Mansfield Fox

Law student. Yankees fan. Massive fraggle. Just living the American dream.

Monday, January 19, 2004

TNR'S DEAN-O-PHOBE SUGGESTS AN INTERESTING POSSIBILITY That a Kerry victory in Iowa actually helps Dean, insofar as it prevents the party from coalescing at an earlier point around an anti-Dean. Does this mean that having two candidates beat him is even better for Dean, since there are now three viable candidates to split the anti-Dean vote? Or does it suggest that the party doesn't need a single anti-Dean, since even a divided field has shown it can squash People-Powered Howard? I know opposition to Dean is the Dean-O-Phobe's raison d'etre, but maybe the race's dynamic has changed such that it's no longer Dean vs. Anti-Dean. Maybe we're back where we were a year ago, with a field of three viable mainstream candidates (except we've replaced Gephardt with Edwards and Lieberman with Clark) and an insurgent Dean as the outside challenger.