Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean delivered a 20-minute, meat-and-potatoes speech to the state DFL convention in Rochester this afternoon, vowing to win back the White House and increase the party’s margins in Congress.

“Our goal is to end the Bush administration and not allow a third term for George W. Bush,” Dean said to thunderous applause. “We honor John McCain’s service to America, but he has served enough.”

Dean drew the biggest ovation of his speech for condemning the Bush administration’s Iraq policies. “Anybody who believes that the American people want to stay in Iraq for another 100 years under any circumstances is badly out of touch with what the American people want,” he said.

The former Vermont governor repeatedly linked McCain and Bush, at one point referring to them as “two peas in a pod.”

Dean repeated the DNC’s announcement this week that it will no longer accept donations from lobbyists or political action committees to bring it in line with the rules governing the Obama campaign. “The American people will set the priorities in the Obama administration, not special interests,” he said.

Dean also went out of his way to give a shout-out to the candidate that Obama finally defeated this week. “You have not heard the last of Hillary Rodham Clinton,” he declared.

The DNC chairman directed his harshest words at freshman Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann. “That’s not a right wing lunatic district,” he said of the 6th Congressional District. “That’s average hardworking Americans.”

After the speech was over, Dean was immediately whisked away and did not talk with reporters.