Monday, July 28, 2003
WE DID IT!!! Final Total: $508,540.31 http://blog.deanforamerica.com/archives/000860.html
WOW. This from grassroots guru Joe Trippi's O-blog thank you:
From Robert's first questioning if Burlington had gotten timid, to the suggestion that Governor Dean enjoy a sandwich while blogging today, the Dean Team vs Bush-Cheney fundraising challenge has been an amazing demonstration of how a Presidential campaign can interact with the grassroots -- and how individuals who believe in each other and work in common purpose can make a difference.
The bat is a symbol of what can happen when power is placed where it rightly belongs, in the hands of the people. A few days ago the bat was placed in your hands, and 9,568 Dean supporters responded with over $507,150.31 in contributions to Dean for America.
PS: The Governor said it was the best sandwich he ever had.
From Robert's first questioning if Burlington had gotten timid, to the suggestion that Governor Dean enjoy a sandwich while blogging today, the Dean Team vs Bush-Cheney fundraising challenge has been an amazing demonstration of how a Presidential campaign can interact with the grassroots -- and how individuals who believe in each other and work in common purpose can make a difference.
The bat is a symbol of what can happen when power is placed where it rightly belongs, in the hands of the people. A few days ago the bat was placed in your hands, and 9,568 Dean supporters responded with over $507,150.31 in contributions to Dean for America.
PS: The Governor said it was the best sandwich he ever had.
phase II: Coverage of the National Urban League convention http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59283-2003Jul28.html
Early reports are beginning to trickle in from the National Urban League convention, in which Bush and the Democratic contenders shared a stage for the first time. By most accounts, the contenders got in some real good jabs at Bush's policies, and Bush received a polite yet tepid response from the crowd. Here's what we've got so far.
WaPo covers the event, noting that Bush emphasised his faith-based initiatives. Yet the article also pointedly mentions that this is only the second time in nearly two years that Bush has appeared before a large African-American group.
As for the contenders, Ohio.com files this report, noting that Sens. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Bob Graham of Florida were no-shows. They mention that Dean got a standing ovation from the crowd when he said, "There are lots of white politicians who go before black groups and talk about race. We need white politicians who go before white groups and talk about race."
The AP wire story says that Bush hasn't met with the Congressional Black Caucus in over 2 years (!), and reports that each Democratic contender fired shots at Bush that resonated with attendees. I'll post more on this event tomorrow as information becomes available.
WaPo covers the event, noting that Bush emphasised his faith-based initiatives. Yet the article also pointedly mentions that this is only the second time in nearly two years that Bush has appeared before a large African-American group.
As for the contenders, Ohio.com files this report, noting that Sens. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Bob Graham of Florida were no-shows. They mention that Dean got a standing ovation from the crowd when he said, "There are lots of white politicians who go before black groups and talk about race. We need white politicians who go before white groups and talk about race."
The AP wire story says that Bush hasn't met with the Congressional Black Caucus in over 2 years (!), and reports that each Democratic contender fired shots at Bush that resonated with attendees. I'll post more on this event tomorrow as information becomes available.
Dean's $3-a-plate Turkey Sandwich Luncheon http://www.deanforamerica.com/site/TR?pg=personal&fr_id=1090&px=117927
Democratic Presidential Candidate Howard Dean enjoys his $3-a-plate turkey lunch with now close to 10,000 supporters, raising an astonishing $482,000 just a few bucks at a time, nearly doubling Dick Cheney's efforts at a South Carolina luncheon with a mere handful of special interest donors. Great job, everyone, but come on, let's do our best to make it a cool half-a-million bucks, eh? That'll show 'em! Woohoo!
Dean Leads Kerry in New Hampshire! http://www2.bostonherald.com/news/national/poll07282003.htm
The Boston Herald has conducted its own poll in New Hampshire - ostensibly gauging support for a Hillary Clinton run against the rest of the field. Two things immediately jump out in this poll. First, Dean runs second only to Hillary (and she doesn't take much from his support, only from others in the field). Second, Dean leads Kerry head to head by 28% to 25%. Clearly this remains well within the margin of error, but this supports the other polling data posted earlier today. Good news for the Dean team. An excerpt:
"The race now tied between Dean and Kerry would quickly become a Dean-Clinton standoff, with Clinton picked by 27 percent of voters and Dean by 23 percent in the poll.
Kerry would fall to a second tier at 16 percent and all other candidates would be relegated to single digits.
But Dean's support among independent- and reform-minded voters seems intact with or without Clinton in the running.
``She doesn't eat into Dean's lead at all,'' said Herald pollster R. Kelly Myers. ``As of today, Dean is the only one who could hold his own (against Clinton).''
Indeed, among independents polled in the survey, Dean and Clinton are locked at 21 percent and 22 percent respectively."
"The race now tied between Dean and Kerry would quickly become a Dean-Clinton standoff, with Clinton picked by 27 percent of voters and Dean by 23 percent in the poll.
Kerry would fall to a second tier at 16 percent and all other candidates would be relegated to single digits.
But Dean's support among independent- and reform-minded voters seems intact with or without Clinton in the running.
``She doesn't eat into Dean's lead at all,'' said Herald pollster R. Kelly Myers. ``As of today, Dean is the only one who could hold his own (against Clinton).''
Indeed, among independents polled in the survey, Dean and Clinton are locked at 21 percent and 22 percent respectively."
Dean Defense Forces Growing http://www.deandefense.org/
DeanDefense.org, itself in the middle of a rebuilding, is becoming a better site all the time. We now have Randy Mayeux kicking some ... well ... something. We've got other new bloggers. We're going to be adding more to the site soon as well. Keep your eyes peeled, and, if you're ever looking for ways to help the Doctor, our site should be able to keep you active.
Georgy's Shameless Play, or, Blush Light http://www.georgyforgov.com/
What do sexy underwear, Howard Dean and Gray Davis have in common? Well, in a shameless play to the Dean base, Georgy Russell, who's running on the recall ballot to replace the California governor, asks us to vote for our favorite underdog, with Howard Dean prominent among them -- along side Harry Truman! You can also buy Georgy's thong underwear and other merchandise. But instead, vote for Howard Dean, check out Georgy's blog and don't forget to come on back here and give a little to help Dean defeat Cheney/Bush! Maybe you're shameless, Georgy, but you got spunk!
UPDATE: Lior Abraham, Georgy's campaign manager, sends me this e-mail regarding this post: "Thanks for the heads up. We were actually about to change the poll anyway, but maybe we'll hold off and let the Dean base have some fun." Thanks, Lior! So Dean Nationals, get to voting. We are currently leading Georgy herself by a small margin, and the fun can't last forever....
UPDATE: Lior Abraham, Georgy's campaign manager, sends me this e-mail regarding this post: "Thanks for the heads up. We were actually about to change the poll anyway, but maybe we'll hold off and let the Dean base have some fun." Thanks, Lior! So Dean Nationals, get to voting. We are currently leading Georgy herself by a small margin, and the fun can't last forever....
Untitled Memoir by Howard Dean http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743255712/unmedia-20
Having some fun on Amazon.com today I came across this interesting book that Amazon states "has not yet been released. You may order it now and we will ship it to you when it arrives." Doctor Dean's untitled book is currently ranked 63,505 on Amazon.com. I think we should all pre-order a copy and see if we can't get that sales ranking up a bit.
According to Amazon.com the book is slated for release in November of 2003.
:: CLICK HERE for MORE INFORMATION
According to Amazon.com the book is slated for release in November of 2003.
:: CLICK HERE for MORE INFORMATION
New Hampshire poll: Dean still trending upwards http://www.americanresearchgroup.com/nhpoll/dem/
AMR released their latest New Hampshire field poll last week. AMR has traditionally undersampled independents, but this time around they're broken down the numbers for us. Here's a quick summary of the latest NH numbers:
If the race were held today....
Kerry 25% (-3), Dean 19% (+1) , Gephardt 10% (+/-0) *the rest of the contenders are in single digits, but note that undecided voters are up to 30% (+7)
Other notable Dean numbers:
- Name recognition is up to 97% (+12), favorability is up to 57% (+11), and unfavorable is still low at 10% (+1)
The poll concludes with this summary:
If the race were held today....
Kerry 25% (-3), Dean 19% (+1) , Gephardt 10% (+/-0) *the rest of the contenders are in single digits, but note that undecided voters are up to 30% (+7)
Other notable Dean numbers:
- Name recognition is up to 97% (+12), favorability is up to 57% (+11), and unfavorable is still low at 10% (+1)
The poll concludes with this summary:
Of the 30% of likely Democratic primary voters undecided in their preference for president, 42% have a favorable opinion of Dean, and 45% have a favorable opinion of Kerry.
Of the 25% of likely Democratic primary voters saying they would vote for Kerry, 83% have a favorable opinion of Dean. Of the 19% of likely Democratic primary voters saying they would vote for Dean, 67% have a favorable opinion of Kerry.
phase II: a message of optimism and hope http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/07/28/column.shields.opinion.dean/
CNN has a nice bit about the Iowa Dean Corps today, who have been volunteering at food banks and soup kitchens across Iowa. While the idea of volunteerism is nothing new, columnist Mark Sheilds (of CNN's Capital Gang) nails it when he says that the underlying message of this work is optimism and hope:
It's called the Great American Restoration, and Dean outlined this theme in his speech to the nation on June 23. It's isn't a gimmick, it's a real movement to restore the American community. Sheilds goes on to draw an interesting comparison between Dean and his predecessors:
Now we're talking. Most of the members of this community have tried repeatedly to make the point that this campaign is about hope. It's about that feeling you get when you finally realise that you can make a difference. It's about channelling your energy into a positive force for change. Dean Corps in Iowa is doing it, the grassroots is doing it, and so are thousands of donors. Thanks, Mark Shields, for helping us spread the word.
The Dean Corps has already been involved in environmental cleanups, which given the popular image of the Vermonter's following, is not surprising. But if a presidential campaign actually does perform valuable human and social service and helps to restore a fraying sense of community, that could potentially change the entire dynamic of the caucus turnout next January 19.
Imagine the profound contrast between the Dean campaign volunteers feeding the hungry and comforting the lonely with the Bush pioneer/rangers corralling their $200 million swag for a primary in which the president is unopposed.
It's called the Great American Restoration, and Dean outlined this theme in his speech to the nation on June 23. It's isn't a gimmick, it's a real movement to restore the American community. Sheilds goes on to draw an interesting comparison between Dean and his predecessors:
But unlike the Gipper, who put a smiling face on conservatism, the doctor does not brim with optimism. The self-deprecating humor is neither particularly self-deprecating nor funny. He is a candidate who seems likely to win more admiration than affection. It is worth remembering that in the last half century only two American politicians have served two terms in the White House.
Both were invincible optimists -- Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton
Now we're talking. Most of the members of this community have tried repeatedly to make the point that this campaign is about hope. It's about that feeling you get when you finally realise that you can make a difference. It's about channelling your energy into a positive force for change. Dean Corps in Iowa is doing it, the grassroots is doing it, and so are thousands of donors. Thanks, Mark Shields, for helping us spread the word.
All Things Considered looks at DFA fundraising http://www.npr.org/atc3.smil
today on NPR's All Things Considered:
Participation in the campaign of Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean is just a click away. On Dean's Web site, one can donate money, volunteer, or chat with other supporters. The candidate's staff believes its use of the Internet foreshadows a sea change in politics, but can it elect a candidate?
Dean Nation vs. Cheney-Bush http://www.deanforamerica.com/site/TR?pg=personal&fr_id=1090&px=1179278
THE BAT IS BACK!
Over the weekend, the campaign raised $250,000 to match Cheney-Bush's planned fundraising goal for today, Monday July 28th (at a luncheon in South Carolina). That's 4,818 regular Americans vs 125 elite special interests. And it epitomizes what this campaign is about.
