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Iowa 2004 presidential primary precinct caucus and caucuses news">
Iowa 2004 presidential primary precinct caucus and caucuses news, reports
and information on 2004 Democrat and Republican candidates, campaigns
and issues Iowa
Presidential Watch's
IOWA DAILY REPORT Holding
the Democrats accountable today, tomorrow...forever.
THE DAILY
REPORT for Monday, October 20, 2003 On skipping Iowa:
"The skipping-Iowa strategy hasn't worked in
the past,"
said state Democratic Chairman Gordon Fischer.
"I don't see it working this time."
"It makes it a four-person race,"
said Iowa
Governor Tom Vilsack. "But now fourth
place is last place. It raises the stakes for
these remaining folks."
Lieberman,
D-Connecticut, told ABC's "This Week." "It's
a time for change from George Bush, but it's not a
time for rookies." His comments were made
regarding retired Gen. Wesley Clark and former
Vermont Gov. Howard Dean. "We want to come
make our case in Florida,"
Dean Campaign
Manager Joe Trippi said. "The Florida
convention has always been a pivotal moment."
Trippi’s
comments are in response to their maverick move
regarding defying the National Democrat Party
boycott of Florida Democrats straw poll efforts.
Dean is showing
how the Democratic Party can become "a
party that can transcend our interest groups, and
that a candidate can get elected without owing
anyone anything,"
said Simon B.
Rosenberg, president and founder of the centrist
New Democrat Network in an article about whether
Dean is a new day in American politics. Clark and Lieberman
out Gephardt leads Dean New television ad for
Gephardt Dean undecided on
spending limits Clark campaign denies
infighting Florida shakedown Dean a sea-change? Clark tries Internet
again Today’s Iowa Schedule Bush attacked
Poll Results on Bush Clark and Lieberman out
Both the Clark and Lieberman campaigns have made
the decision to not campaign in Iowa. Iowa is
known as the winnowing state for Presidential
campaigns. It appears that it may have taken two
more casualties in the process. While many have
tried to bypass Iowa, no one has ever been able to
have a successful effort to date. Both candidates
share better national political numbers than they
do in the early important states of Iowa, New
Hampshire and South Carolina. South Carolina is
important because it is the first Southern state
in the nomination process. National popularity is
deceiving to the process of being nominated. It is
the grinding process of winning delegates state by
state that secures the candidate the nomination.
Popular support is more valuable in 2004. This is
because of the short time frame of delegate
selection. It is almost certain that the nominee
will be selected by March 4th. However,
national popularity can quickly shift because of a
victory in Iowa or New Hampshire. National
popularity is in some ways also trumped by
allotments of delegates to minorities, women and
elected officials by the Democrat delegate rules.
·
Lieberman
Lieberman first campaigned in Iowa in February,
hired a caucus director and opened an office. He
is the only candidate to earn the endorsement of a
statewide elected Democrat, Attorney General Tom
Miller. Lieberman also said from the outset he did
not expect to win the caucuses. He has focused on
the tier of Feb. 3 primaries especially Arizona
and New Mexico. Arizona and New Mexico, voters in
Delaware, Missouri, Oklahoma, North Dakota and
South Carolina make their presidential nominating
choices on Feb. 3. For further details, see Iowa
Presidential Watch’s Democrat Presidential
calendar. Lieberman will open four new offices in
New Hampshire that will be staffed in part by
redeployed Iowa field operatives, aides said. He
also plans to add staff in South Carolina, Arizona
and Oklahoma. "Lieberman's doing it the right way
and is making a strategic decision in his best
interest and maintaining himself as a viable
candidate, should he be the nominee in November,"
Vilsack said. "I think Clark runs the risk of
jeopardizing his standing with Iowa Democrats.
It's not irreparable, but there are going to be
some hard feelings about this." Lieberman made the
case that centrists candidates, like him, are the
ones who will ultimately win the Democrat
nomination on ABC “This Week.” As of Sept. 30,
Lieberman ranked fifth out of nine candidates in
the amount of money raised this year, with $11.7
million, and fifth in the amount left to spend on
the race, with $4 million.
·
Clark
Clark’s website’s newest press release is titled
“New Hampshire Voters Ready to Hear Clark's
Message.” Michael Contarino a professor of
political science at the University of New
Hampshire at Manchester said he thinks Clark is
appealing to moderate voters because they are a
"natural constituency for Clark's background and
message" and more liberal Democrats because they
are "horrified by Bush and see Clark as a winner."
