Mr. Dean's gaffes are viewed as the main reason for his slide in the polls in recent weeks. As a result, Bush strategists disagree with pundits who say the person best positioned to emerge as the Dean alternative is Mr. Clark.
Campaign officials reason that if the Democratic Party balks at nominating Mr. Dean because of his propensity for gaffes, it will be loath to embrace Mr. Clark, whom Miss Iverson called "every bit as gaffe-prone as Howard Dean."
That would leave Mr. Kerry and Mr. Gephardt, both of whom recently have polled well in Iowa. While Mr. Edwards' popularity has surged to a lesser extent, his aversion to criticizing rivals in an increasingly acrimonious contest has positioned him for a possible spot on the Democratic ticket, perhaps as vice president.
Dr. Dean is not dropping because of gaffes, but because of overwhelming negative media exposure. Wesley Clark is clearly the scariest opponent of those left for the Bush wargamers, since Clark essentially comes as their worst nightmare, being that he can credibly put to bed the fictional meme that Democrats "want to bring back Clintonian foreign policy, which requires the permission of the UN."
Examining the record, we see that Clinton followed no such requirement, and Wesley Clark is proof positive in the case of Bosnia.
Beyond that, a Democratic ticket combining the talents of Dean and Clark, whoever ends up being the top man, would clearly worry if not prematurely defeat the Bush war gamers. If this were to be the case, that Clark and Dean would so intimidate the Republicans, can they drop President Bush? What would happen to all the money he's raised?
I only mention this because the Republicans would be better off without Bush, and Cheney, than with them. Any neutral observer would be hard-pressed not to come to the same conclusion, in preemptively considering all the facts and information coming out during the course of the election (that people just aren't paying attention to yet, that will paint Bush and Cheney negatively, and this after catching Saddam hasn't made a bit of difference in popularity).
