Here's an interesting coincidence.

Front page of the New York Times this morning:

Younger blacks tell Democrats to take notice Democratic strategists fear may be a growing problem: The party is perilously out of touch with a large swath of black voters — those 18 to 35 years old who grew up after the groundbreaking years of the civil rights movement.

News story posted just a few minutes ago:

Dean Campaign Gains [Carol Mosely] Braun Key Staffer

BURLINGTON, VT (Talon News) -- In a move that could foretell the end of one campaign and signify the growing chances of another, Democrat presidential contender Howard Dean announced Thursday the addition of Carol Moseley-Braun's campaign manager to his campaign staff.

The former Vermont governor announced that Andrea "Andi" Pringle had jumped from the former U.S. Ambassador's campaign. Pringle, who brings with her a wealth of connections to the African American community, has agreed to serve as Dean's deputy campaign manager.

Good timing. It's a big problem for the Dean campaign, as well as the rest of the Dems.

At my meetup in Denver Wednesday night, there was only one African American, and when we got to the end of the meeting, she was understandibly flabbergasted--and pissed--that our meetup leaders had not even mentioned the issue of reaching out to minority communities, which was on the official agenda set by the national campaign. The local leader just brushed it aside at first, but she pressed, and he said he would sit down with her at the end and discuss it. They did for several minutes and it looked fruitful, but what an inauspicious start.

It's definitely one of those situations where it's hard to for a volunteer base to reach out to a community when it has hardly anyone from that community to start with to guide it. I'd say the Dean campaign is a little behind.

It's understandable: When support suddenly starts erupting, you take it anywhere you can get it, and it's mostly been white. Props to the campaign for grasping the problem and focusing on it early. (It's still early.) Putting it on the Meetup agenda was good, hiring Braun's campaign manager better. We'll see what becomes of this. For Dean and for the party.

. . . And the new Carter, and Goldwater, and McGovern, and Reagan . . .

This Slate story/chart is hysterical. That's the headline above, here's the brief copy:

Brown may be the new black, but Howard Dean is the new Brown. Jerry Brown, that is: a former governor who seems impervious to the tempering influence of focus groups. Or maybe Dean's the new George McGovern: an anti-war candidate destined to destroy his party. Or perhaps he's the new John McCain: a tightly wound straight-shooter known for his (usually) winning candor.

Dean, the once-obscure Democratic presidential candidate who doubled up on the covers of Newsweek and Time this week, has officially gone mainstream. But it's not like Dean came out of nowhere, campaign-watchers agree. He came straight out of the history books—they just can't decide which one.

So, here's Slate's brief guide to the many faces of Dean.

For each person he's compared to, they list the number of Nexis hits, "Who said it best," "What he said" and "What he meant." Only 43 for Ronald Reagan and one for William Jennings Bryan. Click here for the chart.

Funny as this is, I do think McCain is a good comparison. Not on the issues, but it's the same feeling capturing both campaigns--the driving appeal.

Interesting paragraph in this morning's USA Today story on its new poll showing Dean surging:

However, Dean shows weakness among female voters, a key voting bloc for Democrats. Men are twice as supportive of Dean as women.

Hmmmm. Very interesting data, definitely worth a story in itself, but what a half-empty way to look at it. Couldn't he--reporter Richard Benedetto--have just as easily said Dean showed remarkable strength among men, a key Democratic weakness over the past several election cycles? For a press all over Dean for his supposed unelectability against Bush, you might envision Karl Rove suddenly sweating that the Dems finally have a candidate that can challenge them on their solid male turf. The Dems tend to hold firm on their traditional voting blocks: blacks, Latinos, women, Jews, but they've been getting their butts kicked among white men. If Dean can follow that pattern and keep the women in November and grab some of those men, we could have a whole new ballgame on our hands.

Who knows. Dean could also lose the women and fail to grab the Republican men, but I really don't see the women suddenly rushing over to the Bush camp. Seems to me more of a plus than a minus, so it's odd that Benedetto would report it as a weakness.

Well not odd, really, given the Dean coverage all year, just annoying.

But what can you expect from a hack who writes a major story in a national newspaper indicating Lieberman as leading, without a word of explanation that early polls mainly reflect name recognition, and that movement is most of what matters, and Lieberman is moving steadily downward. Not one word about Lieb's decline, or the fact that anyone who knows anything about this would expect him to be ahead still, just much further ahead. The story makes it sound like he's doing great. Those irresponsible journalists and their irresponsible reporting on polls.

USA/TODAY/CNN/Gallup released a new poll tonight showing Dean surging 36 percent in ten days nationally among registered Democrats or Dem-leaners. He jumped from fourth place to a tie for second.

Mostly name recognition, surely, but that's mostly what he was lacking. The Time and Newsweek covers and all the followon publicity brought him to the attention of a lot more people, and they apparently liked him, or at least didn't hate him.

Of course it's important to keep the raw numbers in mind: he went from 11 percent to 15 percent, so he's got a long way to go, but 15 percent isn't bad for a nine-person field, especially against guys who most people likely to vote have heard of. (If you haven't heard of Lieberman, you were either in high school the last election, or there's very little chance you're going to vote. That guy has probably peaked already. He's still in first because he was already on the ballot, but he continues to drift downward. Dean cut his lead from ten points to three points in the ten days.)

Can't be pleasant news for Kerry either. Half the pack has been stuck in virtually the same spot all year, but four have seen dramatic changes, and except for Edwards, they're all accelarating. Dean has risen 150 percent since April, Lieberman dropped 18 percent in the same period, and Kerry plummeting 33 percent, 20 percent just in the past ten days. Edwards--christened early as the golden boy the press was sure would take it--has dropped the furthest, 38 percent, though most of it came in the first month.

(USA Today set up a separate page with a table of all the raw data since April, which you can access directly here.)

Kerry had finally arrested his fall late last month, and ticked back up a couple notches, but Dean grabbed all the coverage and whopped him back down in a week and a half. Dean's four-point rise nearly matched Kerry's three-point slide in the past ten days exactly. Sounds like a lot of soft Kerry support, who were only behind the man they thought was going to win it. (Read this wonderful Slate story for a some convincing anecdotal illustrations of that from right inside the Kerry campaign.)

Of course much of the new Dean support is probably soft as well, and Kerry or Biden or Clark or somebody else will surely grab some of it back again. It's a little early to pop the corks for your man reaching a lofty 15 percent.

But these campaigns tend to be about momentum, and the Dean momentum has been like a steamroller. The latest round of exposure brought him better poll numbers which mean more exposure and more money, which will help his poll numbers and lead to more exposure . . .

The big factor though, is that as people get exposed to Dean, a lot of them fall into a swoon. Now if he can just resist the urge to shoot himself in the head.