Kerry thanks Iowa in D.M. visit

[Freddie Stubbs]

By THOMAS BEAUMONT
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
December 11, 2004

It won't be clear for more than a year whether Sen. John Kerry's stop in Des Moines on Friday was a postlude to his 2004 presidential campaign or a quiet prelude to a 2008 comeback bid.

In a lighthearted and sometimes wistful appearance at the Hotel Fort Des Moines, the losing candidate in last month's bruising election thanked supporters who launched his campaign, while giving no hint about his future.

"We, all of us, are going to remember what this race was about and we're going to continue this fight," Kerry told about 200 Democrats who attended the evening reception in an upstairs ballroom.

By stopping by to say thank you, Kerry separated himself from his predecessor, former Vice President Al Gore, whom supporters criticized after the 2000 campaign for going into seclusion instead of thanking his disappointed supporters.

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