Don't sweat it

A message from Joe Trippi, campaign manager for Howard Dean:

Do what we have learned to do in Burlington HQ when it comes to the press and the rest of the candidates -- we don't pay attention to them and remain focused on our plans and implement them. We just went through a 90 day period in which they ridiculed our strategy of putting our campaign in the hands of citizens organizing for themselves and for their country. Did any of that reporting or the other candidates jortling stop us from emerging into the top tier of candidates? Raise more money than any of the established candidates? Surge to a tie with Gephardt in the latest Iowa polling? Become the only candidate to be in contention with Kerry in New Hampshire? The key to a presidential campaign is to keep the focus and to not let the press or the other campaigns take you off path. It is amazing now to read the quotes of people who never saw this coming -- now being the people who are explaining what it all means. We have the power to show them exactly what it means -- it means people are getting involved in their democracy -- and understand that corporate soft money, special interest money and wealthy contributors who seek Washington's favors have power only because the people have not acted together to pool the power of each of us as individuals into an effort to reclaim government of the people. It will take a herculean effort of the people -- at least 1 million Americans dedicated to the effort of restoring our community and our place as a Idealistic moral force in the world, to right our nation's path. We are now 180,000 strong and growing. Patriots who care deeply enough about what is going on to do something about it. We need to swell our ranks again over the next 85 days. It does not matter what the Kerry campaign does or if they grow or not -- the other campaigns and the press have failed to grasp what this campaign is about -- our cause is America itself -- and even Karl Rove will find it hard to stop that cause when carried by millions of Americans. Millions? Yes Millions. You are among the first 180,000 in the great grassroots campaign of the modern era. We must use every tool on the Internet, and outreach via leafleting, fairs, community events, door-knocking and phone calling to call others to our effort. Consider sitting down and handwriting a few letters to everyone who is close to you regardless of where they live. Ask them to consider Howard Dean and ask them to join our campaign by signing up on our website. We have 85 days left -- 85 days to build a campaign of people, a campaign of participation, a campaign that changes our politics and our country for the better, a campaign that will win the nomination, and the White House -- even if the press and Washington never understand what we are about. Joe Trippi

Joe makes a very important point in this message: we must remain focused on our objectives and not allow ourselves to get distracted by irrelevancies. For example, there have been a recent flurry of conversation about Karl Rove publicly cheering Dean supporters and suggesting to reporters that they would just love it if the Dems were to nominate Dean. Some Dean supporters have argued that this proves that Rove is afraid of Dean otherwise why go out of your way to scare the Dems away from nominating him. Of course, it is also possible the Rove is performing a double-fake-out in order to get us to nominate the candidate he really does think he can beat. Your head can really start to spin when you start thinking about this kind of stuff to hard. Joe Trippi suggests the best solution: don't sweat it. Don't worry so much about the strategy of the opposing campaigns. Just do what needs to be done now in order to win. The rest will take care of itself. Rove would like nothing more then for us to get into spiral of paranoid confusion as we try to figure out what he is going to do next to defeat the Dems. Don't give him the satisfaction. Just reflect fondly on the idea of sending him copies of that story once Dean wins in 2004.