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INSIGHT
Documentary About Dean Campaign
Aired March 4, 2004 - 23:00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN HOST (voice-over): How do you go from this to this?
HOWARD DEAN, FMR. DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I am no longer actively pursuing the presidency.
MCEDWARDS: The rise and fall of Howard Dean.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Hello and welcome. I'm Colleen McEdwards, in for Jonathan Mann.
This time last year, the governor of Vermont, Howard Dean, had high hopes of becoming the president of the United States. He surprised his opponents with his ability to raise money on the Internet and to tap into the discontent of American liberals.
He looked like a sure winner, and then the fall.
At the first crucial contest in Iowa he placed third. About a week later, his campaign manager was gone. A month later, Dean was out of the race.
On INSIGHT today, the anatomy of a campaign collapse. A new documentary offers a fascinating glimpse inside a Dean campaign in disarray at a critical moment.
Here's a look at what happened in Iowa.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's win with Dean, man.
There's a guy boxing with a George Bush dummy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you so much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just keep doing it. Keep doing it. Don't let up. Don't let up.
DEAN: If you're willing to get out here in the snow, so will I. And let's go take back our country.
(MUSIC)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Front page story tomorrow (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) but we wanted to get your reaction (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's margin of error. The national numbers change in a second after Iowa and New Hampshire. In a second.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The new Gallup "USA Today" poll.
DEAN: Haven't seen it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Us 24 nationally, Clark 20.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We win here, we're already at 560,000 people. We start winning states, lots of other people are going to join up. It all starts here and they will try to stop it here.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) 40 points in New Hampshire, but we're going to bounce out of here. You can't underestimate the impact that Iowa has on New Hampshire. It's going to scramble the chess board and you're not going to know what's going to happen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I even think Kerry is so weak right now that if he took second here, I'm not sure he'd get a big enough bump there to go by Clark.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Four years ago, Dean had almost nothing nice to say about the Iowa caucuses.
DEAN: If you look at the caucuses system, they are dominated by the special interests on both sides in both parties. Special interests don't represent the centrist tendencies of the American people. They represent the extremes.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you think Iowa caucus goers are still.
(CROSSTALK)
DEAN: I never thought they were.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Didn't you say that just a few years ago?
DEAN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's the people stupid, is what I would tell -- no. It's the people, stupid. It is the subject line. Do not change the subject line. I just said it. It's the people, stupid.
DEAN: 1992, Bill Clinton said it's the economy, stupid. This time, it's the people, stupid. Washington is going to change and we're going to change it. Thank you very much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) news.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He said Clinton said in.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now it's the people, stupid?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, you know, people will go with that. They're out of their minds. That's what the whole campaign is about.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's the people, stupid. Has anybody used it?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's been saying it the last two stops.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's the message. Don't we deserve to at least get our message out?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here's the attack. What's your response? Here's the attack. What's your response? Here's the attack. What's your response? And when you get through all that, you have no message.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It seems like the other candidates are closing in.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We'll see on Monday. We don't see that. We're going to win.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How's the blog handling all of this? You know, the polls saying it's a dead heat, all that kind of stuff. How are they reacting?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Some are doing the sky is falling. Some people are saying it's not about the sky is falling. You got to be positive. Some people are (UNINTELLIGIBLE). There's definitely some of the sort of freaking out attitude.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kerry 25. Us 19. Gephardt 19. You know what I think?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If we get into a back and forth with Gephardt, who benefits from that? Not either one of us, not this late.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Edwards.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kerry or Edwards.
I don't know, can you get me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Too many glitches at this stage in the game. What, down to five days before the Iowa caucus. And the campaign seems to be lacking in structure.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does anybody know why headquarters isn't answering the phone?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know, but neither is the hotline. The hotline is not answering either.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's not a good understanding of how to deal with the press.
The governor himself hasn't been on lately. He's been tinkering with his message, he's been tinkering with his style.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Next time when you pick them up, turn to the cameras and pick them up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you very much, you're wonderful. Thank you. Thank you so much. Vote for Dean.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governor Dean the other day complained that Joe Trippi was getting more flash than Governor Dean was getting.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're really real.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Joe Trippi may even be bigger than Governor Dean in some circles.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I see Dean people. I hate that sign.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's the point of that?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know, but it comes from the movie slogan "I see dead people."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What do you think it's going to be?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know what everybody else is doing, Joe? They're doing this. Talking to smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller. And we're just growing, baby, every day.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, 36,000 of 130 (ph) would be 28 percent. Should be enough. So it's between us and Gephardt, or you don't think it's between us and anybody?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think it's between us and Kerry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Got it? Great. Thanks for walking with me.
