Democratic Dispatches

By 6:30 a.m. Monday, it was clear Wesley K. Clark’s last full day in New Hampshire would be less a campaign swing and more a military-style, frostbite-friendly, 21-hour slog from one end of the state to the other and back. And then back again.

The itinerary ran to seven pages, not including half a dozen stops. The thermometer outside the Days Inn in Lebanon read 15 degrees below zero.

Aides carried little orange packets of HotHands, each packaged as a “self-activating hand and body warmer,” which would prove meek in the presence of a New England cold snap.

The penultimate destination on this trek: Dixville Notch, population 26, where residents cast the first votes in today’s Democratic presidential primary. Not a single registered Democrat lives here. There are 11 Republicans, all of whom voted for George W. Bush in results announced just after midnight, and 15 Independents, who can vote Democratic.

Clark was delighted to win eight of those independent votes. Kerry received three, Edwards two, Dean and Lieberman one each.

Clark, who has been slipping in opinion polls, carried out the most ambitious blitz of all the Democratic contenders.

Instead of going to bed relatively early Sunday night, he bumped into a group of women voters in Hanover, most of them members of the National Organization for Women and supporters of former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, and joined them for dinner.

He spent more than two hours trying to enlist them, as aides all but begged him to leave. If the race is really close, his single-minded effort could prove worth it.

“I took my Dean button off,” said NOW member Suzy Colt. “I now have my Dean button and a Clark button in my pocket. I’ll decide which one to wear” today.

Clark worked even harder for votes on Monday. When three 18-year-olds told him in Manchester that he could have their votes for the price of some jumping jacks, Clark stripped off his coat and joined their workout.

With New Hampshire shaping up to be a close race for perhaps every place but first, Clark has increasingly turned his attention to upcoming primaries, including the Feb. 3 contest in South Carolina. Bounding through the snows of New Hampshire over the last few days, his campaign has acquired a warm Southern drawl.

Actress Mary Steenburgen, an Arkansas native whose mother was friends with Clark’s mother, told tales of how the doting moms “bragged and bragged and bragged about their children.”

Former South Carolina Gov. Jim Hodges, former Florida Atty. Gen. Bob Butterworth, Rep. Bill Jefferson of Louisiana and others have hammered home the importance of the South in the general election and told crowds Clark was the best man to take on President Bush there.

“Wes Clark can win in my state,” Jefferson called to a Manchester crowd, “can win in Arkansas, can win in Georgia, can win in November.”

Clark took the stage and croaked out a “Thank you.”

Yes, the former supreme allied commander of NATO was the latest candidate to be stricken with campaign-trail laryngitis and wind up rasping and squeaking to the crowds.

Twelve hours after he began his day -- nine hours to go -- he happily accepted a cup of warm water and honey, his favorite throat soother.

“Won ... derful,” he croaked again.