Clark’s campaign has been plagued with missteps
and staff changes over the past several weeks. The
difficulty seems to be the merging of the new
cynical professional former Clinton staff with the
exuberant naive Draft-Clark volunteers. The
incorporating of new blood into a closed political
process, such as being a delegate to the Democrat
National Convention, is historically a challenging
problem. Dean leads Clark in an Oct. 9 New
Hampshire poll 30 to 10 percent with undecided
voters at 20 percent. Clark is in third position
with Kerry at 17 percent and all others in single
digits. Kerry’s pattern in the Granite State
continues on a downward tract. Independent voters
as well as Democrats have a tradition of voting in
the New Hampshire Presidential Primary. Clark’s
campaign has issued a statement that it hopes to
make a good showing in New Hampshire but doesn’t
expect to win. Gephardt leads Dean A new Des Moines WHO TV poll of
Iowa Democrats shows Dick Gephardt taking a
decisive lead over Dean among Iowa Democrats.
Gephardt increased his lead by 4 points to 27
percent to Deans 1 point loss to 22 percent. The
poll shows Gephardt stopping his previous slide in
the polls and gaining ground. These results also
come before the statement by Dean that Medicare is
not beyond the slowing of increases to
entitlements in order to balance the budget. The
percentages of the other candidates in the field
are: Kerry-15; Edwards-11; Clark-11; and
Lieberman-7. The other candidates did not rank
high enough to be reported. New television ad for
Gephardt NAFTA is the focus of the new
television approved by Gephardt. The ad points out
that Gephardt is the only democrat in the fight to
save jobs from going to Mexico and other places.
The ad features a couple that has lost jobs twice
because of jobs leaving the country. The ad comes
on the heels of Gephardt’s speech at a union hall
in Cedar Rapids this weekend in which he included
Edward’s as voting for Most Favored Nation status
for China. The timing of the ad following the
weekend press release demonstrates the excellent
timing of the Gephardt campaign. Dean’s heavy
two-day campaign in Iowa shows that they are
taking Gephardt seriously. Dean undecided on spending
limits Howard Dean on last weekend’s
Iowa Public Radio program, Iowa Press, said that
he was unsure whether he would take public funding
of his campaign and thereby limit his fundraising.
He also said that he was going to ask his
contributors on line whether to forgo campaign
spending limits. A visit to his website did not
find him asking his supporters. Dean outlined the
problem of accepting the limits as being unable to
compete with Bush till after the National
Convention. Dean said that one of the reason
Democrats should support him is that he is the
only one who could raise the money to compete.
However, he pointed out that he would suffer a
cash-flow crunch in Iowa and New Hampshire if he
did not take the public funds. Dean will have to
decide at some point if he is going to abide by
the spending cap that will be set somewhere in the
range of $38 million with the possibility of as
much as $18 million coming from public funds. In
order to receive the full $18 million all
contributions would have to be at the $250 level
or bellow. This is the amount of contribution
authorized for matching funds. Dean is unlikely to
go for the public funds as he has already raised
$25.4 million. With approximately three months
till the Iowa Caucuses he would have to stop his
fundraising in order for the matching funds to be
worthwhile. Otherwise, he would not be able to
collect anywhere near the maximum amount from the
public funds. The Federal Election Commission that
oversees the funds allows 20 percent to the
expected base amount of $38 million. This would
put the maximum with the amount raised at $45
million. This means that Dean only needs to raise
a few million more to qualify to meet his total
amount. Another reason for Dean to not abide by
the limits is the fact that it would not hold him
to spending limits by state. This would enable him
to have a big advantage, despite adjustments made
to the other campaigns when a candidate does not
abide by the campaign limits. Clark campaign denies
infighting Fox news is reporting sources in
and close to retired Army Gen.
