After win some Dems are asking for Dean's head

After Win, Democrats Revert to Finger-Pointing - New York Times November 16, 2006 Political Memo After Win, Democrats Revert to Finger-Pointing By ADAM NAGOURNEY WASHINGTON, Nov. 15 — One would think that after their biggest electoral triumph in about a decade, Democrats would finally break their usual postelection syndrome — a November loss followed by recriminations, finger-pointing and infighting. Well, think again. The Democrats are celebrating their big victory of Nov. 7 with recriminations, finger-pointing and infighting, no matter that they won control of the Senate and the House for the first time since 1994. State Democratic leaders are saying Howard Dean, the party chairman, is not receiving the credit he deserves for the triumph. Offering a rather different view, two leading party strategists rebuked Mr. Dean on Wednesday, saying the Democrats could have captured 40 House seats rather than 29 had Mr. Dean bowed to demands by Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, leader of the effort to recapture the House, to put more money into Congressional races. “I would describe his leadership as Rumsfeldian in its incompetence,” one strategist, James Carville, said of Mr. Dean. Liberal bloggers say they are not receiving the credit they deserve and are chafing at how what they call the mainstream media has showered too much credit on Mr. Emanuel and his Senate counterpart, Charles E. Schumer of New York, for the sweep. “Rahm won everything” was the headline on a sarcastic post on MyDD, a liberal Web site. On Capitol Hill, soon-to-be Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California has waded into a leadership fight that has divided her caucus, providing the public — in its first glimpse of the incoming Congress — with a reminder of just how much Democrats like to rumble. Democrats, if grimacing, sought to put the best face on the latest episode of that familiar Washington series, Democrats in Disarray. “We are a diverse party,” said Donald Fowler, a veteran South Carolina Democratic leader. “We have different people from different backgrounds, and we see things differently both in terms of style and issues.” Mr. Fowler sighed before letting out: “We’re nuts! We’re all nuts!” Larry Gates, the Democratic chairman in Kansas, where Democrats stunned Republicans by capturing a once very-red seat, said: “This is what we Democrats do. A little bit of success, and we start to fight.” So it was that Stan Greenberg, the Democratic pollster, and Mr. Carville used the forum of a Monitor Breakfast, a gathering of newsmakers and reporters, to say Mr. Dean wasted an opportunity to make historic gains by refusing to take resources out of his effort to build up parties in all 50 states and put them into Congressional races. Mr. Greenberg said that Republicans held 14 seats by a single percentage point and that a small investment by Mr. Dean could have put Democrats into a commanding position for the rest of the decade. “There was a missed opportunity here,” he said. “I’ve sat down with Republican pollsters to discuss this race: They believe we left 10 to 20 seats on the table.” Mr. Carville, whose close ties to former President Bill Clinton and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York have prompted speculation that he is attacking Mr. Dean on their behalf, said the Democratic National Committee had taken out a $10 million line of credit and used barely half of it. “They left money on the table,” he said. Asked whether Mr. Dean should step down, he responded, loudly, in the affirmative. “He should be held accountable,” Mr. Carville said. In an interview later, he asked, “Do we want to go into ’08 with a C minus general at the D.N.C.?” Aides to Mr. and Mrs. Clinton said Mr. Carville had not cleared his attacks on Mr. Dean with them. The attacks set off recriminations in Mr. Dean’s base, state parties that have benefited from his decision to channel millions of dollars to them. “Asking Dean to step down now, after last week, is equivalent to asking Eisenhower to resign after the Normandy invasion,” Mr. Fowler said. “It’s just nonsense. “Carville and Greenberg — those people are my friends — they are just dead wrong. They wanted all that money to go to Washington consultants and speechwriters and pollsters. This kind of nonsense is destructive of the party.” The Democratic chairman in Michigan, Mark Brewer, said party money had allowed Michigan to re-elect its Democratic governor and senator. “This is a zero-sum game,” Mr. Brewer said. “That money would have had to come from somewhere. We should be looking forward to future endeavors, and not attacking at this moment of great triumph.” Mr. Dean was traveling and not available for comment, aides said. At Democratic National Committee headquarters, the communications director, Karen Finney, insisted that Mr. Dean had spent money on House races through the final hours, notwithstanding his announcement in the campaign that his top priority was rebuilding state parties, even in longtime Republican states. Ms. Finney expressed incredulity that Democrats would be going after Democrats in this of all weeks. “Did he not see that we won?” she said of Mr. Carville. “Did he not read the results? If James and Stan are interested in knowing what the D.N.C. is doing and has done, they can pick up the telephone and give me a call.” Mr. Emanuel warred with Mr. Dean over his refusal to provide as much money as Mr. Emanuel said he needed. He said Wednesday that a favored candidate, Tammy Duckworth, the severely injured Iraq war veteran running for an open Republican seat in Illinois, had lost because the Republicans had spent $1 million on negative advertisements against her in the final weekend and that he did not have the money to respond. Mr. Carville and Mr. Greenberg have been close to Mr. Emanuel since they worked in the Clinton White House in 1992. Asked about the criticism of the two, Mr. Emanuel said he would offer precisely these two sentences: “More resources brings more seats into play. Full stop.” There was also some lesser blame passing. Mr. Emanuel suggested that Democrats had fallen just short of picking up the seat held by Representative Christopher Shays, Republican of Connecticut, because Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, a registered Democrat, had sought re-election on an independent line after losing the Democratic primary. That brought out more Republican votes. Mr. Greenberg fumbled when asked in a two-part question whether he agreed with some Democrats that a botched joke by Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts and the White House attack on it might have made the difference in very close races where Democrats lost, like the effort to defeat Representative Heather A. Wilson in New Mexico. “Bah-bah-bah-bah, let me go to the first question,” Mr. Greenberg said haltingly before returning, with prompting, to the original question, allowing that the Kerry episode might have “moved the needle a little bit.”