But the campaign isn't resting on its laurels having matched Cheney-Bush (over a slow weekend!). Now they have added a SECOND bat - and here's what it's for:
my speculation: the South Carolina primary is the prize!
So, Dean Nation - let's join in and step up to the plate! It's OUR turn at bat!
Over the weekend, the campaign raised $250,000 to match Cheney-Bush's planned fundraising goal for today, Monday July 28th (at a luncheon in South Carolina). That's 4,818 regular Americans vs 125 elite special interests. And it epitomizes what this campaign is about.
But the campaign isn't resting on its laurels having matched Cheney-Bush (over a slow weekend!). Now they have added a SECOND bat - and here's what it's for:
You'll notice the second bat doesn't have a goal. It will be up to you and thousands of other Americans to fill that bat up to whatever amount you can by midnight, tomorrow. We've matched the Bush-Cheney fundraising machine. Tomorrow, let's see by how much we can surpass them.
And wait til you see what we plan on doing with the additional money you help raise tomorrow. It's top secret, but we can tell you this-- it will surprise everyone.
my speculation: the South Carolina primary is the prize!
So, Dean Nation - let's join in and step up to the plate! It's OUR turn at bat!
Sunday, July 27, 2003
DN's "Backbone" Award: Senator Durbin & Ambassador Wilson http://www.thehill.com/news/072303/leak.aspx
What a week to try and choose winners of Dean Nation's second "Backbone" Award. See comments in this post for all the nominees, some of whom will no doubt be future recipients. But for this week, Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Ambassador Joe Wilson rise above the rest. They are telling difficult truths and asking hard questions -- all while enduring scathing and sometimes dangerous smear campaigns -- yet they continue to exhibit an amazing amount of Backbone. Is there any doubt left that Howard Dean is a leader in this welcome trend of fighting the agenda of the Radical Right? Here's Durbin on WsMD and "sixteen words" from ABC News:
P.S The Fruitcake Rebellion fruitcake this week should go to White House spokesman Scott McLellan and Dick Cheney. But why waste $25 bucks on these guys when you can give $25 bucks to Howard Dean's campaign by simply clicking here!
"We've been asking the wrong question. We've been asking, why did George Tenet not stop the White House from misleading the American people? The more important question is, who is it in the White House who was hell-bent on misleading the American people and why are they still there?"And here is Wilson from an interview with Andrea Mitchell discussing the White House's smear campaign against him and his wife -- including blowing Mrs. Wilson's cover as a CIA operative and putting her and her associates in danger's path and her career in jeopardy -- following a Meet The Press appearance in which he discussed the truth regarding Niger-gate and the "uranium" disaster:
"It’s a shot across the bow to those who might step forward. Those unnamed analysts who said they were pressured by the White House, for example, would think twice about having their own families’ names being dragged through this particular mud."And this from The Hill as Durbin continues the fight for Wilson -- and himself -- against the Rove and McLellan Sewer Diversion Act:
He said that syndicated columnist Robert Novak and Time magazine (A war on Wilson?) both reported that administration officials "told them they believe Mr. Wilson had been chosen [for the mission] through the influence of his wife, whom they identified as a CIA operative."ACTION: Though I've no idea how to contact Ambassador Wilson, please send e-mail and/or please write or call Senator Dick Durbin, tell him you are a Howard Dean supporter, and tell him how much you appreciate leaders like Dean who stand up and fight for what is right and what is true in our country, especially when faced with powerful and vicious foes, and especially when it regards our national security. Finally, tell the Senator how much you respect that he's fighting for Joe Wilson, and ask him to please pass your best wishes to the Ambassador, his wife, and his family. As always, we've a long way to go, keep on fighting!
Speaking to reporters after his Senate remarks, Durbin said, "If a member of the Senate is going to be subject to this kind of effort from the White House to discourage our responsibility … and goes to the point of questioning the integrity of my service on the Intelligence Committee, that is a serious as it gets."
"Sadly, what we have here is a continuing pattern by this White House," he declared. "If any member of this Senate, Democrat or Republican, takes to the floor, questions this White House policy, raises any questions about the gathering of intelligence information or the use of it, be prepared for the worst."
P.S The Fruitcake Rebellion fruitcake this week should go to White House spokesman Scott McLellan and Dick Cheney. But why waste $25 bucks on these guys when you can give $25 bucks to Howard Dean's campaign by simply clicking here!
It's the message, stupid http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50945-2003Jul26.html
Via the O-blog this great WaPo piece on internet and traditional organizing -- and our own grassroots guru, Joe Trippi:
Trippi seems an unlikely person to help lead the Internet revolution in politics, a rumpled and sometimes controversial personality who broke into national politics doing the gritty and old-fashioned work of organizing. [...]
Trippi is nothing if not confident. "The mistake others make is to say it's all Internet-driven," he said. "It's not all Internet. We're using the Internet as a tool for organizing. . . . It's [Dean] and his message that makes all this possible."
Saturday, July 26, 2003
Unreliable Sources http://deandefense.org/archives/000413.html
Howie Kurtz is writing about the DDF, and we have some thoughts on it.
Friday, July 25, 2003
Rep. Frank Pallone Jr (D-NJ) endorses Gov Dean http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/jersey/index.ssf?/base/news-4/105884945695750.xml
We've got another congressional endorsement to report! This time it's New Jersey Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. Also, one of Pallone's former top aides, Mike Beson, is acting as Dean's state coordinator in New Jersey.
So do we, Rep. Pallone. Can anyone from New Jersey provide some background on Rep. Pallone so that we can put this endorsement in perspective?
"I came to this kind of slowly, obviously Mike Beson had a lot of input, but the bottom line is Howard Dean is the best candidate for Democrats," Pallone said at a Statehouse news conference. "I think he can win, I think he can win the Democratic nomination and I think he can beat Bush."
So do we, Rep. Pallone. Can anyone from New Jersey provide some background on Rep. Pallone so that we can put this endorsement in perspective?
"Backbone" Nominations http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A37469-2003Jul23.html
Last week it was Pelosi, Rangel and the House Dems (you'll have to scroll down, the archive link is broken). After promising the Republicans' a "week from hell" Pelosi and the Dems forced GOP leaders to force Bill Thomas to apologize or face losing his leadership spot. Thomas, never humble, was hobbled and practically groveling. Nice job, eh?
It's time for nominations. Who had "back" this week? Who didn't? Does anyone deserve the award? And who should get a Fruitcake Rebellion (TM) fruitcake? Winners (and losers) posted by Sunday.
It's time for nominations. Who had "back" this week? Who didn't? Does anyone deserve the award? And who should get a Fruitcake Rebellion (TM) fruitcake? Winners (and losers) posted by Sunday.
3 Flavors of "Unelectability"
Al From and Bruce Reed, executive directors of the Democratic Leadership Council, argue that Dean is unelectable because he's a far out liberal out of touch with mainstream America. This is simply untrue. Clinton recently pointed out that as Vermont governor, Dean was very much a centrist, and a fair assessment of his record and positions would put him somewhere around where Clinton was in 1992.
So what are From and Reed really thinking? Part of it may be that they just have already committed themselves elsewhere: From is an advisor to Lieberman, and Reed is advising Edwards. A more generous evaluation is that they sincerely believe that Dean is unelectable because he opposed the war. What I think must be their true view was expressed recently by Jonathan Chait in the New Republic:
The third version of the "unelectable" critique is that regardless of his actual views, Dean the Nominee inevitably will be portrayed as a far left liberal. The argument is that the combination of his opposition to the war, his support for civil unions in Vermont, that he was governor of a liberal state, that he says he is a "social liberal and fiscal convervative," and the tone of his rhetoric will give the Republicans too much ammunition for Dean to successfully come off as the centrist he is.
First reply to this: this goes for all the possible Democratic nominees. Even if Joe Lieberman is nominated (highly unlikely), the Republicans will do their best to paint him as a lefty. The more likely alternative to Dean, John Kerry, has plenty on his record that one could selectively pull out to build a campaign ad saying "Kerry is a Commie." (Sidenote: none of the candidates has a stance on civil unions and markedly to the left of Dean's.)
Second reply to this: are we really so helpless in the face of the Republican propaganda machine? If nominated, Dean will have plenty of chance to tell people the truth about his record and beliefs. Already, with more media attention, there have been lots of articles about "Dean the Centrist." I refuse to believe that Bush's grip on the media is so powerful that it will crush the voices telling it like it is. This goes double since the Internet has brought the price of information down to zero. We have the power to let the truth be known.
So what are From and Reed really thinking? Part of it may be that they just have already committed themselves elsewhere: From is an advisor to Lieberman, and Reed is advising Edwards. A more generous evaluation is that they sincerely believe that Dean is unelectable because he opposed the war. What I think must be their true view was expressed recently by Jonathan Chait in the New Republic:
The main problem for Dean is not that the public is so supportive of the war in Iraq specifically but, rather, that it abhors any politician who smacks of weakness against foreign enemies generally. Even in the unlikely event that most voters conclude the Iraq war was a mistake, the broader resonance of Dean's antiwar position will still hurt him. As my colleague Lawrence F. Kaplan pointed out in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, the unpopularity of the Vietnam War hardly made George McGovern's dovishness more politically successful.As I wrote in my commentary, Chait would have it that any candidate who does not support every war unconditionally, no matter how empty and mindless the case for the war, is doomed. I think this is an argument in search of evidence. In at least three presidential elections during the 20th century during which controversial military action was looming or on-going at the time of the election, the winning candidate was the one who vowed either not to get the country into war in the first place or to pull the country out of war. This applies to Wilson in 1916 (whose campaign slogan was "He Kept Us Out of War"), Roosevelt in 1940, and Nixon in 1968. The fact that Wilson and Roosevelt both broke their vows and took us into war, and that Nixon didn't really have a secret plan to end the war in Vietnam is beside the point. You don't have to be a warmonger to win the presidency of the United States.
The third version of the "unelectable" critique is that regardless of his actual views, Dean the Nominee inevitably will be portrayed as a far left liberal. The argument is that the combination of his opposition to the war, his support for civil unions in Vermont, that he was governor of a liberal state, that he says he is a "social liberal and fiscal convervative," and the tone of his rhetoric will give the Republicans too much ammunition for Dean to successfully come off as the centrist he is.
First reply to this: this goes for all the possible Democratic nominees. Even if Joe Lieberman is nominated (highly unlikely), the Republicans will do their best to paint him as a lefty. The more likely alternative to Dean, John Kerry, has plenty on his record that one could selectively pull out to build a campaign ad saying "Kerry is a Commie." (Sidenote: none of the candidates has a stance on civil unions and markedly to the left of Dean's.)
Second reply to this: are we really so helpless in the face of the Republican propaganda machine? If nominated, Dean will have plenty of chance to tell people the truth about his record and beliefs. Already, with more media attention, there have been lots of articles about "Dean the Centrist." I refuse to believe that Bush's grip on the media is so powerful that it will crush the voices telling it like it is. This goes double since the Internet has brought the price of information down to zero. We have the power to let the truth be known.
Congress Takes Aim at Patriot Act
Dean says, "I would remove the parts of the Patriot Act that are clearly unconstitutional."
Jonathan Chait of the New Republic writes
Jonathan Chait of the New Republic writes
Combined with his antiwar stance, Dean's opposition to the Patriot Act could be politically lethal in a general election. For years, Republicans painted Democrats as civil-libertarian purists unconcerned with fighting crime. ....Whatever the merits of Dean's absolutist position, from a pragmatic standpoint he is once again walking into a GOP attack ad while flaying his opponents for failing to do the same.Meanwhile,
In a huge victory, the House voted on Tuesday evening -- by an extraordinary margin -- for an amendment to this year's Commerce, Justice and State funding bill that would bar federal law enforcement agencies from implementing "sneak and peek" search warrants. In one of its most controversial provisions, the USA PATRIOT Act allowed government agents to execute so-called sneak and peek warrants and search homes, confiscate certain types of property and essentially "bug" computers without notifying the subject of the search that it is happening.
