Turning Point
After nearly everyone had written him off, John Kerry turned a limping campaign into a force that couldn't be beat. Here's How
Trippi worried that Dean would betray the movement by slipping back into his role as a conventional politician. (After all, Dean had been a six-term governor and a former chairman of the Democratic Governors' Association. He knew how the game was played and how to play it. There was little in his background to suggest he was truly unconventional.) For Trippi, the first bad sign came at the very beginning of the campaign, when Dean gave an electrifying speech before the Democratic National Committee on Feb. 23, 2003. "What I want to know," Dean began, "is why in the world the Democratic Party leadership is supporting the president's unilateral attack on Iraq?" The party elders, including Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota, were reportedly less than overjoyed, which pleased Trippi and dismayed Dean. "Right after the damn DNC speech he heard that Daschle was pissed at him and he turned to Kate [O'Connor, his longtime aide] and asked for her cellphone so he could call Daschle to tell him that he was sorry we offended him," Trippi told U.S. News. "I turned to the governor and said, 'Better put him on speed dial because we're going to be apologizing to him every other day!'" (Trippi recounts a slightly different version in his book.) One reason Trippi promoted the empowerment message so relentlessly is that he was worried that Dean would slip away from it and his Internet base. "It was almost like this internal fight within him," Trippi recalled. "He was a conventional guy that got to be unconventional, but that conventional side would sneak up on him every once in a while, would pull him back in, sometimes at the worst moment." Trippi usually prevailed when it came to maintaining loyalty to the movement, however. In Dean's last TV ad in Iowa before the caucuses, the much-criticized "White Background" ad, Dean faced the camera and said: "This election is about power. About who runs the country and who owns it." Steve McMahon, who made the ad, said he had been handed the script by Trippi and to this day has no idea who wrote it. Trippi said, "Everyone agrees the last spot could have been better." The ad may have been a mistake--Tom Harkin loathed it, feeling the stark background made Dean look isolated and that the message of empowerment was no longer working. "It was not like we were just sitting back and saying things are going swell," Glantz said. "I had been on the plane about a week when I said to Joe, 'Something is wrong. Something is very wrong in Iowa.'" She could sense it from the crowds, which were smaller and less enthusiastic than Dean crowds in other states.
Weeks went by, the problem remained unresolved, and the headquarters staff continued to split into warring factions. Things got so bad that sometimes no two people could agree on the same thing. Even old friends found themselves at odds. "Joe wanted Ford in the campaign," one senior aide said, "but he grew paranoid about Ford, too." Ford put it this way: "Joe was upset with me, and he was often uncomfortable because he didn't feel he could disagree with me because he was respectful of our old relationship." There was also a difference in styles. "Joe governed with an iron hand and had everyone completely terrorized, from the receptionist to the communications director," one senior aide said. Ford's style was different. "I sometimes believe in comic relief. 'Nobody's going to die here,' I would tell people. 'Let's all relax,'" Ford said.
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