Anti-war delegates have mixed feelings on Kerry

By KAREN BRANCH-BRIOSO

St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Over breakfast Tuesday at the Cheers bar, Colorado Democrat Kim Cohen heard her umpteenth speech since arriving at the convention about how Democrats must unite behind Sen. John Kerry.

But in pink-for-peace bandanas, Cohen and several Colorado delegates don’t want to budge from backing Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s quixotic anti-war campaign in Wednesday’s roll-call vote at the convention. Even though Kucinich himself urged them to back Kerry.

"I’m tired of hearing, for the sake of unity, we need to rally around one candidate,' " said Cohen, 48, a home-health care worker from Boulder. "Thursday night, I will be a Kerry person - 100 percent. But for the next two days, let us have our place." The Kucinich delegates are among the last in the convention hall who are holding out for a symbolic showing for the party's left wing. Most here prefer to play up Kerry to the middle-of-the-road crowd. It shows in the party platform, which stops short of condemning the war in Iraq. And it's showing in the stepped-back speeches of the more liberal Democratic primary contenders: Kucinich and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean. "There's a lot of angst. Some of us feel that our platform as a platform has its shortcomings, to put it mildly," Kucinich told the Colorado delegates Tuesday morning. "You may say,Well, I don’t agree with John Kerry on this and that.’ No, wait a minute. We have to change this country. He’s our hope to do that."

Dean, who chided Kerry during the primaries for his vote for the war resolution, expressed strong support for him Tuesday night:

"For the next 100 days, I’ll be doing everything that I can to make sure that John Kerry and John Edwards take this country back for the people who built it," Dean said. "Because tonight, we’re all here to represent the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party."

Some of Dean’s anti-war delegates, like Charles E. Johnson of Vermont, is finding it tough to make the switch.

"Kerry’s doing a little too much me, too' making him like Bush," Johnson said. "Kerry needs to show more clarity in distinguishing himself." But many Dean delegates are fully on board, passing out "Deaniacs for Kerry" buttons on sidewalks outside the FleetCenter. Dean's progressive supporters were out in force to hear him speak a bit more freely at an event billed as a "left-wing conspiracy" at a Cambridge hotel Tuesday. So many arrived to see Dean and "Fahrenheit 9/11" director Michael Moore that Cambridge's Tactical Patrol Force barred scores from entering the hotel. The group was herded to the back of the hotel, where Dean appeared on a balcony to say the party should take progressive politics even to the most conservative states. "Sooner or later, people who keep voting in these right-wingers are going to say,We’ve been voting these people in for a long time. My kids still don’t have health insurance. Not only did my neighbor’s job go to China, but mine did, too. Maybe I’ll give that Democrat a chance.’ Then, we’re going to have jobs, health insurance, education and national security policy consistent with American morality and American values," Dean said to hoots and hollers from the crowd below.

Yet even some of the more left-wing supporters were pragmatists.

"We love Dean and Michael Moore and we share a lot of the ideas they stand for. Normally, I would vote for (Ralph) Nader," said Krisztina Chander, 34, of Brookline, Mass. "But I think it’s really important that Nader voters give their votes to Kerry."

Tom Hayden, the anti-war leader from the Vietnam era and ex-California state senator, said that many liberal activists are content to wait for the outcome of the November election to see where they go from there.

"The anti-war sentiments are being channeled into the election," said Hayden, when asked about why anti-war sentiments in the Democratic platform don’t match the anti-war sentiments expressed by many delegates. "If anything, there’s a dispute about tactics." BOSTON

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