A Pilgrim's Progress

ON NOVEMBER 8, 2002, Howard Dean spoke before a lunchtime audience of a few dozen Manhattan elites at the Yale Club of New York City. His speech was stirring, passionate, and candid.

At that point in the race for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination, he was still an enigma. Outside the green hills of Vermont, few Americans had any idea who Dean was–an obscurity reflected in his lack of funds, his staff of one, and the fact that he could walk the streets of Manhattan in complete anonymity. In fact, the only recognizable figure in the Yale Club that afternoon was Barry Scheck, the attorney who gained notoriety in the 1994 murder trial of O.J. Simpson.