Maine mortgage quote

PRESIDENTIAL POLS & POLITICS; It's all in the timing, Long Jawn

On the Trail

JOHN F. KERRY'S campaign thought it had learned its lesson after the debacle of the Iowa caucuses. That night, Kerry waited for the losers to speak.

And they spoke, and spoke, and spoke - pushing Kerry past the 11 p.m. news.

As returns arrived Tuesday in New Hampshire, Kerry's people decided they wanted to pull a surprise and go out first. The idea was to quickly declare victory, get out of town and let the losers take the later air time. Instead, Kerry delayed, and delayed,and delayed.

Finally, retired Gen. Wesley Clark decided to take the stage. That prompted action - and Kerry hopped onstage.

Clark was whisked off as Kerry started to speak. But Kerry quickly dripped into Senatespeak and took what should have been an eight- minute victory dance into a 20-minute disaster.

Clark, Jonathan Edwards and Joseph Lieberman took the stage anyway and all the networks drifted away from Kerry.

So last didn't work, first didn't work. Maybe this Tuesday Kerry should just put out a statement.

THE TRUTH IS, Howard Dean knows Howard Dean.

Never was that clearer than at a primary-eve rally in Manchester, N.H., when a husband-wife team of doctors suddenly appeared onstage.

Dean, looking confused, let the doctors come in and give Dean and his wife, Judy Dean, matching stethoscopes from "Doctors for Dean."

"That was a total surprise," Dean laughed.

Then, in an homage to his Iowa "I have a scream" speech, Dean said, "You took a big risk in surprising me like that."

Dean then revealed just a bit more about his campaign - or at least his thinking of his campaign.

"This campaign is nothing, if not scripted," he said.

Realizing his gaffe only after the crowd began laughing, Dean corrected himself, "I mean unscripted."

Ooops.

FOR THE TEA-LEAF readers, there was probably no better sign than election night in New Hampshire to divine that Dean was about to dump media darling campaign manager Joe Trippi.

Sitting at the edge of the stage a little while after Dean had given his second concession speech in two weeks were Trippi, his partner Steve McMahon and a couple of his followers.

Asked what happened in the Granite State, Trippi - who never, ever misses a chance to blow hard for the media - reportedly replied, "I'm not talking to you."

Asked why, Trippi said, "Because the media is a pain in the ass."

What's that line about living by the sword?

EVEN AS HE WAS endorsing Kerry in South Carolina last week, U.S. Rep. James Clyburn poked a little fun at the Bay State senator and his white-guy groove.

Kerry was speechifying about their friendship and recalling how he danced a bit at a nighttime fish fry thrown last year by Clyburn, South Carolina's most prominent African-American Democrat.

Unexpectedly, Clyburn said, "I wouldn't call that dancing if I were you." Kerry took a minute to recover as the laughter died down but then quipped, "I thought for a white guy I showed some rhythm," and acknowledged he might need a few more lessons. "I'm ready for it, folks," he said. "Bring it on."

THE JOURNALISTS traveling with Kerry's campaign got an unpleasant surprise this week when a fellow reporter set his sights on them instead of the candidate.

Joe Hagan of the New York Observer boarded the bus ostensibly to write about Kerry but turned on the scribes, calling them "a kind of tight-knit brat pack."

Hagan labeled New York Times correspondent David M. Halbfinger "the dark prince of the bus," and called him "the cool guy in a black leather jacket with a decidedly dark pose."

And Hagan took a shot at Washington Post correspondent Ceci Connolly, who covered Al Gore in 2000. "Ms. Connolly sauntered back to the Kerry tour bus in candy-striped sunglasses and a black scarf around her neck, reeking pleasure at re-establishing her old part."

Hagan quoted several reporters, including Halbfinger at length, as saying the reporters rely on each other if they happen to miss a quote but "bristled at the suggestion that a kind of Manchester Syndrome might set in, in which they fall in love with Mr. Kerry and each other."

Hagan wrote that the reporters were "less than thrilled" to be, in his own word, "victimized" by him.

