Ron Brownstein-Dean's Success May Hinge on Luring Blue-Collar Votes

[realFedUp]

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-upscale21oct21,1,6842295.story?coll=la-home-leftrail

Dean's Success May Hinge on Luring Blue-Collar Votes
Popularity with college graduates might not be enough to capture the nomination, experts say.

By Ronald Brownstein
Times Staff Writer

October 21, 2003

WASHINGTON — Can Howard Dean escape the Starbucks ghetto?

New polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, the critical first two states in the Democratic presidential race, show the former Vermont governor dominating among voters with a college degree — the sort of people more likely to stop at Starbucks than a doughnut shop in the morning. But in both states he is showing much less strength among voters who did not graduate from college.

That sharp educational divide has been a driving force in every recent Democratic race involving candidates, like Dean, who positioned themselves as Washington outsiders and reformers. In those contests, the inability to sufficiently connect with blue-collar and less-educated voters ultimately helped doom contenders like Gary Hart in 1984, Paul Tsongas in 1992 and Bill Bradley in 2000, all of whom generated enthusiasm among better-educated voters.

Many of Dean's rivals believe that he faces the same risk if he cannot build more support among blue-collar voters, especially after the race contracts to a two- or three-person contest after the initial primaries.

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[Classical_Liberal]

1. I believe he will

He certainly isn't having any problems in New Hampshire and Iowa.

[Larkspur]

2. Our Meetup doesn't meet at Starbucks

and we don't fit the media profile of Meetup attendees. That's probably why we don't register with the media.

The exec director of the Connecticut Union that has endorsed Dean, CCAG, attended a large union convention in Connecticut last month and found out that those that had endorsed Gephardt had Dean as their second choice.