For Grossman, [Dean] decision has a winning look

[w4rma]

Steven Grossman remembers vividly the meeting at John F. Kerry's Beacon Hill manse last November, when he broke the news that he was backing Howard Dean's presidential campaign.

"I think he was dumbfounded," said Grossman, who cochaired the senator's 1996 reelection effort against William F. Weld. "I don't think he understood why, after all these years, I was not going to support him."

Kerry might have also been slack-jawed because at the time, Dean was a flyspeck on the political map, and Kerry was almost the presumptive front-runner in a crowded Democratic field.

That all changed as Dean surged to the lead in fund-raising and polls in early voting states. "I know what it is to be a long shot; I was one myself," Grossman said, referring to his failed campaign last year for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination.

But one thing hasn't changed. Grossman, the former national and state party chairman, remains the only major Democratic figure in Massachusetts openly promoting one of Kerry's rivals. As Dean's national cochairman, he is a major fund-raiser and a bridge to influential party figures he worked with as chairman of the Democratic National Committee in the late 1990s.

By Dean's own account, the Newton businessman, activist, and philanthropist was the first national Democratic leader to support him. Grossman said his allegiance to the out-of-stater is less about Kerry, whom he has never publicly criticized, than it is about Dean.

"I believe in Howard," said Grossman, who has known Dean since 1992 when Grossman chaired the Massachusetts Democratic Party. "I observed how he handled himself during the civil unions battle back in 2000. In my 33 years in politics, rarely have I seen a politician willing to put his career on the line and potentially end his career for a matter of principle."
…
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/president/dean/articles/2003/10/12/for_grossman_decision_has_a_winning_look/

[Evanstondem]

1. Grossman has good reasons for supporting Dean

Dean's early opposition to No Child Left Behind is another.

Dean just seems to have a better BS-ometer than the Washington candidates.