MAYBE IT WAS the frigid New Hampshire air, or the at-last absence of those nasty Democrats, but President Bush seemed to be feeling pretty cheeky during a Granite State visit last week.

As Fidelity Investments employee Steve Marshall, a pro-tax-cut panelist at Bush's event, was introducing his own family, he noted his 4-year-old son Alex is "just like his mother - gorgeous."

Eyeing Rachel Marshall, seated down front, Bush immediately quipped, "I can see that" - sparking howls of surprised laughter and even a few catcalls from the buttoned-down crowd.

The president also confided that, like the average Joe Homebuyer, he can't make head nor tails of mortgage applications.

"You pass out over the amount of small words in the thing - it makes you nervous," Bush said.

At another point, Bush offered a bit of self-deprecating humor when he pointed out Fidelity President Abigail Johnson, 42, daughter and granddaughter of the company's founding honchos.

"There is nothing wrong with a child following in the father's footsteps," Bush deadpanned.

LAST WEDNESDAY, Gov. Mitt Romney unveiled his proposed budget for the next fiscal year, complete with "reforms" to block excessive pensions (read: Billy Bulger) and fake firings to engineer pensions for state officials (read: former Jane Swift aide Peter Forman.)

To buttress his case, Romney pointed to some visual aids produced by his staff about pension payments. But one of the graphs was giving the governor a little trouble because a line was missing.

"I'm feeling like Ross Perot up here," said Romney, comparing himself to the diminutive, over-caffeinated, chart-happy Texan who ran for president in 1992. "Except his charts worked."

JOE SCIACCA'S MIND READER

Joe Trippi on being fired - or "quitting" - as Dean campaign manager

WHAT HE SAID: "You can't have two captains."

WHAT HE WAS THINKING: Even the Titanic only had one.

UNCONVENTIONAL

We hear the folks at Boston 2004 have been bonding over Chinese food. It started out innocently enough with a couple of staffers heading to Panda Express one Friday. Now, it's a ritual that requires either group takeout or a pilgrimage to Panda EVERY Friday. That's all fine and good for the staffers who like Chinese. But the couple of folks who don't partake are given the cold shoulder - EVERY Friday. Whatever happened to the party of diversity?

PEANUT GALLERY

"It's working, it's working. The economy is growing, people are finding work. There's an excitement in our economy. And the tax relief we passed made sense then, it makes sense now." - President George W. Bush, answering months of Democratic criticism that the economy is listless, the recovery is jobless and Bush's tax cuts should be repealed.

STAY TUNED

- After trudging through Super Bowl Sunday on the campaign trail, the candidates converge on St. Louis tonight for their final debate before the Tuesday contests.

- Tuesday's another big day for the Dems, with primaries or caucuses in seven states - South Carolina, Oklahoma, Missouri, North Dakota, Arizona, New Mexico and Delaware. A Kerry sweep could put a nail in some campaign coffins.

- The rest of the week will mean crisscrossing from Michigan to Washington State, the two states that vote next - on Saturday.

- And a week from today, Kerry and Dean square off as the top two contenders in the Maine caucuses.

David R. Guarino, Elisabeth J. Beardsley, Andrew Miga, Noelle Straub, Jack Meyers and Ellen J. Silberman contributed to this page.

Got tales from the trail, dirt on the candidates or just think you're funnier than we are? Drop us an e-mail at pols@bostonherald.com.

WB 56 POLITICAL ANALYST JON KELLER'S SPIN-O-METER

"As a governor, I know how to manage money."

- Howard Dean

The spin-o-meter is very sensitive to phonies who talk the talk, but can't walk the walk. The Dean campaign had more than $40 million in the bank a month ago. Now they're down to less than $3 million. THIS is sound money management? Yikes.

Gazing into his future?

Some might think that high-flying Sen. John F. Kerry sees the world through rose-colored glasses these days - or in this case, red, white and blue glasses. But here he's actually peering through the window of a water-cooled cutting machine at a South Carolina factory - with very snazzy safety glasses. AP PHOTO