I'm Joe Trippi. I'm running the governor's campaign for president. We need to get everybody to the caucuses that we can. I mean, it's going to be close here. Talk to your neighbors for us, OK? And bring your family. Thank you so much. We really appreciate your time.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE). I don't know if we're second or third, but Gephardt is in fourth place (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If anyone is feeling worried by the newest numbers, it is likely to be Kerry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why is Kerry on every single (EXPLETIVE DELETED) station? Because I just got asked by NBC out there in the neighborhood when I was walking.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Some news agencies are kind of writing your obituary right now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is that what's going on?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He walks out of the house with Jimmy Carter, Jimmy and Rosalind with him, and they get out the house, and when they do the wave to the camera stuff, he doesn't say -- he doesn't say great to be here with the president and the first lady. Doesn't say that. He turns to the cameras and says, "Hey, guys, new Zogby poll out tonight." I swear. I swear to God. It's true. It's true.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I love Howard. He's genuine, authentic and rule.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's true.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Walked into the newsroom and said, I want to make one thing clear. I didn't invite him. And I'm not endorsing him.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, for so long in this campaign, nothing went wrong.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What I'm saying is, are you getting, seeing Kerry surging (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You think we're going to win?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You think Kerry will get by us here?
I mean I'd rather hear it than.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. I don't know. He's doing well in this part of the state.
DEAN: You and all those people you dragged to the caucus have the power to take the White House back in 2004, and that is exactly what we're going to do. Thank you very much.
(MUSIC)
DEAN: Thanks a lot.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You are hot. That is the message. You're doing it.
DEAN: Now we're just got to make sure that we win.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're going to kick ass tonight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You cannot move in Iowa without seeing orange hats on every corner, knocking on every door.
DEAN: Help all those people you identified this week get to the caucus, and we'll see you at the victory celebration in Des Moines tonight. Thank you very much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I am serenely calm.
(MUSIC)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is it?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Taken from a pure polling stand point, which I know isn't a straight comparison, but if it doesn't get any better, it means that we just, you know, we just tipped flat and never got any back and they kept moving. Kerry in particular.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hello?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hey. It appears that (UNINTELLIGIBLE). Kerry 34, Edwards 23, (UNINTELLIGIBLE) and Gephardt 11.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Should Gina tell him?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, go ahead. OK. Bye.
DEAN: We're going to South Carolina and Oklahoma and Arizona and North Dakota and New Mexico and we're going to California and Texas and New York.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've only just begun to fight. And we're the insurgent again.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hello? Yes.
JOHN KERRY, U.S. DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE: I have only just begun to fight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. I will. Keep it going. Thanks.
That was the governor. Kerry is giving my stump speech.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MCEDWARDS: And that unique look at the Dean campaign was a segment from an hour-long CNN special, "True Believers: Life Inside the Dean Campaign."
We're going to take a short break, but when we come back, a closer look at what went wrong.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MCEDWARDS (voice-over): Howard Dean always had a somewhat difficult relationship with the media. He was often portrayed as angry and unpredictable, unable to win over the Democratic mainstream. And then there was the scream.
DEAN: . and Oregon and Washington and Michigan and then we're going to Washington, D.C. to take back the White House.
MCEDWARDS: The clip played over and over and then some. The media focused less on Dean's policies and more on his personalities.
DEAN: The news media does what the news media does. They're an entertainment business at least as much as a news media. When you chose to play it 673 times in one week.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MCEDWARDS: Welcome back.
Howard Dean says what he thinks, and that's what many of his supporters say attracted them to him.
He was outspoken not just about Bush, but about the other candidates for the nomination. Was that his downfall?
A short while ago, we got in touch with Dean's former campaign chairman Steve Grossman.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
STEVE GROSSMAN, FMR. DEAN CAMPAIGN CHAIRMAN: Well, I think, Colleen, that at the very moment the voters of Iowa were paying the most attention, the campaign had a series of self-inflicted wounds that all sort of started, in my judgment, with the very negative campaign that Howard Dean and Dick Gephardt ran against one another.
It was kind of like two scorpions in a bottle with a death struggle going on and what the voters of Iowa rejected at the Iowa caucuses on January 19 was negative campaigning. They rewarded John Kerry and John Edwards for a more positive campaign and they certainly penalized both Howard Dean and Dick Gephardt for running a kind of negative, vitriolic campaign that they felt was a little bit beyond what they had hoped to see.
MCEDWARDS: Did that contribute to the image that some people felt that Dean had, that he was angry all the time? Do you think that contributed to it, or to what extent did the media play a role in that as well?
GROSSMAN: Well, to some extent. I mean, Howard was angry. He was angry at the fact that the president had, in his judgment, lied to the American people about the reasons for going to war. But the American people invite a president into their living room every night for four years and they make a judgment about someone, and at the very moment when Howard needed to humanize himself, when he needed to talk about himself as the physician, the caregiver, the man who had been in family practice with his wife, Judy, for more than 10 years, and what he learned from that.
