Dean rallies AZ Dems

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean's message today was loud and clear: the Democrats will challenge Sen. John McCain in his home state of Arizona.

Dean was in Phoenix to discuss strategy with a group of volunteers who will be campaigning on behalf of whoever wins the party's nomination fight, and assure them that the Democratic Party is not rolling over in the Grand Canyon State.

"He is confident we can win in Arizona," said one attendee, who asked to remain anonymous.

However, the attendee did not say that Dean mentioned that any specific DNC resources would be devoted to Arizona, or what level of committment the national party would make to fight McCain on his own turf. 

Though one recent poll shows McCain beating likely Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama by a relatively small nine point margin in Arizona, the latest Rasmussen tracking poll has the home state senator besting Obama head-to-head by 20 percent.

Adding to the unlikelihood that Arizona Democrats will see much help from the national party in the presidential race this year is the unique political map in 2008.

Democrats are poised to open up new battlefronts in states like Virginia and North Carolina, which haven't cast their electoral votes for a Democrat in a generation. Meanwhile, once reliably Democratic states like Michigan and Minnesota are currently in danger of being poached by the GOP (if McCain succeeds in Minnesota, he will be the first Republican to do so since 1972).

The Democratic National Committee may also take note of the fact that, while Arizona did vote for Bill Clinton in 1992, it was the first and so far only time it has done so since Harry Truman won the state in 1948 - and that was a year before Barry Goldwater was even first elected...to the Phoenix City Council.