Conservative Rep. C.L. "Butch" Otter (R-ID) offered the amendment, which passed by a vote of 309 to 118, with 113 Republicans voting in favor. The amendment still has to clear the Senate and the President before it becomes law.
The Otter Amendment is the first unequivocal indication that lawmakers are taking seriously a broad, grassroots backlash against excessive government powers, which has grown exponentially in the past several months. To date, at least 142 communities and three states, encompassing more than 16 million people, have passed pro-civil liberties resolutions that speak out against the PATRIOT Act, many of which call for specific fixes to the bill.
Dean on the War http://www.sunspot.net/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.witcover25jul25,0,3170193.column?coll=bal-home-columnists
From an interview by Baltimore Sun columnist Jules Witcover:
"The premise on which the country went to war turned out not to have been true," he says. "Saddam Hussein was never a danger to the United States. We're in more danger now than we were before the president went into Iraq."
....
"The job of president means you have to really make tough decisions and clear-eyed decisions. So I think the four guys who supported the war have got some explaining to do, because they basically swallowed all the evidence that the president was dishing them up, the major proportion of which turned out to be exaggerated or simply not true."
Mr. Lieberman, who was in support of the invasion from the start, may have an easier task defending himself, Mr. Dean says, but "the guys who sort of backed into it [support of the war], 'On the one hand I only did it to send it to the United Nations,' that kind of stuff, or they denounced the president while they were voting for the resolution, those guys are going to have a little more trouble."
....
"It isn't just Kerry. Gephardt, Edwards and Lieberman all voted for the war. [But] I truly believe that if you make a decision and it's based on the best information you have, that you ought to defend it all the way through."
....
"If I can figure out the case the president was making wasn't accurate, and wasn't a good one, and these guys, these campaigns, are all spinning that I don't have foreign policy experience," he says, "then how come my team could figure it out and the other teams couldn't?"
As for those in his party who suggest Mr. Dean may be getting too strident in his remarks about the still-popular president on the war, he says: "I think the strength of the whole campaign is how strongly we come out against the president's far-right policies. I think people will listen to both arguments on the war and they'll make up their minds about that. I don't worry that I'm opposed to the war because it's a principled position. There'll be an open debate about that, and I'll be glad to have that open debate."
Report on Dean Corps in Iowa: Dean Campaign More Than Politics as Usual http://www.dailyiowan.com/news/448601.html?mkey=816489
Another great thing about the Dean campaign is its willingness to engage in the unconventional. Most campaigns are simply about increasing name recognition and finding new contributors. The Dean team is smart to focus on getting local volunteers plugged into community activities - not only will this generate goodwill for Dean, but it will multiply his base of support, as Dean Corps members introduce themselves to individuals at the local level. A great use of grassroots support!
Bush's failure to engage citizens in community activities in the post-9/11 world, only underscores the difference between the two candidates. Dean's effort here should serve him well.
** FYI, I've been in Mexico the last six weeks, and now relocated in Montpelier, VT. Sorry to have been out of touch!
Bush's failure to engage citizens in community activities in the post-9/11 world, only underscores the difference between the two candidates. Dean's effort here should serve him well.
** FYI, I've been in Mexico the last six weeks, and now relocated in Montpelier, VT. Sorry to have been out of touch!
audio: Dean on VPR http://www.vpr.net/switchboard/switchboard_072403.wax
Dean on Switchboard (VPR)
Bob Kinzel hosts the show from Ottumwa, Iowa in this special simulcast on Vermont Public Radio and Iowa Public Radio. Dean will discuss his campaign so far and take questions from listeners and from a studio audience of undecided Iowa voters.
(bonus link: previous archive of VPR coverage of Dean's campaign)
Life of the party? http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/07/25/dean/index_np.html
A generally pro-Dean piece in Salon - if you aren't a Salon subscriber, you'll have to sit through a 30 sec commercial to access it though. The general theme is taking on the Dean = McGovern by showing how Dean actually is an embodiment of the real soul of the Party. And it starts out by quoting McGovern himself:
I love hearing the DLC described as center-right! But the beauty of this article is that it shows exactly how Dean has been guided by the DLC itself, and as Trippi points out, is running the race that they themselves literally wrote the book on for how to win:
The article goes on to show that the DLC attacks are actually harming the entire Democratic field, by essentially hand-delivering the talking points to the Republicans. This will harm whoever is the nominee.
The second page of the article looks at the other main candidates, and points out that the DLC favorites, Edwards and Lieberman, have started out with all the advantages and spent the most money, but has steadily lost ground. They then point out that Kerry is the biggest threat to Dean (remember back when Dean was the biggest threat to Kerry?), and make an insightful observation that people who label Kerry as more electable are actually insulting Kerry himself:
still, it takes more than a good manager to win, and the carping of the DLC will come back to haunt even the strongest campaign. The article closes out:
the most important thing McGovern can see about the upcoming presidential contest of 2004 is that it is not taking place in 1972, and that he is not running in it. Certainly, McGovern can see some resemblance between himself and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean. They're both from sparsely populated, rural states. They both entered their respective races early, and became heavily reliant on volunteers and grass-roots mobilizing. That aside, though, "I think it's difficult to draw a close comparison," says McGovern.
"There's no transcendent issue now that he's identified with," says McGovern, who met Dean and some of the other Democratic presidential aspirants at a May conference on rural issues in Lake Placid, N.Y. "There's no Vietnam War, no Great Depression ... I don't see any single issue that has mobilized especially the young people and women like 1972 did. There was something about the Vietnam involvement that did create a divide in the Democratic Party probably surpassed only by the period of the Civil War, which had a shattering impact on the Democratic coalition. I don't think there's anything quite as divisive culturally or politically today.
"Another difference," continues McGovern somewhat wistfully, "is that he has a large sum of money in the race more than a year ahead of the election and I was never but one step ahead of the bill collectors ... I never had the millions that he has."
There are plenty of other differences, too -- such as the rise of the Internet and a front-loaded primary schedule next year that could provide a clear winner as early as March 3, whereas McGovern's state-by-state slog for the nomination lasted through and then into a convention so divisive that California's delegation was challenged all the way to the Supreme Court and four of McGovern's vice-presidential picks turned him down publicly before he finally won over former Peace Corps director Sargent Shriver.
But to hear Howard Dean's critics in the conservative wing of the Democratic Party, he is nothing less than the second coming of McGovern, doomed to lead the party into the same electoral inferno if he wins its nomination next year. According to Al From, CEO and founder of the center-right Democratic Leadership Council, and Bruce Reed, DLC president and President Bill Clinton's former domestic policy guru, Dean must be stopped before he steers the party back to the McGovern era of bell-bottoms and muttonchops -- and back to political oblivion.
I love hearing the DLC described as center-right! But the beauty of this article is that it shows exactly how Dean has been guided by the DLC itself, and as Trippi points out, is running the race that they themselves literally wrote the book on for how to win:
If anything, the DLC's attacks have increased support for the Dean campaign, which sees its fundraising spike each time it comes under attack from the Washington insiders, says Trippi. That's because rather than running as McGovern, Dean seems to be running according to the campaign playbook outlined by none other than From and Reed in their very smart Feb. 11 memo, "What It Takes to Win the White House."
"Your most formidable opponent," the duo wrote, "isn't President Bush or your fellow contestants for the nomination. Your real enemy is the ghost of Democrats past.
"[P]arty perceptions are a wonderful foil for an insurgent candidate looking to define himself," they continued, urging the candidates to refuse "to be subtle about defying the Democratic stereotype." Added Bernard L. Schwartz and Daniel Yankelovich in the same issue of Blueprint magazine: "The worst mistake Democrats can make is to continue to work within a Republican framework. This is how Democrats were snookered in the 2002 election."
What From and Reed did not realize is that their DLC would become the Democratic ghost against which an insurgent Dean would run.
Rather than running against the Democratic Party of 1972, Dean is running against the DLC-dominated (in image, if not in fact) Democratic Party that lost the House in 1994, the White House in 2000, and the Senate in 2000 and again in 2002. This, too, is just as From and Reed advised, though they seem to have forgotten that.
"The real front-runner, fresh off its triumph in the midterms, is the Democratic Party's losing image," they wrote in February. "If you want to win the presidency in 2004, you have to redefine the Democratic Party in 2003. By all means, capture your party's imagination -- but do it on your terms, not theirs."
That is exactly what Dean is doing -- by directly challenging the party's support for the president's war in Iraq, the USA PATRIOT Act, and such losing or poorly funded pieces of legislation as the Patient's Bill of Rights and the No Child Left Behind Act. "Don't look for the false unity that comes from shying away from every controversial issue, and reject the consultant consensus that stacking constituency upon constituency will add up to a majority," wrote From and Reed. "Now more than ever, the one reason to seek the presidency, and the only way to win it, is to unite people behind a cause that is larger than your candidacy."
And so Dean's presidential announcement speech on June 23 reached for the broadest themes possible: "This campaign is about more than issue differences on health care or tax policy, national security, jobs, the environment, our economy ... It's about who we are as Americans," Dean told the 30,000 people across the country who followed his speech. "I ask all Americans, regardless of party, to meet with me across the nation -- to come together in common cause to forge a new American century. Help us in this quest to return greatness and return high moral purpose to the United States of America."
Now that Dean is capturing the party's imagination on his own terms, the DLC is crying foul.
The article goes on to show that the DLC attacks are actually harming the entire Democratic field, by essentially hand-delivering the talking points to the Republicans. This will harm whoever is the nominee.
The second page of the article looks at the other main candidates, and points out that the DLC favorites, Edwards and Lieberman, have started out with all the advantages and spent the most money, but has steadily lost ground. They then point out that Kerry is the biggest threat to Dean (remember back when Dean was the biggest threat to Kerry?), and make an insightful observation that people who label Kerry as more electable are actually insulting Kerry himself:
Dean critics portray Kerry as a less exciting, but more electable candidate. "The Democrats would be much better off with a blander, more faceless, less exciting candidate -- Kerry, Gephardt or even Lieberman (perhaps with Edwards, Florida Sen. Bob Graham, or retired Gen. Wesley Clark as running mate) -- than they would be with a fiery, controversial Dean," wrote John Judis in Salon. This analysis is especially unfair to Kerry. Kerry is not the leader in New Hampshire because he is the bland, unexciting, unobjectionable party favorite. Kerry is leading because he is running an aggressive, smart campaign that was first out of the gate in January with a strong operation, has spent wisely, and has expanded ahead of the rest of the pack into multiple states. Kerry has proven himself a surprisingly personable and adept one-on-one campaigner, and his campaign has shown flexibility in responding to the challenge Dean has posed.
still, it takes more than a good manager to win, and the carping of the DLC will come back to haunt even the strongest campaign. The article closes out:
the DLC attacks of this spring and summer will work their evil magic, you may be certain. They will weaken the eventual Democratic nominee -- whether it is Dean, Kerry, Gephardt, Edwards or some other candidate – and increase the chances that the nominee will lose to Bush.
But in the end, victory might well go to the boldest candidate, despite the carping of the cautious and centrist. "Americans don't vote for someone who has positioned himself in the center," says Curtis Gans, former director of the nonpartisan Committee for the Study of the American Electorate. "They vote for a human being who they trust to help them solve their problems."
Thursday, July 24, 2003
Open Thread http://www.dailykos.com/archives/003515.html#003515
As a conversation starter, check out this new National prez pref poll and accompanying analysis at Daily Kos. Consider the floor yours. Now get to dancin' okay?
