Taegan Goddard's Political Wire

February 29, 2004

Inside The Fall of Howard Dean

"The feuding and backbiting that plagued the Howard Dean campaign had turned utterly poisonous. Behind the facade of a successful political operation, senior officials plotted against each other, complained about the candidate and developed one searing doubt."

In interviews with more than a dozen Dean advisers, Howard Kurtz found Dean's campaign "a dysfunctional political family, filled with tales of blocking access to the candidate, neutralizing internal rivals, trying to penalize reporters deemed unfriendly. And some of its members just plain despised each other."

Dean's former chief blogger, Mathew Gross, says Kurtz's article is "a well-balanced, well-documented piece" and "is an accurate portrayal of the internal tensions within the campaign."

However, Howard Dean writes on his blog that "the quotes attributed to me by others in Howard Kurtz's gossipy rendition of the divisions in the Dean for America campaign are entirely false."

Interestingly, Dean also attempts to separate his own future ambitions (as reported last week) from former campaign Joe's Trippi's.

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Taegan D. Goddard is the creator of Political Wire, a political column updated around the clock with the most interesting news, buzz and commentary.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country, including the Washington Post, USA Today, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Philadelphia Inquirer and Christian Science Monitor.

This is a personal site and does not necessarily reflect the views of any company, political campaign or advocacy group.

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