Kerry, McCain know NH primary's value

[Mass]

http://www.unionleader.com/article/20110917/NEWS06/709179979




Kerry and McCain shared memories of their presidential runs during a panel discussion following the dinner and awards. The event, which also honored late Washington Post political reporter David Broder, was a who's who of New Hampshire's politically connected, including the state's entire congressional delegation, Gov. John Lynch, numerous state legislators and political operatives both Republican and Democrat.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen took the podium to hand Kerry his award and recalled the grim days in 2003 when the Massachusetts senator was struggling in the polls. He received help from the state firefighter union, which held chili dinners in Kerry's honor and put him in front of thousands of voters.

“Throughout his successes, he still remembers those chili feeds, the cold New Hampshire days of New Hampshire retail politics,” said Shaheen. “John Kerry brought out the best in the New Hampshire primary as the New Hampshire primary brought out the best in John Kerry.”

[MBS]

1. nice article!

And yes, those firefighters were key to the campaign, especially to the primaries.
But I do think that, in JK's case, it was the Iowa campaign that really made people take him seriously. (In a way, a NH win was expected. . )
In both cases, I agree totally that the demand for up-close-and-personal campaigning is good for the candidates themselves, as well as for the voters and the process.
In both cases (I did phone calls for both, and in-person campaigning in NH), it was such a pleasure to interact with voters who knew the issues, and/or WANTED to get to know the candidates and the issues. I thought more than once: if all states had the same attitude to elections, maybe we wouldn't be in the fix we're in.
(In 2004, the Repubs made me angry. But it was the apathetic, lazy and/or ignorant citizens (as some of them didn't even bother to register, so it seemed inappropriate to call them voters) who made me angriest of all. )