Kurtz on Crowley on Kerry on Dean on Woodruff http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39295-2003Jul24.html?nav=hptop_tb
The The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz, remarking on TNR Primary writer Michael Crowley's musings on Kerry, and Kerry's (I think quite sneaky and dishonest) attack on Howard Dean from yesterday's Inside Politics:
"People who talk about Kerry's ability to connect with voters typically focus on his 'aloofness' and patrician bearings. But Kerry's most off-putting quality may be his tedious long-windedness. The man desperately needs an editor lobe in his brain. When Kerry finally announced his position on Iraq last fall, for instance, he did so with a 45-minute Senate-floor sermon that threw off other senators' time slots. But the problem isn't just his big speeches; Kerry's television interviews are just as bad. Take, for example, his appearance on CNN's 'Inside Politics' yesterday. When the show's host, Judy Woodruff, asked him about the Howard Dean surge, Kerry rambled for what felt like three minutes."Ouch.
We'll spare you the long monologue.
"Kerry did work in a nice swipe at Dean ('we don't need a learning curve in the presidency'). But it was buried under 20 lungfuls of blather. Kerry would do well to stop claiming that he speaks 'straight-forward, candid, with a clarity' and, like his nemesis from Vermont, actually start doing it."
Weicker Endorsement http://mattbailey.blogspot.com/politics/2003_07_20_deanarchive.html#105908152176772869
From the Dean Campaign:
See GrassrootsforDean.com for full press release.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 24, 2003
Lowell Weicker Endorses Howard Dean for America
Original Co-Sponsor of the American with Disabilities Act lauds Dean's leadership, courage
IOWA CITY-Former Connecticut Governor Lowell Weicker, Jr. announced today his endorsement of Governor Howard Dean, M.D, for president of the United States. Weicker, who is best known for his political independence and his sponsorship of the landmark Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), said that he was attracted to Dean because of the former Vermont governor's common-sense and forthright agenda.
"I'm endorsing Governor Dean today because he, more than all the other candidates, speaks to the issues that I care about-health care, civil rights, fiscal responsibility and most of all, a government that is truthful with the American people," said Mr. Weicker, who spoke with Dean via conference call this afternoon. "I firmly believe that Dr. Dean has his priorities straight."
"Dean has based his career in public service around three American values I deeply share: equal rights for all people, access to health care and fiscal responsibility. I have been impressed with the way that, when so many others were silent, Governor Dean spoke out against the hurtful and divisive policies of the Bush administration. He is a fighter and he works from the facts. Dean is not afraid to stand for what is right-no matter how politically unpopular it may be," Weicker said.
See GrassrootsforDean.com for full press release.
Jonathan vs. Jonathan http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=express&s=chaitcohn072403
The two guys who wrote the pro- and anti- Dean articles in the New Republic are now having an online back-and-forth about Dean. I think Jonathan the Good defends himself quite well and gets the better of his opponent. I like his posting here more than the original article. He also cites our blog for discussion of why Dean is not McGovern. Read it all! Then go over to Dean Defense Forces for info on how to e-mail the the New Republic a letter with your thoughts.
Carville on the "Big Message" for 2004 http://mattbailey.blogspot.com/politics/2003_07_20_deanarchive.html#105906345788238002
James Carville gave a speech in San Francisco recently to the American Trial Lawyers Association in which he identified what he predicts the “big issue” should be in the 2004 election. Carville was the Clinton strategist who developed the “it’s the economy, stupid” theme of the 1992 presidential campaign which led to the defeat of the first President Bush.
While Iraq will not be the focus of the election, it should be mentioned:
For the Democrats to have a chance to beat George W. Bush in 2004, they need a big issue to bring to voters. The article on TomPaine.com that covers the speech reports Carville saying it is not going to be the economy or foreign policy:
So, to keep you in suspense no longer, THE BIG ISSUE OF 2004:
More on GrassrootsforDean.com
While Iraq will not be the focus of the election, it should be mentioned:
On Iraq, Carville said Democrats "should not exaggerate the facts," but merely state and restate them. "They lied to get us in. They don't know how to get us out," he said. "How did they not know the country wasn't divided? How do you commit 150,000 troops with no plan to get out? All we have to do is remind people of that."
For the Democrats to have a chance to beat George W. Bush in 2004, they need a big issue to bring to voters. The article on TomPaine.com that covers the speech reports Carville saying it is not going to be the economy or foreign policy:
"The issues we now face as Americans are so huge, so great, demand so much attention, we have to look at it all," he said.
So, to keep you in suspense no longer, THE BIG ISSUE OF 2004:
And that lead to what Carville said was the big issue for Democrats in '04, what he called the Bush administration's reversal of "the generational promise of America -- each time we do what we can do to make the next generation better."
"That promise, today like no other time in our lifetime, is under attack," he said. "The idea that we are a society beyond our own self-interest is under attack. We are told America is best when people are interested in ourselves. We know America is better when we're based on a common interest.
"We have a president that is no longer interested in what happens to the next generation. We have a president that is no longer interested in what happens to the promise of America.
"I am telling you that there is so much at stake here. There is so much for us to fight for. There are so many people who don't want to give up the dream of generational promise.
More on GrassrootsforDean.com
Talk Back, Baby
Are you a Dean supporter? Are you A Dean Critic? Want your thoughts heard?
I have questions for you. E-mail me at Points West
I have questions for you. E-mail me at Points West
Wednesday, July 23, 2003
phase II: Steve Grossman and Howard Dean
Sometimes I can't see the forest for the trees. ;^) After throwing out a blanket solicitation to Trippi to help explain Howard Dean's ties with AIPAC via Steve Grossman, one of our readers (DavidNYC) came through. He leaves this link and it says:
Grossman is the son of Russian Jewish immigrants, and his father was both an entrepreneur and a Boston political activist. Steve has a long history of being politically active and aligned with the power players in the Democratic Party. The Boston Phoenix's bio includes this gem:
Steve Grossman was part of the effort to elected Michael Dukakis in 88, and supported Ron Brown for Democratic Party Chair. Brown later invited Grossman to become part of - drumroll, please - the DNC. He's well known for rebuilding the Massachusetts Democratic Party after he became it's chairman in 1990. After Paul Tsongas dropped out of the 92 race, he got behind Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton.
He became the head of AIPAC in 1992, and played a key role in drumming up American Jewish support for the Oslo Accords (as mentioned above). He left AIPAC in 1997, and the organisation was more bipartisan and balanced than it had been in it's history.
Essentially, Grossman is one more connection to the Democratic Party power centers (check out this article, in which his fellow Democrats sing Grossman's praises). As we talked about last week, Dean's beginning to reach out to people inside the Beltway. People power can certainly win this election, but Dean's going to have to work with the power players once we get him elected. Reaching out to them now and building bridges is definitely smart, and Steve Grossman (fundraising capabilities aside) can help make that happen. Ahhh... I get it! ;^)
During his four years as AIPAC's president, Grossman remained on excellent terms with both Clinton and Rabin. In 1993, after Rabin signed the Oslo peace accords and shook hands with Yasir Arafat in the White House Rose Garden, Grossman coaxed from his board a unanimous declaration of support.
Grossman is the son of Russian Jewish immigrants, and his father was both an entrepreneur and a Boston political activist. Steve has a long history of being politically active and aligned with the power players in the Democratic Party. The Boston Phoenix's bio includes this gem:
It was after business school, in 1970, that Grossman had a "political epiphany" about the power of grassroots activism. The occasion was a caucus at Concord-Carlisle High School, where Grossman's uncle Jerome, co-founder of a statewide peace organization called MassPAX, planned to nominate Father Robert Drinan, an anti-war cleric, to challenge Representative Philip Philbin, a pro-Vietnam hawk. A lantern-jawed Vietnam War hero named John Kerry threatened to throw a wrench into those plans. But Jerome Grossman took Kerry aside and urged him to back away, saying the progressive wing of the Democratic Party would remember his decision. Kerry did so, and Drinan went on to serve in Congress for a decade.
Steve Grossman was part of the effort to elected Michael Dukakis in 88, and supported Ron Brown for Democratic Party Chair. Brown later invited Grossman to become part of - drumroll, please - the DNC. He's well known for rebuilding the Massachusetts Democratic Party after he became it's chairman in 1990. After Paul Tsongas dropped out of the 92 race, he got behind Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton.
He became the head of AIPAC in 1992, and played a key role in drumming up American Jewish support for the Oslo Accords (as mentioned above). He left AIPAC in 1997, and the organisation was more bipartisan and balanced than it had been in it's history.
Essentially, Grossman is one more connection to the Democratic Party power centers (check out this article, in which his fellow Democrats sing Grossman's praises). As we talked about last week, Dean's beginning to reach out to people inside the Beltway. People power can certainly win this election, but Dean's going to have to work with the power players once we get him elected. Reaching out to them now and building bridges is definitely smart, and Steve Grossman (fundraising capabilities aside) can help make that happen. Ahhh... I get it! ;^)
Internal campaign donations http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2003/07/franke-ruta-g-07-22.html
This is an interesting little article that initially focuses on Edwards, but then goes on to examine all the campaigns, in seeing how much money they raised was from donations by campaign staff (and the candidates themselves). The Dean campaign is no exception, though most of its donations to itself were nowehere near the deadlines and thus clearly not intended to beef up the Q3 reporting:
(emphasis mine). Intriguingly, the Kerry campaign had almost no internal donations. Mainly because he leads the pack with cash on hand and has the Heinz fortune in reserve, so that certainly seems wise :)
Five senior Dean for America staffers gave to the campaign on June 30, though three of them gave less than $300 each, and one of them, longtime Dean adviser Tom McMahon, gave $500. Most internal donations to the Dean campaign seemed to have been geared toward keeping the campaign afloat during Dean's stint in the cash-poor wilderness last winter. Fund-raiser Steve Grossman donated $1,000 last December and another $1,000 in January, while campaign manager Joe Trippi gave $250 in January and $1,999 on March 20, putting him $249 over the legal limit, according to FEC records. Trippi says the first donation was from his wife on a shared credit card, and attempts to have it labeled as such in the FEC database are ongoing.
(emphasis mine). Intriguingly, the Kerry campaign had almost no internal donations. Mainly because he leads the pack with cash on hand and has the Heinz fortune in reserve, so that certainly seems wise :)
Gang Green http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2003/07/tomasky-m-07-23.html
Michael Tomasky takes on Ralph Nader and those Greens who are, as he puts it, "left-wing lions of ideological chastity." In addition to making the best summarized case of why it's self-interest defeating for Green party members to actually vote Green in 2004, he makes a suggestion that's audacious beyond words - that to counter the threat of Nader and a Green candidate for President in 2004, the Democrats need to attack Nader - ferociously, and immediately:
I'm always bemused by controversial advice to Dean on how to win by people who still haven't endorsed him or are hedging their bets. If Tomasky came out and said "I support Howard Dean, he has my personal endorsement, and this is my advice" then I might be a little less skeptical.
But I can't really find any factual fault with Tomasky's analysis either. I mean, what exactly has Ralph Nader done in recent years that lets him keep his Saint Ralph halo? and certtainly Nader hasn't shown any restraint in his ferocious attacks on Democrats, notably Gore. And I'm still firmly convinced that we do need to thread that delicate line between wooing Green voters on the issues whil repudiating all things Nader. Might this be the answer?
Attack Nader right now, and with lupine ferocity. Say he's a madman for thinking of running again. Blast him especially hard on foreign policy, saying that if it were up to the Greens, America would give no aid to Israel and it would cease to exist, and if it were up to the Greens, America would not have even defended itself against a barbarous attack by going into Afghanistan. Have at him, and hard, from the right. Then nail him from the left on certain social issues, on abortion rights and other things that he's often pooh-poohed and dismissed as irrelevant. Cause an uproar. Be dramatic. Don't balance it with praise about what he's done for consumers. To the contrary, talk about how much he's damaging consumers today by not caring who's in charge of the Food and Drug Administration or the Federal Communications Commission.
