Journalist crafts simplistic but effective plan to stop Howard Dean’s campaign

As regular readers may know, I’ve taken a more-than-passive interest in former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean’s presidential campaign. For a number of reasons, I’ve reluctantly come to the conclusion that it’s in everyone’s interests — particularly those of us anxious to replace Bush in 2004 — for Dem primary voters to reject Dean’s candidacy.

Dean, however, is not going away. Indeed, the Dean for America campaign is stronger now than ever, even exceeding the expectations of some of his most loyal backers.

Oddly enough, every significant attack levied on Dean by Democratic rivals seems to backfire. The centrist DLC urged party leaders to dismiss Dean as part of the “McGovern-Mondale” wing of the party, and the campaign used it as an effective rallying cry for liberals to “reclaim” what it means to be a Democrat. Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry attacked Dean on national security grounds, and it ended up making Kerry look like a bully and Dean sympathetic.

More importantly, each incident raised Dean’s public profile. For months, the good doctor’s biggest problem was getting noticed, especially since many in the media dismiss him as a quirky doctor from a small New England state. Every time his rivals go after him, Dean generates new and broader support from voters who didn’t know that they liked him and new interest from reporters who didn’t know they were supposed to follow him.

This prompted Chuck Todd, a reporter for National Journal and editor of The Hotline, to draw a conclusion that is both brilliant and stunningly obvious — if you want to stop Dean, ignore him.

Todd concludes that “the anti-Dean forces need to tone it down” because the high-profile public criticisms are “like rocket fuel for the guy.”

“The best cure for Dr. Deanitis may be, ‘Pause for two seconds and ignore him in the morning, the afternoon and night,'” Todd wrote in his column this week. “Dean is a free-media machine. It might be wise for the establishment wing to pull back on its attacks.”

I think Todd is completely right about this. Kerry’s campaign, in my opinion, made a tactical error when they brought public attention to Dean’s poorly timed and poorly phrased comments about Iraq and Saddam Hussein.

I understand the strategy. Kerry’s folks figured a big debate over whether Dean was qualified to be commander in chief would cut their way. The debate’s very existence would play in their favor because it would raise doubts in voters’ minds about Dean’s competence. (It’s like in West Wing last fall when Bartlett mocked the intelligence of Ritchie, starting a long, drawn out flap about how dumb the Republican was.)

The mistake was overestimating Dean’s significance. Kerry’s supposed to be the front runner while Dean is pulling mid-single digits. By starting this fight, Kerry unintentionally put Dean on his level.

I think the party would be wise to take Todd’s advice. I have a hunch the silent treatment would drive Dean batty.