He wasn't talking about those things that, again, humanized himself, and I think that hurt him. People didn't get a sense of the man and they didn't develop the relationship with the candidate that they needed to develop in order to vote for him.
MCEDWARDS: So is that the fault of Howard Dean, then, or the fault of his campaign? I mean, published reports have taken this campaign apart. They have called it a civil war, that there was back biting, feuding. Was it that bad?
GROSSMAN: Well, look, there may have been some of that. I think every campaign has its growing pains, and this is a campaign that went from 1/2 of 1 percent to leading the national polls.
But at some fundamental level, I think the candidate has to decide how to project to the people who are going to vote for you and create a sense of likability and to create a relationship, and it was always surprising to me that Howard, the man who had the most intimate relationships with patients and with people in Vermont, whom he had given healthcare too, seniors who had had to cut their prescription drugs in half, people whom he had helped, he never dramatized that by bringing those real people into his story and so he never really developed the relationship with the voters that he needed to develop in order to win.
MCEDWARDS: And I'm sure you would have said that to him.
GROSSMAN: I did.
MCEDWARDS: I'm sure you would have sat down with him and said, you know, this is what you have to do. Did he not listen?
GROSSMAN: Well, I said it to him on some occasions, it was a matter of some frustration.
But again, this campaign was growing by leaps and bounds. This campaign had a message of political empowerment. This campaign had a message of giving the people a sense that participatory politics was being revitalized and being renewed, and people were flocking to it, by the hundreds of thousands.
So when you have a strong campaign and a lot of momentum, it's hard to change gears and in those last 17 days, he didn't make the sale.
MCEDWARDS: And you raise the interesting point that things did go so well for so long. I mean, to what do you attribute the success early on?
GROSSMAN: Well, I think he tapped into a vein of discontent among the American people. He was blunt. He was direct. He was authentic. He wasn't giving people two answers to every question. He wasn't speaking out of both sides of his mouth. People learned to look at him and say he's a little like John McCain, the straight express.
And that propelled him a long way. But then when you got to those last 17 days, a couple of events took place. There was a town meeting in which he told a man in no uncertain terms in a somewhat negative way, to sit down, you're finished now I'm talking, and people developed a sense of concern about demeanor and temperament. And I don't think it was legitimate, but that's what they saw, and they've got to go with what they saw.
Also, there was a tape that was played of an interview that was four years old, where Howard Dean had talked about caucuses as being in the hands of extremists, in the hands of special interests. And you don't say to the people of Iowa at the very moment that we're on the national and international stage, that they are extremists and that they're special interest. You welcome then. You embrace them. And that was a very, very negative moment in this campaign.
MCEDWARDS: But, you know, isn't that the job of the campaign, though, to manage those types of issues that inevitably come up? People say things that come back to haunt them. Candidates say things that don't play the way they're expected to.
Where did the campaign fail him?
GROSSMAN; Well, 20/20 hindsight says that you review those tapes, you realize you have a problem. And six months earlier, you say I'm sorry to the people of Iowa for statements that I made. I now understand, having been to all 99 counties how wrong I was, and I've learned humbly that participatory politics is what Iowans are all abut. You get rid of the problems six months in advance. You don't wait until 10 days before the Iowa caucuses, a tape comes out of the blue and your polling numbers drop by more than 10 percent overnight, 10 points overnight.
MCEDWARDS: Mr. Grossman, did Howard Dean it -- you talk about those last 17 days. At what point did he know there was trouble.
GROSSMAN: Well, I think he knew that he was in a battle. John Kerry was out there growing and John Edwards was the happy warrior, campaigning in a way that was very likeable. He rejected the negative campaigning, but again, we felt that we were in a battle with Dick Gephardt, and to be in a battle with Dick Gephardt, who was furling these negative ads across the airways, we got into that negative, vitriolic campaign, and it was regrettable, and I think obviously if you had to do it over again, you would do it differently. But in politics, there are no re-dos, as you and I both know.
MCEDWARDS: That's true.
Steve Grossman, I think you for your thoughts. Appreciate it.
GROSSMAN: Colleen, thanks for having me.
MCEDWARDS: We have to take a short break. When we come back, what Dean did right.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MCEDWARDS: They were known as the Deaniacs, the mostly young (UNINTELLIGIBLE) supporters of Howard Dean. Many had never voted before. They felt alienated from Washington politics.
Howard Dean energized and inspired them in a way that they say no other politician had been able to do.
Welcome back.
The number of young people who vote in the us has been steadily declining.