This would be, for some clever Democrat, the defining Sister Souljah moment of this campaign. Except times 50, because Sister Souljah was a second-tier rapper no one had heard of and Ralph Nader is one of the most famous Americans of the last half-century. Anyone who did this would automatically look tough. The candidates are running around now saying things like, "I'll be as tough as Bush." Well, you can say that 7,000 times and it doesn't matter. You have to do something to show people you're tough. That's the only way a message like that is delivered in a campaign. Then, people will look at what you've done and say, "Hey, that guy's pretty tough."
Who should do it? That's up to them. It wouldn't have much impact coming from Joe Lieberman, because he's not hunting for any votes over there in anything close to Nader territory. It has to be someone with at least one leg in the liberal soil -- John Kerry, Dick Gephardt or Howard Dean. Yes, Dean. If Dean does this, he doesn't lose his base -- his base is pissed-off Democrats who hate Nader for 2000, so if anything, he augments his standing among them. And, of course, he sends a reassuring signal to the centrist wing of the party that fears his success; it would give them something about him to admire. He can't lose.
I'm always bemused by controversial advice to Dean on how to win by people who still haven't endorsed him or are hedging their bets. If Tomasky came out and said "I support Howard Dean, he has my personal endorsement, and this is my advice" then I might be a little less skeptical.
But I can't really find any factual fault with Tomasky's analysis either. I mean, what exactly has Ralph Nader done in recent years that lets him keep his Saint Ralph halo? and certtainly Nader hasn't shown any restraint in his ferocious attacks on Democrats, notably Gore. And I'm still firmly convinced that we do need to thread that delicate line between wooing Green voters on the issues whil repudiating all things Nader. Might this be the answer?
Howard Dean and Saving the Net http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6989
This is an astounding editorial by Doc Searls, the editor of Linux Journal. Searls ties together the FCC consolidation rulings, the real reason why broadband is still not widespread, the real reason we lost the Eldred vs Ashcroft case, and even throws in commentary about the different attitudes of liberals and conservatives and how this shapes the ongoing struggle to save the Internet. At the end, Searls invokes Howard Dean - and points us in the same direction as Lessig did a few days ago. (I'm not going to excerpt - the whole thing is essential reading).
The discussion thread on Slashdot is buzzing - and Howard Dean is mentioned repeatedly (including calls for an interview). I don't know if the campaign realizes just how attuned the Slashdot demographic is towards Dean right now - as Searls points out, Dean's campaign use of the Internet is exactly the kind of nascent innovation that poses a real threat to those who oppose the user-centric ideals that the Internet embodies.
I cannot stop beating this drum. A slashdot interview is critical - but before it can happen, Dean needs to get up to speed. And this article by Searls is a great, great start.
The discussion thread on Slashdot is buzzing - and Howard Dean is mentioned repeatedly (including calls for an interview). I don't know if the campaign realizes just how attuned the Slashdot demographic is towards Dean right now - as Searls points out, Dean's campaign use of the Internet is exactly the kind of nascent innovation that poses a real threat to those who oppose the user-centric ideals that the Internet embodies.
I cannot stop beating this drum. A slashdot interview is critical - but before it can happen, Dean needs to get up to speed. And this article by Searls is a great, great start.
Weicker to Endorse Dean
Dean for American announced today that former Republican senator and Independent governor Lowell P. Weicker of Connecticut will be endorsing Gov. Howard Dean for president. As a senator, Weicker was an original sponsor of the Americans with Disablities Act and was known as a Nixon critic during the Watergate scandal. As Connecticut's governor, Weicker instituted the state's income tax despite extreme opposition to the measure. Weicker lost his senate seat to Sen. Joseph Lieberman. He founded A Connecticut Party and was elected governor on that ticket. He was mentioned as a possible presidential candidate for the reform party in both 2000 and 1996.
Hilights from Trippi on Thom Hartmann show
Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi offered some real gems during his interview with Vermont talk-show host Thom Hartmann. The question and answer session last an hour and twenty minutes. Here are some hilights:
Fair enough, but Dean's ties to AIPAC - if there are any - need to be clarified. We know he visited Israel on an AIPAC-sponsored trip last year. We know Dean's said (last summer) that his stance is close to AIPAC. But there's been nothing new since then. Has he become more moderate? Has he reached out to any Palestinian organisation, or any aid organisations that are currently working in that area? We also know Dean had a close friend - who recently passed away - who worked closely with a Jewish peace organisation that is not as hawkish as AIPAC. What influence did that friend's work have on Dean? Joe, it's really time to explain this. It's not a deal-breaker, but we need to know if his stance has evolved on this very important issue. Feel free to leave a comment.
Overall, the interview was really good. The host was eloquent and gave Joe plenty of time to answer the questions. Joe sounded like he needed some rest, but overall did a good job of explaining where Dean stands. If you listened, please leave a comment about your impression of the interview.
update Shoot, I forgot that Joe got asked about the VP question. Joe said, "I like Wesley Clark a lot - I think he's a really strong leader. But we're just fighting to get the nomination right now." Sorry for the ommission.
* Dean supports Instant Runoff Voting. When asked about IRV, Trippi joked, "IRV is easy - Dean supports it. We wish moveon would have done it."
* Regarding the Republicans slashing veterans benefits: "We believe you've gotta keep your committment to the veterans of this country. These people fought and died for our freedom and you've gotta support them."
* On the dumbing down of political discussion in America: "The vocabulary of our politics has become totally meaningless."
* On Dean and the national media that promotes the stupid "McGovern" and "wild-eyed liberal" memes: "Part of what's going on there is when you have five different campaigns who all go drinking every night with the press people in Washington... the press basically gets spun. The McGovern stuff that's not true - its like I said there has been a totally different political vocabulary that's meaningless. This campaign is about restoring the meaning to the dialogue."
* Trippi stated Dean favors repealing the [un]PATRIOT[ic] Act, but feels the main problem is with the way the Justice Departmen implemented the act under Ashcroft's leadership.
* On the Bush Doctrine: "Bush has turned around centuries of foreign policy - since Thomas Paine and John Adams - we were not to become the new Rome. The Governor feels strongly that the preemtpive doctrine must be torn up the first day in office. This is not a left or right idea - it's an idea that's steeped in America itself. To try to define it ideologically is just wrong."
* On what Trippi would change about campaigning if he could: "If I had the power to do one thing, abolish one thing in our politics today, it woudn't be the negative ads, I would abolish polling." He went on to explain how polling agencies - beginning in the 80s - started to only poll likely voters, which led to more conservative poll numbers. People who aren't likely to vote generally don't get polled, and this includes a huge segment of the population that's dropped out of the process because they feel disenchanted, like they can't make a difference. This population is more progressive and more likely to vote Democrat than Republican.
* On the DLC's Dean-bashing: "The DLC - you know - Al From is supporting Lieberman and Reed is supporting Edwards - they're advisors. So you have to take with a grain of salt all these memos they're writing about why Howard Dean should not be elected. They're worried Dean might stop their guy from getting the nomination."
* On Dean taking on a former AIPAC member as a fundraiser: Trippi spun his wheels saying that because Dean's donor base is so large (over 90K people), he will not be beholden to any special interests. But he didn't answer the caller's question, which was how much justice the Palestinian children could expect from a Dean administration. Trippi said that Dean believes there's wrong on both sides (which is perfectly reasonable), and that Israel needs to pull out of the settlements and Palestinians need to stop committing state-sponsored terror.
Fair enough, but Dean's ties to AIPAC - if there are any - need to be clarified. We know he visited Israel on an AIPAC-sponsored trip last year. We know Dean's said (last summer) that his stance is close to AIPAC. But there's been nothing new since then. Has he become more moderate? Has he reached out to any Palestinian organisation, or any aid organisations that are currently working in that area? We also know Dean had a close friend - who recently passed away - who worked closely with a Jewish peace organisation that is not as hawkish as AIPAC. What influence did that friend's work have on Dean? Joe, it's really time to explain this. It's not a deal-breaker, but we need to know if his stance has evolved on this very important issue. Feel free to leave a comment.
Overall, the interview was really good. The host was eloquent and gave Joe plenty of time to answer the questions. Joe sounded like he needed some rest, but overall did a good job of explaining where Dean stands. If you listened, please leave a comment about your impression of the interview.
update Shoot, I forgot that Joe got asked about the VP question. Joe said, "I like Wesley Clark a lot - I think he's a really strong leader. But we're just fighting to get the nomination right now." Sorry for the ommission.
Boston Globe profiles the political blogosphere; focuses on Dean in Kerry's backyard http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/204/metro/_Blogs_shake_the_political_discourse+.shtml
Lots of pro-Dean bloggers are featured in this article which ran on the front page of today's Boston Globe. You'll see some familiar names and some familiar themes, and Globe reporter Joanna Weiss does a good job of summing up how blogs are influencing politics out in the real world. She also mentions that the other candidates haven't been as quick to embrace the power of blogs.
One thing I remember mentioning to her is that I think there's still room for the other candidates to build a community of online supporters. Witness John Kerry, who's finally gotten hip to meetup and now has over 7500 supporters signed on. Also, Wesley Clark supporters are getting a good response over at draftclark.com. However, I also feel that they're facing an uphill climb and a learning curve. If the rest of the contenders don't jump in the water soon, they might miss the boat. Do you think there's room for more candidates in the blogosphere? If so, is it possible for them to garner the kind of support that Trippi has orchestrated for Dean? Is it too late for them already?
One thing I remember mentioning to her is that I think there's still room for the other candidates to build a community of online supporters. Witness John Kerry, who's finally gotten hip to meetup and now has over 7500 supporters signed on. Also, Wesley Clark supporters are getting a good response over at draftclark.com. However, I also feel that they're facing an uphill climb and a learning curve. If the rest of the contenders don't jump in the water soon, they might miss the boat. Do you think there's room for more candidates in the blogosphere? If so, is it possible for them to garner the kind of support that Trippi has orchestrated for Dean? Is it too late for them already?
Listen to Trippi online at Noon EST Today http://www.thomhartmann.com/show.shtml
Alert reader Larry Patterson sends a heads-up. Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi will appear on the Thom Hartmann radio show today at noon EST, 11 CST, 10am Mountain, and 9am Pacific. Listen live at www.ieamericaradio.com, on a radio station near you, or on Sirius Satellite Radio channel 145. Call 1-800-Talk-Yes to be on the air. Hartmann's show is billed as "Uncommon Sense From the Radical Middle", and it should be good. Tune in if you can.
Wesley Clark http://www.notgeniuses.com/archives/000357.html#more
This is the follow-up to yesterday's post on the ramifications of a Biden candidacy. I've taken what's below from the middle of my post so that what's on here is Dean-centric. Enjoy.
Clark's likelihood of entering the race is inversely proportional to Dean's likelihood of winning it. Clark is looking at the same base, the same grassroots activists, and the same campaign as Dean - he needs people dissatisfied with Bush and with the "traditional" Democratic establishment. People who are loyal to Democratic politicians are going with Kerry, Gephardt, Lieberman, etc. People loyal to Democratic ideals and tired of our politicians are going with Dean. If Dean is looking weak as September rolls around (a situation that looks increasingly unlikely), Clark is more likely to get in. More of Dean's base will be nervous that they're backing the wrong horse and he has less of a chance of being picked as VP by Kerry or Gephardt. If Dean is strong, Clark can't get his base and is highly likely to be picked as VP, so why dirty himself and weaken his chances + run the risk of pissing Dean off?
