Nation-Building >> post-mortems on the campaign abound | return to front page

The link goes to a USA Today story that essentially blames Rogan for dysfunction within the campaign. Contrast that piece with this one in the Times that blames Trippi. Then there's also the WBUR radio show "The Connection" which featured a number of analysts, including Matthew Gross and TNR's Ryan Lizza, which takes a broader look at what worked, what didn't, and what the legacy of the campaign's innovation was.

I think what most of the analyses are missing is an understanding of the point that Dean imself made in his final speech:

Change is hard work. Change does not happen simply because you go to a rally and simply because you make phone calls -- and I know how hard everybody here has worked. But change is a process that you can never give up on because change is the state of America and change is the state of humankind.

In a sense, most of the analysts above saw Dean's failure as one of process, namely problems with personalities or gafes or strategy. But in doing so, they set the bar of expectation very high. Dean's campaign has already succeeded in its three basic goals that I laid out earlier in my post-Deanism entry, namely :

1. bring Americans back into the political process
2. force the Democratic party to stand up for its beliefs
3. transcend the divisive politics of Left-Right/Us-Them

There's a strong sense running through th epost-mrtems on the campaign that it failed to properly channel the powerful forces it has harnessed. I see it more as succeeding in releasing those forces, with no pretense of harnessing them. Ryan Lizza said in the radio show that he though Dean never really made his case to the larger electorate beyond the core Deaniac base; but I think that Lizza is getting ahead of himself. That broader appeal is a process that could only begin this cycle, not finish.