Wesley Clark’s
presidential campaign are denying that infighting
between grassroots organizers and the so-called "Clintonistas"
on the staff has caused their candidate to
stumble. Clark interim campaign manager from the
Draft Clark Movement, Donnie Fowler has not
commented on his departure since he left, and the
campaign has offered nothing but positive spin on
the situation. Since the fallout with Fowler, key
posts have gone to several Clintonistas — refugees
from past Clinton and Gore campaigns and former
high-level staff members of the previous
Democratic administration. "We have the best and
the brightest, and some of them just happen to
have worked for the past Clinton administrations
and campaigns. I think the fact we have them
working here really bodes well for us," said Maya
Israel, associate director of communications,
whose roots are in the "Draft Clark" Internet
movement credited with convincing Clark to run for
office. The article goes on to review various
theories, including the Clintons are using the
campaign to spoil Dean’s chances. Florida shakedown Howard Dean is taking a separate
road in defiance of the Democrat National
Committee according to a story in
http://www.theunionleader.com/prez_show.html?article=27862.
The Democratic National Committee has asked each
campaign to sign a letter to Florida Democratic
Party Chairman Scott Maddox promising to boycott
the convention if a straw poll is held. Dean
campaign manager Joe Trippi said his candidate is
interested in showing muscle at the Florida
convention, with or without a straw poll. The
proposed Florida poll would only involve the
approximate 3,000 Florida Democrat Party delegates
to the state convention. Bill Clinton used the
event to spark his campaign for President in 1991.
“The reason the situation is getting worse is that
George Bush has absolutely no interest in solving
the problem whatsoever,” Dean said, as he
responded to a question regarding affordable
housing. “This President is running the country
for the benefit of multinational corporations, and
those who give $2,000 checks to his campaign.”
Dean gave the response to a question regarding
affordable housing in New Hampshire yesterday.
“What I’ll do is stop the Bush tax cuts for those
making over $200,000 a year,” Edwards said. “I’ll
raise the capital gains tax in the highest bracket
from 15 percent to 25 percent and close corporate
tax loopholes, including the one that let
corporations relocate to Bermuda to avoid paying
taxes.” Concern exists by top Democrats that the
Florida straw poll would take needed resources
away from the key strategy of defeating Bush. Dean a sea-change? Today’s Washington Post article,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50652-2003Oct19.html,
by Thomas B. Edsall outlines the current debate
among top Democrats regarding what Dean’s campaign
means to the future of politics. The story
outlines that there are two camps. One camp
believes Dean is a sea-change in politics and the
other believes Dean is the ghost of George
McGovern, Walter F. Mondale and Michael S.
Dukakis. Samuel L. Popkin, a political scientist
at the University of California at San Diego, who
has worked in a number of Democratic presidential
campaigns, said win or lose, the Dean campaign may
well prove to be significant. "New blood is
important whether it wins right away or not. There
are 'new blood' losers and bad losers," he said.
Goldwater lost by a landslide in 1964, but he
helped start the conservative revolution within
the Republican Party that culminated in the
election of Reagan in 1980, Popkin noted. Clark tries Internet again Clark, following the loss of a
top Internet guru, is back trying to pull in money
with a novel approach. Clark is making a new pitch
for donations, inviting Internet donors to his
presidential campaign to predict the World Series
champion with their money pledge. The "Clark04
Baseball Challenge" appeals to baseball fans to
make a contribution to the retired general's
campaign on behalf of their favorite team, the
Yankees or the Marlins. Kent Cooper, co-founder of
Political Money Line, an Internet service that
tracks campaign finance, said mixing politics and
baseball may not win Clark much support. "I don't
know if fans will appreciate a politician keeping
score," said Cooper. Today’s Candidates' Schedule Bush attacked National Democrat Party began
running a 30 sec. ad Monday in the Scranton-Wilkes
Barre television market in Pennsylvania. The
following is a highlight of the ad: "It keeps
getting worse ... scandals in the Bush White
House," the ad says. "Now they illegally leaked
the identity of an American CIA agent ... all to
hide Bush administration deceptions about the war
in Iraq." It is also reported that the Democrats
sent out approximately 1.4 million e-mails asking
to pay for the ad. They currently have bought
$20,000 in the Pennsylvania market. Poll Results on Bush An ABC/Washington Post poll
shows Bush is continuing to decline. If the 2004
presidential election were today, 46 percent of
Americans say they would vote to re-elect Bush,
while 47 percent would favor the Democratic
candidate — the president's weakest showing to
date in this so-called generic horse race. (It's
44 percent to 49 percent among registered voters).
Bush's lead in this test is down from +13 in
April, +8 in August and +5 last month.
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