The leading Democratic candidates have signed a pledge not to campaign in any of the so-called rogue states, but once the early primaries are over and New Hampshire's sanctified status is upheld, they'll be in Florida. It's too important a swing state to ignore. And once the party has a nominee, Dean will probably be pushed aside. He'll still be chairman in title, but the nominee will put her or his own people in charge. If Hillary wins the nomination, her longtime consigliere, Harold Ickes, would be an obvious choice to insure the party apparatus is in sync with the campaign.

The spat with Florida is about Dean as much as it is about the inside baseball of securing the nomination. The state chairs love him because of his 50-state strategy. He's determined to rebuild the party, and he's put money and resources into places the national party gave up on a long time ago. But in a year where Democrats are going gangbusters, the DNC lags behind the RNC in fund-raising—the only national Democratic Party apparatus not outpacing its GOP counterpart. A DNC official says the presidential contenders are vacuuming up the money that would otherwise go to the party. But Dean's personality also comes into play. He's not a glad-hander or a natural salesman, like McAuliffe, who's now Hillary's campaign chairman. "He doesn't have good rapport with funders," says a Democratic operative. "He can't connect with these people. He's seen as a left-wing kook. Dennis Kucinich is competing for the same money as Dean."

Two members of the Florida congressional delegation, Sen. Bill Nelson and Rep. Alcee Hastings, held a press conference last week to announce they had filed a lawsuit charging the DNC (Dean is also named in the suit) with depriving Florida voters of due process, noting the state's history of voter suppression. One of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit is an African-American woman who lives in one of five counties in Florida under judicial watch because of past discrimination. A reporter asked if it was "embarrassing" to charge the national party with racial discrimination. "We're shedding light not to embarrass but to correct an inherent wrong," Hastings replied. The DNC has not formally commented other than to say through a spokesperson that the committee found it "disappointing" that this path was taken, especially after months of negotiation. A spokeswoman told NEWSWEEK that because Florida had not sought a waiver from the Justice Department to move the date, the suit could be derailed on a technicality.

Florida is still talking about the right to vote 42 years after the Voting Rights Act passed and seven years after the 2000 vote debacle, Hastings said. These facts seem to have eluded a certain medical doctor from Montpelier, Vt.

© 2007