say two people he commiserated with (they don't want their names attached to the details of a private conversation). He has no interest in practicing medicine or running for governor of Vermont again. Jim Jeffords, the Independent senator from Vermont, is up for reelection next year, but Dean says he wouldn't run against Jeffords, an early supporter of Dean's presidential campaign."

He has always said that about Jeffords, and I don't think he would ever run against him.

[Cha]

4. I can't imagine Dean wanting to be

a Senator from Vermont..he's a National kinda guy now!

[DFLforever]

5. WP still doesn't get though, do they?

They don't seem to fathom this political party is in deep crisis.

[DeepModem Mom]

6. kick

[whirlygigspin]

7. listen to the DNC hearings

http://blog.radioleft.com

[quaoar]

8. Bingo

The audience is rapt only when Dean speaks.

Anyone need any more evidence that Dean is the guy for this job?