Howard Dean's campaign saw those borders as an untapped resource.
We spoke to former advisor to President Clinton and CNN "CROSSFIRE" host Paul Begala about how Governor Dean managed to draw in the disenfranchised.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAUL BEGALA, "CROSSFIRE": Well, some of it was stylistic. Howard Dean spoke English, he spoke Americans. He talked like a regular guy. He didn't have the Washington bureaucratic ease that many of the Senators he was running against seemed to latch into. So that helped.
He looked and acted and talked like a regular guy. The style, with the sleeves rolled up and the plain spoken language effective. Some of the (UNINTELLIGIBLE), the substance. Keep in mind in 2002 my party was traumatized when President Bush and the Republicans just steamrolled us across the country.
The very first time in decades that a president in his first midterm gained seats. They always loose them after they get elected. Bush gained them in part because Democrats wimped out and laid down. Dean was the first guy to stand up and fight. A lot of young people really like that. They like some toughness in their candidates and they wanted some voter fire, and he taped in to both substance and style, which those young voters wanted.
MCEDWARDS: So what do you think John Kerry gleans from this?
BEGALA: A couple of things. First, I think Dean's courage in taking on Bush has emboldened Senator Kerry and the whole rest of the Democratic Party, all the way down to county chairmen and county commissioners. So that has been a lasting legacy. I think Kerry, who has seen the effectiveness of standing up the way that Dean did. Do you think also Dean taught him and all of us now to raise money, big money, ethically.
(UNINTELLIGIBLE) $1 million without a taint of scandal or special interest support, because he did it through the Internet. And Kerry and everybody else is going to be copying that for years to come.
MCEDWARDS: Well, I'm sure Senator Kerry would also love to get his hands on Howard Dean's list of contributors. Apparently Howard Dean doesn't really want to give them up. What's going on there?
BEGALA: Well, Governor Dean is a good Democrat. I think at the end of the day he wants to defeat President Bush, at lest he said so, and I certainly believe him when he says that. And so I think he'll do everything he can, including contacting his supporters -- I certainly expect him to be contacting his supporters, asking them to contribute money to John Kerry.
Of course, they're not robots. They're not automatons. These Dean voters are fiercely independent, but I think that Governor Dean would do well for the party and frankly for the country to ask his folks to send a couple of bucks to John Kerry the same way they did to him.
MCEDWARDS: Where do the Dean supporters go? I mean, is moving to John Kerry, Senator Kerry, a natural fit?
BEGALA: Not necessarily, no, not necessarily natural.
They've got to -- Senator Kerry, that is, has to reach out to them and meet them where they live. I think he's done a good job, Kerry has, of walking away from some of that stilted, stentorian, senatorial language that he used to use and more like Dean, speaking like a regular guy.
He's got to also appeal to them through the technology they understand. He's got a good Web site, Kerry does, a lot of policy and substance, a lot of very solid stuff on it.
So he's going to have to reach them and ask them for their support. I think one of the reasons young people supported Howard Dean is he was the first one to go and ask them, and I think John Kerry needs to do the same thing.
MCEDWARDS: And what about Ralph Nader?
BEGALA: Ralph Nader I think will infuriate most of the Howard Dean supporters.
First off, Nader was a relentless critic of Governor Dean's. There was Howard Dean saying all the things that we used to think Ralph Nader actually believed in and Nader was banging on him, attacking him every day.
Now Nader will try to go and get some of those Dean supporters, and I would just tell them you have two options if you want to reelect George W. Bush. You can vote for President Bush himself or you can vote for Ralph Nader. Because every single vote that is cast for Ralph Nader is a vote that's going to help President Bush.
MCEDWARDS: People are certainly going to remember Howard Dean as the candidate who took a spectacular fall, but what are they going to remember about what he did for the Democratic Party?
BEGALA: I think he's already and always will be remembered as the guy in the year 2003 who gave us back our spine and gave us back our soul.
I was worried that he would lose to Bush, frankly, in the end. I didn't think he had the sort of foreign policy experience that we needed, so I wasn't like a true believer in Dean at all. I was a critic of his. But even his critics, like me, have to point out that he gave us some spine, he gave us some soul. He toughened up his party again.
Nobody now is using the words liberal and wimp together. I think Dean decoupled those and I think Kerry now benefits from that as a war hero himself. He's nobody's wimp and I think that's a wonderful contribution to the Democratic Party that Dean has made.
MCEDWARDS: Paul Begala, we have to leave it there. Thanks.
BEGALA: Thanks a lot.
MCEDWARDS: That is this edition of INSIGHT. I'm Colleen McEdwards. Tune in to CNN this weekend for the hour-long special "True Believers: Life Inside the Dean Campaign."
For now, though, the news continues on CNN.
END
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