Howard Dean Weighs DNC Decision

By Eleanor Clift

 

The struggle to be Democratic
National Committee chair is round one of the battle for the soul of the
party. The obvious choice is Howard Dean, who has the clarity of
conviction and the passion that voters hunger for even if they don’t
always agree with him.



Party
activists around the country are furious at the Washington Democrats
for blowing the election. Wresting control away from the entrenched
establishment is their goal. Dean would spark a Red State rebellion
within the party, but the Heartland’s leading contender, Iowa Gov. Tom
Vilsack, withdrew his name from contention after being shown numbers
suggesting Dean would win.



Dean is
talking to a lot of people, and what he’s telling them is that if a
consensus African-American or minority candidate emerged, he would not
seek the job. Clinton Labor Secretary Alexis Herman’s name surfaced,
but she said she wasn’t interested, and so far nobody else has assumed
the mantle. A DraftHoward.com Web site has sprung up, and a Democratic
source says Dean is planning a series of speeches “to position himself
as a centrist.” A campaign aide with close ties to the governor
protests that he “wouldn’t be positioning himself. Remember in Iowa,
the nicks came from the left.” Rival campaigns attacked Dean for once
agreeing with Newt Gingrich that Social Security’s growth rate should
be slowed, and for winning the endorsement of the National Rifle
Association as Vermont’s governor.



Democrats
who have spoken with Dean say he is moving toward a decision about the
DNC post. But they caution that it could go either way. Anybody who has
run for president doesn’t get it out of their system fast, particularly
anybody who came as close as Dean thinks he came. Deciding to lead the
party would probably take Dean out of the running for the ’08
nomination. Maybe that’s why the Clintons are quietly pulling for Dean.
He would be one less party favorite for Hillary to dispose of. It’s not
just his own ambition that Dean is weighing. The DNC job is no nirvana.
It’s a place where he could make a difference, but it’s like any other
Washington bureaucracy, says a Democratic operative. “There is a huge
institutional pull in the same direction—‘We do it that way because
we’ve always done it that way'.”


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