A Clark candidacy would badly hurt Dean and Kerry, strengthen Gephardt, and create a 3 way race. Clark could run strong in the South - but he needs more of a message or platform before his appeal nationwide can be predicted. Dean has grassroots Clark needs and is the only other anti-war candidate, Clark is a viable anti-war candidate and takes Kerry's resume advantage away. So everyone's hurt and they stand a chance of killing each other and handing Gephardt the nomination - I just can't see Clark winning due to his disadvantages and late start. Clark would, however, be a good choice for Gephardt's VP slot.
Read the whole thing...
Clark's likelihood of entering the race is inversely proportional to Dean's likelihood of winning it. Clark is looking at the same base, the same grassroots activists, and the same campaign as Dean - he needs people dissatisfied with Bush and with the "traditional" Democratic establishment. People who are loyal to Democratic politicians are going with Kerry, Gephardt, Lieberman, etc. People loyal to Democratic ideals and tired of our politicians are going with Dean. If Dean is looking weak as September rolls around (a situation that looks increasingly unlikely), Clark is more likely to get in. More of Dean's base will be nervous that they're backing the wrong horse and he has less of a chance of being picked as VP by Kerry or Gephardt. If Dean is strong, Clark can't get his base and is highly likely to be picked as VP, so why dirty himself and weaken his chances + run the risk of pissing Dean off?
A Clark candidacy would badly hurt Dean and Kerry, strengthen Gephardt, and create a 3 way race. Clark could run strong in the South - but he needs more of a message or platform before his appeal nationwide can be predicted. Dean has grassroots Clark needs and is the only other anti-war candidate, Clark is a viable anti-war candidate and takes Kerry's resume advantage away. So everyone's hurt and they stand a chance of killing each other and handing Gephardt the nomination - I just can't see Clark winning due to his disadvantages and late start. Clark would, however, be a good choice for Gephardt's VP slot.
Read the whole thing...
Tuesday, July 22, 2003
phase II: Greens Want Candidate in 2004 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20410-2003Jul20.html?nav=hptoc_p
The Green Party had its convention, and they overwhelmingly support running their own candidate for President in 2004:
The magnitude of the disaster this decision poses to the hopes of unseating Bush cannot be understated. And the threat is not Nader-specific, in fact the Greens have multiple presidential candidates under consideration, at least one of whom is at least as delusional as Nader himself:
I'd go as far as saying that Nader running wouldn't actually be the worst possible outcome. The worst possible outcome is if Dennis Kucinich, after losing the Democratic nomination (as he surely will), decides to run as a Green.
I've deliberately labeled this post as a Phase II because I see courting the Green vote as critical. Remember, 2004 is NOT ABOUT 2000. As Dean supporters, we have to make a clear and RESPECTFUL case to the Greens. We can't take them for granted and we can't take the extreme left wing of the Democratic base for granted either. What we need is outreach on the same scale as we do for Latinos and asians and blacks.
Some have maintained the Greens should skip the race and support the Democratic candidate in the hopes of unseating President Bush. "Bush is a serious threat to your country and the planet -- a much greater threat than any Gore-like Democrat," wrote Jason Salzman and Aaron Toso on their Web site, repentantnadervoter.com. Both were supporters of Green Party candidate Ralph Nader in 2000.
Most, however, said the party should join the race. Many said they believe there is still little difference between the major parties -- one activist tagging them "Republicrats and Demopublicans."
Others complained the Democratic Party is too weak-willed to adequately oppose Bush's agenda. Others said Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (Ohio), the only Democratic presidential candidate who has much support among the Greens, is unlikely to win his party's nomination.
There are also more practical concerns: Without a presidential candidate, the party could lose its place on some states' ballots. It would probably be largely ignored by the news media without someone at the top of the ticket -- and the public might assume the party is on the decline.
The magnitude of the disaster this decision poses to the hopes of unseating Bush cannot be understated. And the threat is not Nader-specific, in fact the Greens have multiple presidential candidates under consideration, at least one of whom is at least as delusional as Nader himself:
Carol Miller, an activist from New Mexico who urged Bush, Vice President Cheney and the entire Congress to resign over their handling of the situation in Iraq.
I'd go as far as saying that Nader running wouldn't actually be the worst possible outcome. The worst possible outcome is if Dennis Kucinich, after losing the Democratic nomination (as he surely will), decides to run as a Green.
I've deliberately labeled this post as a Phase II because I see courting the Green vote as critical. Remember, 2004 is NOT ABOUT 2000. As Dean supporters, we have to make a clear and RESPECTFUL case to the Greens. We can't take them for granted and we can't take the extreme left wing of the Democratic base for granted either. What we need is outreach on the same scale as we do for Latinos and asians and blacks.
Uday and Qusay at the OK Corral http://www.dailykos.com/archives/003491.html#003491
Steve Gilliard's post at Daily Kos helps put the deaths of Saddam's bad-boys bound for hell into perspective:
The commanders on the scene did what they thought was right, but if they really died in a gunfight, we've replaced two perverted killers with two Arab martyrs who would rather die than cower to the Americans. Think it can't happen? Jesse James, who would probably be considered a war criminal today, is one of America's greatest heroes.But really, there is much more to the post, and you should read the whole thing.
Governor Dean: Where was the "Leadership?" http://mattbailey.blogspot.com/politics/2003_07_20_deanarchive.html#105890726127366149
From the Dean Campaign...
See the link above for full press release.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 22, 2003
Governor Dean: Where was the 'Leadership'?
MANCHESTER, N.H.-While campaigning in New Hampshire today, Governor Howard Dean made the following statement: "Nine months ago, the United States Congress considered the resolution to go to war with Iraq.
"At the time, even though I was a governor of a small state in New England, there were many unanswered questions in my mind and in the mind of many Americans about the nature of the threat posed. Many of us continued to ask these difficult questions in the months leading to the war, and continue to ask those questions to this day.
"Last week, I called upon the Administration to answer sixteen questions about their leadership and candor in leading us to war.
"Today, I ask some important questions of those in Congress who had the power to seek the truth nine months ago, who had the power to involve the American people in the debate prior to the Congressional vote, who had the power to ask the tough questions of the Administration, and yet voted to give the President blank check authority to go to war with Iraq anyway.
See the link above for full press release.
Dean Surpasses $5 Million on the Internet http://mattbailey.blogspot.com/politics/2003_07_20_deanarchive.html#105890691728963113
From the Dean Campaign
See link above for full press release.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 22, 2003
Dean Surpasses $5 Million on the Internet
BURLINGTON-Governor Howard Dean's presidential campaign announced today that as of July 21st, it has raised more than $5 million over the Internet in 2003. In addition, Dean's massive grassroots campaign has continued to grow to more than 207,222 Americans across the country, with nearly 65,000 people signed up to attend monthly "Meetups" for Howard Dean.
"We are building the great grassroots campaign of the modern era," Campaign Manager Joe Trippi said. "These 207,000 people are out in their communities everyday, talking to neighbors, passing out flyers at public events, and working to spread Howard Dean's message of restoring the American community through the active participation of people in their own self-government."
See link above for full press release.
Biden vs. Dean http://www.notgeniuses.com/archives/000345.html
Biden's potential entry is chock full of meaning for Dean's candidacy. I explore it in depth in a post that's too long to copy here in full, but his potential entry is something we should be thinking about and preparing for, because at this point, it's looking likelier than not. And if we're not incredible prepared and ready for its effects, it could hurt us badly.
The Hotline (paid subscription only) relates that:
National Security credentials. He is the top Democrat on the Foreign Relation committee (that same committee Kerry is on - and this is key, Biden outranks Kerry on national security) and is quite hawkish. Biden, along with Dodd, is the favored guest by most Sunday morning shows when they need a Democrat to discuss foreign policy.
Biden is an excellent establishment candidate. He's been around for quite a few years, been instrumental in crucial battles for the Democrats (he is the ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, and so he spearheaded the fight against Robert Bork -- Biden kept him from the nomination. He was far worse against Clarence Thomas, however.) , and, as such, has powerful inside-the-beltway support. He has a nationwide network from the years as an influential senator, good favorability ratings across America, and is a great choice for a traditional candidate.
Biden is a fantastic orator, many feel he's on par with Cuomo. When he ran in 1988 (before a brain aneurysm and Bork, along with some plagiarism, sidetracked him) his main strength was his ability on the stump -- he was doing the Dean thing and outshining all his better known rivals, coming out of nowhere to dominate events.
Lastly, he has good centrist credentials. He's a hawk, chairman of the Judiciary Committee (so he's got tough on crime credentials), and great bipartisan respect (particularly from his work with Lugar). He is in no way a liberal democrat, nor does he come across as one. Simultaneously, he is a traditional Democrat, so he will get the base -- unions and minorities, etc. We're not dealing with a Lieberman here.
Now why would Biden enter the race, especially this late?
Three words: Dean and Kerry. Biden is the antithesis of Howard Dean (especially in perception) and he SAVAGES John Kerry (which explains the altercation above). With Biden in the race, Kerry stands no chance of making it out of New Hampshire, and as such, making it through the primary. But lets go through that chronologically.
Keep Reading...
The Hotline (paid subscription only) relates that:
Biden's "toying with a candidacy has irked" Sen. John Kerry (D-MA). "We hear that Kerry recently harangued Biden on the Senate floor about his plans, repeatedly asking, 'Why are you doing this?' At one point, Kerry even asked if Biden didn't think Kerry was good enough to run"Lets talk a bit about the rationale for Joe Biden joining the Democratic race. Biden comes in with 4 main areas of appeal:
Now why would Biden enter the race, especially this late?
Three words: Dean and Kerry. Biden is the antithesis of Howard Dean (especially in perception) and he SAVAGES John Kerry (which explains the altercation above). With Biden in the race, Kerry stands no chance of making it out of New Hampshire, and as such, making it through the primary. But lets go through that chronologically.
Keep Reading...
California Dreamin' http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/6356406.htm
In case you havent got the email from the campaign yet - Dean takes the lead in a California poll!
here's the full breakdown:
Dean: 16 (7)
Kerry: 15 (16)
Lieberman: 14 (22)
Gephardt: 7 (14)
Edwards: 4
Graham: 3
Kucinich: 3
Sharpton: 3
Moseley-Braun: 2
The Yahoo/AP story also has some additional detail about the base of Dean's support:
The poll, released today, showed Dean is the choice of 16 percent of likely Democratic voters in California, followed by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., at 15 percent and Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., at 14 percent.
Because the poll has a margin of error of plus or minus five percentage points, the three candidates are essentially tied, meaning the race for California's haul of convention delegates in the March 2 primary is still up in the air. One-third of respondents said they are undecided.
...
``The only explanation that I know of is that whole momentum we've sensed in Iowa and New Hampshire and other places we've been has actually found its way to California,'' said Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi.
here's the full breakdown:
Dean: 16 (7)
Kerry: 15 (16)
Lieberman: 14 (22)
Gephardt: 7 (14)
Edwards: 4
Graham: 3
Kucinich: 3
Sharpton: 3
Moseley-Braun: 2
The Yahoo/AP story also has some additional detail about the base of Dean's support:
The poll found Dean's support strongest among men, college graduates and people who call themselves "liberal." Kerry polled best among voters over age 50, college graduates and those living in the San Francisco Bay area.
Jon Stewart on Dean http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_stewart.html
From the transcript of Bill Moyers' great interview with the Daily Show's Jon Stewart:
MOYERS: Let's take a look at a recent clip about Dean on your show.
STEWART: Alright.
[VIDEO CLIP:]
Stewart: Speaking of the Democratic contenders — and someone's got to — Vermont Governor Howard Dean recently became the first to release a campaign ad.
Dean: I'm Howard Dean. It's time for the truth because the truth is that George Bush's foreign policy isn't making us safer.
Stewart: Wow, if you listen closely you can almost hear Al Gore saying, "Dude, Loosen up."
