'Hateful' allegations mar Dean's bid for the White House

Attempts to smear Howard Dean and thwart what looks increasingly like an unstoppable bid for the Democratic presidential nomination grew uglier yesterday. An incendiary television advert highlighted his lack of national security experience and an internet gossip-monger hinted at possible cam- paign finance irregularities.

The new attacks on the front-runner were murky in origin and had no effect on the soaring morale of the candidate as he finished a 48-hour swing through California, with Democratic office-holders, showbusiness entertainers and grassroots supporters falling at his feet like teenagers in love.

Rather, the smears represented, on the Democratic side, a last-ditch attempt to break the aura of inevitability surrounding Mr Dean's candidacy and, on the Republican side, the opening salvos of what promises to a be a long and bruising fight for the White House.

The advert, aired in the crucial primary states of New Hampshire and South Carolina, mingles sinister music, a close-up of Osama bin Laden's eyes, and a series of slogans flashed up on the screen: Dangerous World, Destroy Us, Dangers Ahead, No Experience. "Americans want a president who can face the dangers ahead," an announcer says. "But Howard Dean has no military or foreign policy experience. And Howard Dean just cannot compete with George Bush on foreign policy."

The advert was sponsored by a previously unknown Democratic Party group headed by a former Ohio congressman who has refused to divulge the names of his financial backers. The Dean campaign dismissed it as hateful and cynical, "exactly the kind of ad that keeps people from voting".

The campaign finance questions were raised by Matt Drudge, the internet columnist who hounded Bill Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, and centred on the legality of foreign contributions to political websites such as MoveOn.org which are close to the Dean campaign and General Wesley Clark's campaign.

Drudge questioned the truth of MoveOn.org's recent assertion that it was turning down all foreign contributions, arguing that roughly one-third of MoveOn's two million members are non-Americans, and pointed out the existence of websites in Britain and Sweden campaigning for President George Bush's defeat next November.

There was no immediate reaction to the Drudge column within the Dean camp or elsewhere. On the campaign trail, the former Vermont governor trumpeted the fact that most of his contributions have come in small donations of $100 or less, saying his popular movement was the only thing that could hope to compete with the Bush juggernaut that has already raised $200m, largely from corporate sources.

Denouncing President Bush for running an administration "of the corporations, by the corporations, for the corporations", he thrilled his supporters with his pledge to re- energise the Democratic Party base and bring out up to three or four million new voters.

"Fifty per cent of the people don't vote in elections because they can't tell the difference between Republicans and Democrats," he said to a typically exuberant young crowd at the House of Blues, a celebrated Los Angeles music venue. "We need to stop apologising for being Democrats and give them a reason to vote again."

Political pundits have wondered whether the Dean campaign, with its wellsprings in the anti-war movement, might be weakened by Saddam Hussein's capture. There was no sign of that on the ground, however, as Mr Dean insisted that the capture had not changed his overall view of the Iraq conflict, received a warm reception at a high-powered international affairs think- tank for his first detailed foreign policy speech, picked up valuable new endorsements from Latino members of Congress and thrilled a lunchtime meeting of the Democratic National Committee.

To overstate the enthusiasm and renewed sense of possibility that Mr Dean's cam- paign has provoked in a demoralised Democratic Party is hard. Xavier Becerra, one of the Latino lawmakers who endorsed him, spoke of a new "air going around that we are all beginning to breathe".

Even Terry McAuliffe, the DNC chairman who is officially backing nobody yet, found containing his enthusiasm hard as he talked about the party's electronic databases of supporters, swing voters, the issues they care about, phone numbers and e-mail addresses.

The House of Blues felt like a campaign event on the eve of an election, not 11 months away. The place was packed with banner-waving supporters as Mr Dean was introduced by the film director Rob Reiner and serenaded by both The Bangles, the 1980s girl band, and The Folksmen, the spoof trio featured in Christopher Guest's recent mock documentary A Mighty Wind.

Mr Dean said it was time to give Mr Bush "a one-way ticket to Crawford, Texas" and replace him with a programme that would appeal to the best in America, not the worst. "And this time," he added, "the person with the most votes is going to the White House." The crowd went wild.