Vilsack getting ready for 2008?

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By Dan Tuohy | Thursday, June 15, 2006 1:14 AM CDT | () comments

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Gov. Tom Vilsack and his wife Christie taste dairy products during a tour of Stoneyfield Farms in Londonderry, N.H., on Wednesday. Vilsack is testing the waters for a possible run for president.

BEDFORD, N.H. — Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack kicks back a wild berry smoothie and is midway into a cup of frozen yogurt when Kally Abrams, a self-described “real voter,” tells him to forget mass marketing and focus on intimate settings.

Political advice dispensed, she offered the “fresh face” and his first lady an open invite to supper at her house.

Vilsack, on his first trip Wednesday to New Hampshire exploring a presidential run, introduced himself to a business group over bacon and eggs and hobnobbed with party activists at a Flag Day dinner in the state’s largest city.

He didn’t kiss any babies, but he ate his share of yogurt after a tour of Stonyfield Farm, the world’s largest manufacturer of organic yogurt.

“He’s become my front-runner,” said Abrams, a financial analyst who supported Wesley Clark and then Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry in 2004.

Several people meeting Vilsack for the first time said they’re not familiar with his record. “People don’t know much about him,” said Joe Keefe, a former state party chairman. “But in New Hampshire, a guy like Vilsack gets a fair shot.”

Coming in with a blank slate can be an advantage, as a candidate can define himself, but it gets tougher to gain ground and to raise campaign cash in a crowded field, Keefe said.

Portsmouth Mayor Steve Marchand, who met first lady Christie Vilsack last fall, praised the governor’s call for better investment in education and diversified energy production. A past supporter of former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean in 2004, Marchand cited conventional wisdom that governors have an advantage over U.S. senators running for president in that they do not have a long and complicated voting history to defend.

“Governors tend to make logical presidential candidates,” Marchand said. “They go from executive position to executive position.”

Abrams, who met and questioned Vilsack at Stonyfield Farm, said her support for Vilsack is based on his credentials as chief executive officer of a state.

Gary Patton, chairman of the Hampton Democratic Committee, said Vilsack has a centrist message that could help him win support across the party. “Democrats have a tendency to go with a fresh face,” he added.

At each stop Wednesday, Vilsack, 55, spoke in broad terms about the need to expand health care coverage, invest in early childhood education and renewable energies. He boasted of Iowa’s role as the No. 1 wind-energy producing state, and advocated for better solar, wind and bio-based energies to help lessen America’s dependence on foreign oil.

Noting his trips to China and India, Vilsack said America must teach creativity and encourage innovation in schools, not simply instruct young people to be standardized-test takers. He dismissed the federal No Child Left Behind Act as a punitive law that has yet to reach its potential.

Vilsack said New Hampshire voters have asked him about everything from nuclear warfare to handgun control. At the “Politics & Eggs” event, which was sponsored by a regional business group and the state’s Political Library, he was touted as the chairman of the Democratic Leadership Council. He was introduced as Iowa’s 39th governor who “has created or retained 20,000 high-paying jobs and leveraged more than $3.3 billion in capital investment.”

Before the governor’s breakfast speech, state Rep. Ricia McMahon leaned over her scrambled eggs and urged Vilsack to support New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary. Vilsack later praised the state’s primary as a cousin to Iowa’s lead-off caucuses, with each state a good proving ground for candidates.

“New Hampshire and Iowa allow candidates to learn,” he said.

Though she admitted to being hopelessly nostalgic about Kerry, who is considering another campaign, McMahon said Vilsack’s two terms as governor might make him battle-tested for a run at the White House.

“My guess is we’ll look at everyone as a fresh face,” she said. “He has experience dealing with the intense heat, the glare of the lights.”

Gary Hirshberg, a major party donor who is Stonyfield Farm’s president and chairman, said Vilsack’s record as governor would help him stand out in what is shaping up to be a crowded field of prospective Democratic candidates.

“He has a low-talk-to ratio and he has got a record of action, not rhetoric,” said Hirshberg, who said he is buying milk from Iowa because of New Hampshire’s atrophied dairy industry.

The yogurt plant has become a must-stop on the New Hampshire campaign trail. Former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner visited earlier this year. Past election cycles have seen President Clinton, Al Gore, Dean and Clark.

After sipping a plain, low-fat yogurt on the Stonyfield Farm tour, the first lady said she and her husband enjoyed listening to residents’ concerns and hopes. She said the presidential exploration was a serious look at America’s challenges, and that she would travel with her husband “to the ends of the world.”

Even New Hampshire.

The city desk can be contacted at (563) 383-2245 or newsroom@qctimes.com.