Dean: I believe it's time to put Americans back to work, to provide health insurance for every American. It's time for Democrats to be Democrats again. That's why I'm running for President. And that's why I approved this message.
Stewart: That's why I approved this message?! Alright! A can-do guy who's in charge of the things that comes out of his own mouth!
[END VIDEO CLIP]
STEWART: I'm looking forward to Dean as President. We haven't had a President whose neck is larger than his head in a long time. And it's time that changed.
MOYERS: Is that a healthy criterion for voting?
STEWART: It's a very healthy criterion for voting. To be fair, him saying, that's why I approved that message, is based on the new campaign laws.
Lessig praises Dean http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/archives/2003_07.shtml#001371
Lawrence Lessig has a coda to last week's guest-blogging by Dean, that really inspires:
read the whole thing, it's eloquent and (I firmly believe) prophetic. I was hard on Dean at the outset myself, because I fundamentally misunderstood the purpose of Dean's blogging on Lessig's forum. A lot of the anger that Lessig alluded to resulted from the same wellspring, a kind of disappointment that stemmed from the basic mistake of exxpecting Dean to put cart before horse. Dean came to Lessig to blog so he could experience the passion and anger and ideas about what it means to "free culture". It was our task to educate Dean, by his invitation, and I hope that we succeeded in the end.
It is still my ambition to see a Slashdot interview of Dean. It's like a fervent dream. And I think that the Lessig blog event was critical to laying the foundation for Dean to be able to do that someday, with real substance. And that's the true measure of the success of the Lessig endeavour.
note the blog category to which Lessig assigned this post.
The appearance by Governor Dean here has created lots of excitement, some stir, and a bit of anger.
...
I invited Dean in particular because so much of the success of his campaign has come from those who spend time on the Internet, and I suggested that the mix who spent time at my blog had a valuable set of insights that might be useful to understanding the issues that rage on these pages.
But as I’ve said before, these issues are not the central issues of a presidential campaign (yet, anyway).
...
But whether it is here or elsewhere, every serious candidate should spend time in just such an open, egalitarian place. Everyone now recognizes that the leading Democratic candidate is the leading candidate in part because of how his message spreads in places like this. They should all find places where they can do the same — unprotected by handlers, exposed to many with strong and deep knowledge of a subject, and open to fair criticism. Let there be one week on a blog for every five choreographed “town halls”, and we’ll begin to see something interesting.
Neutrality aside, though, Governor Dean has earned a special respect. Of course there are issues on which I would disagree with anyone. But I have been struck in reading these posts, and the passion they inspired. They revive a feeling I had as a kid — that ideas could matter, and that there could be people who would make them matter.
read the whole thing, it's eloquent and (I firmly believe) prophetic. I was hard on Dean at the outset myself, because I fundamentally misunderstood the purpose of Dean's blogging on Lessig's forum. A lot of the anger that Lessig alluded to resulted from the same wellspring, a kind of disappointment that stemmed from the basic mistake of exxpecting Dean to put cart before horse. Dean came to Lessig to blog so he could experience the passion and anger and ideas about what it means to "free culture". It was our task to educate Dean, by his invitation, and I hope that we succeeded in the end.
It is still my ambition to see a Slashdot interview of Dean. It's like a fervent dream. And I think that the Lessig blog event was critical to laying the foundation for Dean to be able to do that someday, with real substance. And that's the true measure of the success of the Lessig endeavour.
note the blog category to which Lessig assigned this post.
Do the Dems need the South? http://www.matthewyglesias.com/archives/000941.html#000941
Matthew Yglesias points out that Gore would have won in 2000 if he'd picked up just one more northern state (that hadn't been spoiled by Nader). This suggests that the Dems don't need to win the South in 2004. He points out that the logic still holds if you do the electoral math for Clinton's win in 1996. If this analysis is sound, then that pretty solidly demolishes the whole DLC line and the Ruy-Judis critique. Weigh in with your thoughts!
UPDATE: Ikraam Saeed draws an analogy to Quebec.
UPDATE: Ikraam Saeed draws an analogy to Quebec.
Really Really Hardball http://www.msnbc.com/news/942095.asp?0cv=CA01
The link is to an MSNBC story on Ambassador Joe Wilson, also a major topic on tonight's Hardball with Chris Matthews. I watch nearly every night, and tonight was, like, wow. Quite a jolt. Matthews was fairly anti-war pre-invasion, but since then he's flip-flopped. My guess? No more. There was a decisive and seemingly permanent shift in his attitude. Matthews is like a dog with a bone -- and yes, I mean more than usual -- on the 16 words and the State of the Union and the Case for War. This must be a GoodThing. (TM 2003 Annatopia.com)
Though I guess I saw it coming, it has never been as clear as it was tonight. The Andrea Mitchell report on the retaliation by the White House against Ambassador Wilson and his wife was quite a piece of reporting. Then, Chris Matthews just hammers Ralph Reed into a well-tanned bundle of twitching nerves. It was a joy to behold. Later, the debate with Howard Fineman, Dee Dee Myers, and Ed Rollins was pretty damaging punditry for Cheney.
These scandals get worse by the day, is Bush in freefall? I bet that Condoleeza is sure regretting the "16 words" meme right about now -- and that aircraft carrier landing is start to look the doomed folly of an arrogant king. It reminds of the painters Napoleon hired as official millitary campaign artists, who transformed mules into majestic white horses.
Once the transcript is up, I'll post some highlights, but you can watch (or record) the entire hour at 11:00 p.m. PDT / 2:00 a.m. EDT on MSNBC -- catch it if you can.
Though I guess I saw it coming, it has never been as clear as it was tonight. The Andrea Mitchell report on the retaliation by the White House against Ambassador Wilson and his wife was quite a piece of reporting. Then, Chris Matthews just hammers Ralph Reed into a well-tanned bundle of twitching nerves. It was a joy to behold. Later, the debate with Howard Fineman, Dee Dee Myers, and Ed Rollins was pretty damaging punditry for Cheney.
These scandals get worse by the day, is Bush in freefall? I bet that Condoleeza is sure regretting the "16 words" meme right about now -- and that aircraft carrier landing is start to look the doomed folly of an arrogant king. It reminds of the painters Napoleon hired as official millitary campaign artists, who transformed mules into majestic white horses.
Once the transcript is up, I'll post some highlights, but you can watch (or record) the entire hour at 11:00 p.m. PDT / 2:00 a.m. EDT on MSNBC -- catch it if you can.
Monday, July 21, 2003
Dean decries civil rights abuses for Arabs and Muslims http://blog.deanforamerica.com/archives/000737.html
in the wake of this kind of atmosphere, it is encouraging to see at least one candidate have the courage to address the scapegoating of Muslims in general and Arabs in particular: Howard Dean comes out with a moving statement:
Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean issued the following statement on the forthcoming Inspector General’s report documenting abuse of Arabs and Muslims detained under the Patriot Act:
“For the second time in recent weeks, the Justice Department Inspector General will be reporting serious abuses of the civil rights of Arabs and Muslims in the war on terror. These abuses are wrong and must stop immediately.
“I am appalled by allegations – which the Inspector General has deemed credible – that Department of Justice employees have, among other things, beaten Muslim and Arab detainees.
“This should not happen in America.
“The Inspector General’s report confirms my fear that we have unnecessarily compromised constitutional freedoms in the name of fighting terrorism. The ongoing abuses alienate the community whose cooperation we need most and diminish our moral credibility in the eyes of the world. The rule of law and due process must continue to be the hallmarks of our judicial system.
“I urge Congress to reconsider aspects of the Patriot Act and other anti-terror tactics that lead to such abuses.
“The government must protect Americans against terrorism while protecting basic civil liberties every step of the way.”
The Problem With the DLC
My colleagues at the DDF have ably tackled the new Dean issue of TNR more comprehensively, but I want to note that Jonathan Cohn gets it right when he writes:
The post-Clinton DLC has made its living attacking other Democrats. The DLC could have decided to stand with its back to the liberal wing of the party, moderating its positions, and winning elections by denouncing the extremes of hyper-conservative Republican governance. Instead, DLC leaders decided to ignore the damage Republicans do to the values it cherishes and aim their rhetorical guns at other Democrats.
To be sure, railing against that monolithic glob known as "liberals" has become a profitable business in the last decade or two. It's also easy -- as the DLC demonstrates, moderate Democrats can get right to it because the GOP has already written and disseminated the talking points.
But capitulating to a Republican smear campaign by trying to distance yourself from liberals only divides the party. Attend a forum on globalization on any college campus and you'll learn one thing very quickly: you can't win a shouting match against the far left.
The Republican Party has learned a similar lesson about the far right, and has put it to effective use. Do Republicans have a premiere advocacy group constantly deriding its ideological base? No, they've got the Club for Growth, which funds conservative primary challengers against moderate Republican Senators like John McCain and Arlen Specter.
Moderate Republicans still haven't figured out how to control their party. They have been content to keep quiet so long as it pays off in November. Consequently, their party moves further to the right every two years. Again, some may be content to be brow-beaten and ridiculed by their conservative leadership, but that won't last forever (witness defector Jim Jeffords) and represents a frighteningly short-sighted plan.
Moderate Democrats, on the other hand, managed to elect a president. Bill Clinton made his career as a moderate, but he didn't do it by railing against liberals in every speech, press release, and op-ed (Al From, Bruce Reed, I'm looking in your direction). He did it by playing good defense. He deflected critics who derided him as a liberal by -- well, not being terribly liberal.
Howard Dean will do the same thing. His record as governor and his agenda as presidential candidate illustrate as much. His dissent on the Iraq war was not, as his critics would have you believe, about pacifism or about President Bush somehow doing "too much" to stop terrorism. He refused to support the drive to war because he believed that alienating the world and getting bogged down in Iraq would prevent us from doing more to stop terrorism and protect Americans. The issue in 2004 will not be Howard Dean's stance on Iraq. The issue will be George Bush's crusading adventurism in Iraq, while Al Qaeda has reconstituted itself, Afghanistan remains a lawless breeding ground for terror, and North Korea is producing still more nuclear weapons.
The Iraq issue highlights the difference between Clinton and Dean. Candidate Clinton might have gone along with the war in Iraq in order to avoid being called a liberal and establish his New Democrat bona fides. Clinton had to overcome a presumption about Democrats. He had to define for Americans what it meant to be a New Democrat.
Dean carries no such burden; lopsided majorities supporting the war included a majority of Democrats and their leaders. After a decade of Clinton-Daschle Democrats, the country expects moderation from the Democratic Party. The burden of proof has shifted from candidates who had to prove their moderation to those critics who would accuse them of anything else.
This shift means that it is time for New Democrats to play offense. This has terribly confused the DLC, which still defines itself primarily as an alternative to liberal Democrats.
Until the it recognizes that it has more in common with other Democrats than with President Bush and Justice Scalia, Democrats will only win elections in spite of the DLC. Its divisive politics undermine its sensible policy agenda. Not only do its broadsides against any combative Democrat -- liberal or otherwise -- make a far-left challenge by Ralph Nader more likely, they are the functional equivalent of Nader's self-defeating attacks.
Note: Also posted, in slightly different form, at Not Geniuses.
So, if Dean isn't really so liberal, why do so many liberals love him? A big reason is that he seems as angry as they are--not just at President Bush but at the Democratic Party's leadership for meekly going along. Dean does have a habit of going too far--such as the time he criticized Edwards for fudging his stance on the war when Edwards had actually made his position absolutely clear--to the point that his apologies have become as predictable as his outbursts. But, in the larger, substantive sense, Dean's attacks on the party and his rivals are absolutely right: The Democratic leadership and presidential candidates have been timid. (Emphasis his.)As one of those supposedly-liberal Dean supporters, let me tell you that the problem with the DLC isn't its policy. The problem with the DLC is its politics.
