What happened to Dean?
From Political Wire
Dean’s “outsider campaign” had trouble assimilating insiders. His plunge coincided almost perfectly with endorsements from Al Gore, the ultimate insider, and Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA), the most coveted endorsement in the state.
Negative ads by Dean and Rep. Dick Gephardt worked perfectly in that nearly destroyed each other.
The capture of Saddam Hussein made the pro-war votes by Sen. John Kerry and Sen. John Edwards more palatable to many Democratic voters. In addition, Dean’s first reaction to the news raised many eyebrows
From Kos
Ouch. Word on the ground is he had the worst media, and far too much of it. Lost his message. All those endorsements (Gore, Bradley, Harkin) directly contradicted his anti-establishment message.
From BOP News
As I said before, I don’t think Kucinich people are going to go for Dean. This is very bad for Dean; he’s not even getting the youth vote.
Edwards just told Larry King on CNN that he had some kind of agreement with Kucinich around getting K’s folks if they didn’t make the required 15% in the caucuses. Also vice versa, not that it mattered.
In other words, Kucinich’s people slipped to Edwards. Probably.