The media corps is always looking for a good horse race, which probably explains the headline on this Yahoo!/Reuters story: Kerry Holds Off Edwards in Wisconsin.
The count as of this article was Kerry 40%, Edwards 35%, which is a good showing for Edwards. Dean's distant 18% effectively ends his run as a viable contender, whether or not he decides to formally withdraw at this point.
The big contests in two weeks will be California, New York and Ohio. Edwards would have to make a huge and unlikely surge in those states to still have a realistic shot at the nomination. But emerging as the second contender in a race that included Dean the surprise insurgent and such well-known national Democrats as Dick Gephardt and Joe Lieberman certainly makes him an attractive possibility for Vice President.
Nick Confessore at TAPPED offered a fresh perspective on Tuesday on the meaning of Wesley Clark's Presidential run, arguing that he opening the way for Kerry's surge by coming into the race as a strong critic of the Iraq War who also had particularly impressive national security credentials. "By early January, Kerry was vocally anti-Bush and was very critical of the administration's Iraq policy; like Clark, he had a military background, but unlike Clark, he had broad (if not exactly passionate) appeal to different segment of the party and more substance on domestic issues. With Clark faltering, Kerry was the natural next candidate."
3 comments:
I think Edwards can make a good run at Kerry if he can scrape a little money together before Super Tuesday. His "two Americas" message will play well in the states that have been hit hard by manufacturing job losses. And there's four Southern primaries on March 9.
In exit polls, Kerry is killing Edwards on "electability," but Edwards is leading on "likeability." And both are 10 points ahead of Bush in the latest CNN/USAToday poll.
The "CW" (conventional wisdom) of the week is that a lively contest is good for the Democrats. Given the current state of the political press corps, that's probably true. As long as they have a Dem "horse race" to talk about, they'll be focusing some attention on the candidates. Otherwise they might have to focus on, say, actual issues. The Bush AWOL story has been pretty quiet this week. Hey, there were no "interns" involved, so how long can the mainstream press stay focused? - Bruce
I think a little bit of a contest is good for the Democrats. Without one, the press is going to lose interest and there'll be a couple of months of nothing but Bush gearing up the smear machine. As long as they attack Bush more than they attack each other, it's all good.
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