Last year, we heard a lot of hype about the Howard Dean campaign. "What Dean is doing, whether he wins or loses, is going to go down in history as the beginning of the new presidential campaign," Simon Rosenberg, director of the centrist New Democratic Network, said last June.
The Internet was supposed to transform U.S. politics. Larry Noble of the Center for Responsive Politics said, "I think we will look back in 10 or 15 years and see this election as a turning point." Like the 1960 election. When he was riding high in October, Joe Trippi, Mr. Dean's former campaign manager, predicted that his candidate's use of the Internet "is going to have as much impact from this day forward as television did after the Kennedy-Nixon debates in 1960.
So -- what happened? Just as sometimes happens with all those Internet dating sites, Howard Dean turned out to be a Bad Internet Date.
Mr. Dean's message came across great on the web. Hundreds of thousands of eager suitors responded to it. His message of empowerment thrilled liberals for a reason. They are disempowered. Democrats are more shut out of power now than at any time since the 1920s. Mr. Dean rallied the left like Henry V at Agincourt, telling them, "You have the power to take back our country, so the flag of the United States is no longer the sole property of John Ashcroft and Rush Limbaugh and Jerry Falwell!" His message stirred hundreds of thousands of Americans to send money. Over $50-million was raised -- more than any Democratic campaign in history -- in contributions that averaged just $80.
But a campaign is more than a message. Sooner or later, the voters had to meet the man. That's when the trouble started.
"Oh my," many voters said when they finally met the former Vermont governor. "You're not at all what I expected." Howard Dean's personal favourability ratings started to decline in December, the day after Saddam Hussein was captured and Mr. Dean said it "has not made America safer." The problem wasn't what Mr. Dean said -- most Americans agree with him -- the problem was when he said it: at a moment when the country was feeling relief and satisfaction.
Mr. Dean's judgment repeatedly came into question. There was his comment that Osama bin Laden should not be judged guilty without a fair trial. His insulting characterization of the Iowa caucuses as dominated by special interests. His dressing down of an Iowa voter. His statement that he would have to "plug a hole" in his résumé by finding a running mate with experience in world affairs. Mr. Dean's temperament, his rashness, his edge of irritation seemed to rub voters the wrong way. Even before his notorious "I Have a Scream" concession speech in Iowa.
The vote for president is the most personal vote Americans cast. They have to live with a president in their homes, day after day, for four years, on television. Television is intensely personal. It's how the voters get to know you.
The Internet is not very personal. Go on a dating site and you can be anybody you want. In politics, you can use the Net to feed voters a line. Mr. Dean turned out to be an exciting date. But in the end, not the man voters wanted to marry. As a currently popular bumper sticker puts it, "Dated Dean, Married Kerry."
Why John Kerry? Democrats see a quality in the Massachusetts Senator they didn't see in Howard Dean: electability. Mr. Dean had no experience in national or world affairs. John Kerry has been in the Senate for 19 years. He has accumulated a record of expertise in foreign policy. And one more thing: He's a war hero. That gives Democrats standing to raise an issue they dared not raise against George W. Bush in 2000, when Bill Clinton was in the White House -- Mr. Bush's military service record.
Howard Dean, Wesley Clark and John Edwards all ran for the Democratic nomination as outsiders. There are many years when outsiders have enormous appeal. Like 1976, after the Watergate scandal, and 1992, when Ross Perot burst upon the scene. But 2004 is not one of those years. Governor Dean and General Clark have been eliminated. Senator Edwards is struggling to survive -- he hopes, by picking up voters who supported his fellow outsider, Howard Dean.
Outsiders are out this year. Why? Because Democrats learned a bitter lesson in 2002. They thought that, by voting to authorize war in Iraq, they could let President Bush have his national security issue and fight the midterm election on the Democrats' agenda -- the economy and domestic issues.
The Republicans refused to let that happen. Mr. Bush made the election a referendum on his leadership in the war on terrorism. He routed the Democrats by calling them soft on national security. The living symbol of that disaster is Max Cleland, a Vietnam war veteran and triple amputee who lost his Senate seat in Georgia because he had voted against authorizing the President's Department of Homeland Security. Mr. Cleland, the martyr of 2002, now campaigns all over the country with Mr. Kerry, a fellow veteran.
What Democrats see in John Kerry is a candidate who can match President Bush on national security before moving the debate to health care and jobs. Senator Kerry can do something Mr. Dean could never do -- stand next to the President and make a credible promise to keep the country safe. "If George Bush wants to make national security the centrepiece of this campaign," Mr. Kerry tells Democrats, "we have three words for him that we know he understands. Bring it on!"
In the end, Howard Dean did make an enduring contribution to American politics. The Internet proved to be a phenomenal success for organizing and fundraising; just not for campaigning. Mr. Dean also gave his party a backbone implant. His message -- that Democrats need to stand up to George Bush -- was a brilliant success. Evidenced by the fact that the other candidates stole it.
Are Mr. Dean's followers so alienated by the Democrats' rejection that they may be willing to support Ralph Nader now that he has declared his independent candidacy for president? It depends on whether they are angrier at the Democrats who spurned them or President Bush who provoked them.
It also depends on how clearly Howard Dean says to his followers, "Get over it."
Bill Schneider is CNN's senior political analyst, based in Washington.