Kerry seeks boost with official bid
Stresses his experience in visits to S.C., Iowa
MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. -- Senator John F. Kerry, who has fallen behind a surging Howard Dean in the polls in New Hampshire, came South yesterday in an orchestrated bid to rejuvenate his Democratic presidential campaign -- this time standing before a storied aircraft carrier.
Later, in Iowa, Kerry conceded that the speechmaking and media blitz carefully planned for this week might not be enough to jumpstart his stalled campaign, and that changes in his political team might be needed, although he said no specific moves were under consideration.
"I always reserve that right, but I've made no decisions at all. I haven't even considered it," Kerry said in Des Moines. "You always leave windows open. If something isn't working properly, you do something."
By choosing to restart in South Carolina a candidacy that began long ago, the Massachusetts senator was trying to make the case that he, rather than Dean, would be a more plausible candidate in a southern state whose primary falls a week after New Hampshire's next year.
In his speech, Kerry explicitly tried to send another message, aimed farther down the campaign road he hopes to travel: That he has the military experience to perform better than President Bush as commander in chief. It was Bush whom the decorated Navy veteran criticized by name, not Dean or any of the seven other candidates for the Democratic nomination.
"Being flown to an aircraft carrier and saying `mission accomplished' doesn't end a war. And the swagger of a president saying `bring `em on' will never bring peace," Kerry said. "At times in the term of the next president, we may well have to use force to fight terrorism. I will not hesitate to do so. But if I am president, the United States will never go to war because we want to, we will only go to war because we have to."
The ceremonial announcement in front of the USS Yorktown, a retired aircraft carrier that saw battle in World War II and the Vietnam War, drew heavily upon symbols of national defense, patriotism, religion, and race in a region where all four count big-time in Democratic politics.
There was a red-white-and-blue backdrop, and reminders that Kerry is the only presidential contender to have fought in a war. He took the stage to strains of "Anchors Aweigh." He was joined by eight crewmates from Vietnam, and called upon one who happens to be an African-American minister from South Carolina to say a prayer in a Bible Belt state where black voters are expected to constitute nearly half of Democratic primary voters.
Seated listeners, sweltering in the heat, tried to stay cool by waving small paper fans, a scene that Kerry said reminded him of an outdoor revival meeting.
"George Bush's vision does not live up to the America I enlisted in the Navy to defend, the America I have fought for in the Senate -- and the America that I hope to lead as president," Kerry, 59, said. "I reject George Bush's radical new vision of a government that comforts the comfortable at the expense of ordinary Americans, that lets corporations do as they please, that turns its back on the very alliances that we helped create and the very principles that have made our nation a model to the world for over two centuries," Kerry added.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan shrugged off Kerry's criticisms of Bush, saying, "I think I'll leave the politics to the Democrats in their primary. The president's continuing to focus on the people's business."
While Bush was the only presidential candidate Kerry mentioned, he challenged Dean in conversations with reporters Monday night and early yesterday morning. In both cases, he said Dean does not have the experience necessary to be president.
"We're in a dangerous world now, and the presidency is no place for on-the-job training," Kerry said en route from Boston to South Carolina on his campaign's chartered plane. "President Bush has proven that beyond any reasonable doubt."
Kerry also dismissed a potential candidacy from another decorated veteran, retired Army general Wesley Clark of Arkansas, saying that while he is a friend and a respected military figure, Clark, too, lacks the experience to be president.
"I think it is a broad lifetime of experience of leadership, of fighting for people, of fighting for what's right, and of helping to show the courage of all Americans that we need right now to do what's right for our country," Kerry said yesterday on NBC's "Today" show. "That's the test that people should apply as to who should be president."
Similarly, Kerry dismissed Dean's poll showings, in part by noting another national poll released over the weekend. It showed that over two-thirds of the people interviewed could not name one Democratic candidate.
"That's why I'm announcing my campaign now and that's why the polls don't mean anything today. America is only just beginning to listen," he said on the tarmac after his plane touched down in Charleston.
Asked whether he had underestimated Dean, Kerry replied: "There was always going to be two or three candidates in a race; we knew that. We're just announcing. [Today] I begin my campaign in earnest."
Political circles have crackled recently with stories that the media consultant Kerry brought into his campaign, veteran wordsmith Robert Shrum, was angering the staff, headed by campaign manager Jim Jordan and advised by John Sasso, who helped former Massachusetts governor Michael S. Dukakis win the Democratic nomination in 1988. In particular, Shrum was described as limiting access to Kerry amid a debate about how strongly to respond to Dean's momentum, including whether to criticize the former Vermont governor in the South Carolina speech.
Yesterday, Kerry initially refused to rule out staff changes in comments to CNN and the Associated Press. Before delivering an evening speech in Des Moines, Kerry released a one-paragraph statement, saying: "I have confidence in my campaign. I have assembled a great team that is going to beat George W. Bush. Any rumors to the contrary are completely erroneous, and there will be no changes."
In a telephone interview, Shrum denied any campaign rift over whether Kerry should criticize Dean in the speech, a conflict that the Associated Press had reported earlier yesterday. Shrum disputed any tension exists between him and Sasso, a Massachusetts political strategist.
"In the process of this speech being written, which John Kerry was very deeply and personally involved in, a lot of people offered suggestions about a lot of ideas," he said. "One debate we did not have -- at all -- was whether this speech should slam Dean. That's just utterly and completely false." As for Sasso, Shrum said: "John Sasso and I are very close friends. That's an insane thing. Usually we agree on almost everything."
In South Carolina, Kerry was introduced by former senator Max Cleland of Georgia, who lost his legs, right arm, and part of his left arm in the Vietnam War. Cleland was introduced by Steve Cheney, a retired Marine Corps general and past commandant of the Parris Island training base. Cleland jabbed at Vice President Dick Cheney's draft deferrals during the Vietnam War, saying of Steve Cheney: "Isn't it nice to have a man named Cheney who actually wore the uniform of the United States?"
Kerry made what appeared to be a veiled swipe at Dean, who was endorsed by the National Rifle Association while governor of Vermont. Kerry proclaimed himself a hunter but said, "I have never gone hunting with an AK-47. Our party will never be the choice of the NRA -- and I'm not looking to be a candidate of the NRA."
The challenge confronting Kerry is large: No sitting senator has been elected president since John F. Kennedy in 1960.
Glen Johnson can be reached at johnson@globe.com.