The post-Clinton DLC has made its living attacking other Democrats. The DLC could have decided to stand with its back to the liberal wing of the party, moderating its positions, and winning elections by denouncing the extremes of hyper-conservative Republican governance. Instead, DLC leaders decided to ignore the damage Republicans do to the values it cherishes and aim their rhetorical guns at other Democrats.
To be sure, railing against that monolithic glob known as "liberals" has become a profitable business in the last decade or two. It's also easy -- as the DLC demonstrates, moderate Democrats can get right to it because the GOP has already written and disseminated the talking points.
But capitulating to a Republican smear campaign by trying to distance yourself from liberals only divides the party. Attend a forum on globalization on any college campus and you'll learn one thing very quickly: you can't win a shouting match against the far left.
The Republican Party has learned a similar lesson about the far right, and has put it to effective use. Do Republicans have a premiere advocacy group constantly deriding its ideological base? No, they've got the Club for Growth, which funds conservative primary challengers against moderate Republican Senators like John McCain and Arlen Specter.
Moderate Republicans still haven't figured out how to control their party. They have been content to keep quiet so long as it pays off in November. Consequently, their party moves further to the right every two years. Again, some may be content to be brow-beaten and ridiculed by their conservative leadership, but that won't last forever (witness defector Jim Jeffords) and represents a frighteningly short-sighted plan.
Moderate Democrats, on the other hand, managed to elect a president. Bill Clinton made his career as a moderate, but he didn't do it by railing against liberals in every speech, press release, and op-ed (Al From, Bruce Reed, I'm looking in your direction). He did it by playing good defense. He deflected critics who derided him as a liberal by -- well, not being terribly liberal.
Howard Dean will do the same thing. His record as governor and his agenda as presidential candidate illustrate as much. His dissent on the Iraq war was not, as his critics would have you believe, about pacifism or about President Bush somehow doing "too much" to stop terrorism. He refused to support the drive to war because he believed that alienating the world and getting bogged down in Iraq would prevent us from doing more to stop terrorism and protect Americans. The issue in 2004 will not be Howard Dean's stance on Iraq. The issue will be George Bush's crusading adventurism in Iraq, while Al Qaeda has reconstituted itself, Afghanistan remains a lawless breeding ground for terror, and North Korea is producing still more nuclear weapons.
The Iraq issue highlights the difference between Clinton and Dean. Candidate Clinton might have gone along with the war in Iraq in order to avoid being called a liberal and establish his New Democrat bona fides. Clinton had to overcome a presumption about Democrats. He had to define for Americans what it meant to be a New Democrat.
Dean carries no such burden; lopsided majorities supporting the war included a majority of Democrats and their leaders. After a decade of Clinton-Daschle Democrats, the country expects moderation from the Democratic Party. The burden of proof has shifted from candidates who had to prove their moderation to those critics who would accuse them of anything else.
This shift means that it is time for New Democrats to play offense. This has terribly confused the DLC, which still defines itself primarily as an alternative to liberal Democrats.
Until the it recognizes that it has more in common with other Democrats than with President Bush and Justice Scalia, Democrats will only win elections in spite of the DLC. Its divisive politics undermine its sensible policy agenda. Not only do its broadsides against any combative Democrat -- liberal or otherwise -- make a far-left challenge by Ralph Nader more likely, they are the functional equivalent of Nader's self-defeating attacks.
Note: Also posted, in slightly different form, at Not Geniuses.
Oregonians get it! http://www.oregonlive.com/letters/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/editorial/1058616406121890.xml
Dean supporter Todd Peterson gets a letter printed in the Oregonian, in which he sums up perfectly the message of hope that is intrinsic to this campaign.
Way to go, Todd! Notice he also identifies himself as an Independent, further validating Dean's cross-party appeal. Karl Rove, fear this!
While Marie Cocco sees anger on the minds of Democrats supporting Howard Dean ("Put past aside, focus on future," July 8), what I've seen in our local Dean "meet-up" groups could better be characterized as hope.
Hope for electing a new president who really cares for our children and their education, not the unfunded "No Child Left Behind" promises of President Bush. Hope for the elderly and their health care, not "privatized" prescription plans benefiting drug companies. Hope for the poor and their access to jobs, not more tax cuts for the rich in a battered economy.
As an independent voter for nearly 40 years, I agree with Cocco that Dean and the Democratic Party need to focus on "dangers ahead, instead of a debate now past" on Iraq. Otherwise, the hope of electing a trustworthy president to restore America's credibility around the world and revive the U.S. economy will be lost in 2004.
Way to go, Todd! Notice he also identifies himself as an Independent, further validating Dean's cross-party appeal. Karl Rove, fear this!
phase II: seeking support among hispanics http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dallas/politics/state/stories/072003dntextexdems.9257a.html
Reaching out to the hispanic vote is something the GOP learned to do while Bush was Governor of my state. But unfortunately for the GOP, they didn't learn the meaning of "follow-through". Bush hasn't delivered on any of the promises he made to the Mexican community in Texas, particularly his promise to work with Mexican president Vincente Fox.
Texas's hispanic community is ripe for the picking (and I might assume the same goes for hispanics across the country). Like every other voting bloc, they want someone who will listen to them and understand their concerns. But beyond that, they are seeking someone who will follow through with concrete programs that solve these issues. In other words, like you and me, they don't need lip service; they need action.
Perhaps the biggest concern among southwestern hispanics is immigration policy. Mexicans and other central Americans risk their lives every day trying to enter the U.S., and some pay the ultimate price. They have to work with coyotes (human smugglers), dodge bullets on the border (these bullets come from the INS, border-area property owners, and local militias that operate under a "range law" mentality), risk drowning and dehydration, and defy all odds in order to have a better life. Over 175,000 illegals have already been apprehended and turned away this year (scroll to bottom). And that's not all. Once they cross the border, they have to hide from the INS, meanwhile seeking out fake documents or continuing to live here illegally as fugitives.
During the 2000 race, Shrub promised that he'd work with Fox to set up a fast-track immigration program. In fact, as Texas Governor, Bush did a pretty good job of building bridges to Mexico (this is probably the ONLY good thing he did down here, and I give credit where credit is due). But since he took national office, he's squandered all political goodwill that existed between our two nations. Granted, much of this happened after 9/11, when a main concern was locking down our borders. However, Fox's non-support of the Iraq war has also made him persona non grata within the Bush administration. In these conditions, there is very little hope that fast-track will become a priority. Meanwhile, Mexicans continue to die on a daily basis. I believe that any candidate who intends to woo hispanic voters needs to have a solid understanding of this problem, and also needs to come out in support of fast-track citizenship.
These are things that we need to understand. I strongly suggest that you read all the articles I've linked. Get to know these people and their concerns. Imagine walking a mile in their shoes. And then let's get out there and work with them to formulate real solutions to these problems.
*registration required for DMN link, or use nospam@mybox.net w/password dean2004
Texas's hispanic community is ripe for the picking (and I might assume the same goes for hispanics across the country). Like every other voting bloc, they want someone who will listen to them and understand their concerns. But beyond that, they are seeking someone who will follow through with concrete programs that solve these issues. In other words, like you and me, they don't need lip service; they need action.
Perhaps the biggest concern among southwestern hispanics is immigration policy. Mexicans and other central Americans risk their lives every day trying to enter the U.S., and some pay the ultimate price. They have to work with coyotes (human smugglers), dodge bullets on the border (these bullets come from the INS, border-area property owners, and local militias that operate under a "range law" mentality), risk drowning and dehydration, and defy all odds in order to have a better life. Over 175,000 illegals have already been apprehended and turned away this year (scroll to bottom). And that's not all. Once they cross the border, they have to hide from the INS, meanwhile seeking out fake documents or continuing to live here illegally as fugitives.
During the 2000 race, Shrub promised that he'd work with Fox to set up a fast-track immigration program. In fact, as Texas Governor, Bush did a pretty good job of building bridges to Mexico (this is probably the ONLY good thing he did down here, and I give credit where credit is due). But since he took national office, he's squandered all political goodwill that existed between our two nations. Granted, much of this happened after 9/11, when a main concern was locking down our borders. However, Fox's non-support of the Iraq war has also made him persona non grata within the Bush administration. In these conditions, there is very little hope that fast-track will become a priority. Meanwhile, Mexicans continue to die on a daily basis. I believe that any candidate who intends to woo hispanic voters needs to have a solid understanding of this problem, and also needs to come out in support of fast-track citizenship.
These are things that we need to understand. I strongly suggest that you read all the articles I've linked. Get to know these people and their concerns. Imagine walking a mile in their shoes. And then let's get out there and work with them to formulate real solutions to these problems.
*registration required for DMN link, or use nospam@mybox.net w/password dean2004
Good TNR and Bad TNR http://deandefense.org
As Anna posted earlier, the New Republic has Dean on its cover and has two articles on the Doctor. One is a pro-Dean piece, and the other rehashed the "unelectable" line. Click above to head over to the Dean Defense Forces website, read the articles, and send the magazine a letter letting them know what you think. The posted anti-Dean article includes my point-by-point running commentary.
16 Questions for the President http://blog.deanforamerica.com/archives/000719.html
The controversy over 16 words in Bush's State of teh Union address has limited mileage. The main point is not about Iraq, it's about Bush - and now the public has finally awoken to the reality that Bush's straight-talkin' image is a facade. Rather than simply flog the dead horse, Dean has taken the role of principled opposition to the next stage - by preparing a list of 16 Questions for President Bush:
Dean has drawn some admiring comments for his use of the "16" theme - it reminds people of the 16 words, but goes beyond the relatively minor issue of Nigerian yellowcake and tackles those issues of much greater relevance.
Note that the Dean campaign has also launched another petition you can sign to demand Bush answer these questions. It's largely a symbolic gesture, but it feels good.
Today I call on the President to answer these sixteen questions to ensure that the American people can retain their trust in their government and to help ensure that the United States can retain its credibility as a moral force in the world.
1) Mr. President, beyond the NSC and CIA officials who have been identified, we need to know who else at the White House was involved in the decision to include the discredited Niger uranium evidence in your speech, and, if they knew it was false, why did they permit it to be included in the speech.
2) Mr. President, we need to know why anyone in your Administration would have contemplated using the Niger evidence in the State of the Union after George Tenet personally intervened in October 2002, to have the same evidence removed from the President’s October 7th speech. (The Washington Post, Walter Pincus and Mike Allen, 7/13/2003)
3) Mr. President, we need to know why you claimed this very week that the CIA objected to the Niger uranium sentence “subsequent” to the State of the Union address, contradicting everything else we have heard from your administration and the intelligence community on the matter. (Washington Post, Priest, Dana and Dana Milbank, 7/15/2003)
4) Mr. President, we urgently need an explanation about the very serious charge that senior officials in your Administration may have retaliated against Ambassador Joseph Wilson by illegally disclosing that his wife is an undercover CIA officer. (The Nation, Corn, David, 7/16/2003)
5) Mr. President, we need to know why your Administration persisted in using the intercepted aluminum tubes to show that Iraq was pursuing a nuclear program and why your National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice, claimed categorically that the tubes were “only really suited for nuclear weapons programs,” when in fact our own government experts flatly rejected such claims. (CNN, 9/08/2002, Knight Ridder News Service, 10/04/2002)
6) Mr. President, we need to know why Secretary Rumsfeld created a secret intelligence unit at the Pentagon that selectively identified questionable intelligence to support the case for war – including the supposed link to al-Qaeda – while ignoring, burying or rejecting any evidence to the contrary. (New Yorker, Seymour Hersh, 5/12/03)
7) Mr. President, we need to know what the basis was for Secretary Rumsfeld's assertion that the US had bulletproof evidence linking Al Qaeda to Iraq, despite the fact that U.S. intelligence analysts have consistently agreed that Saddam did not have a "meaningful connection" to Al Qaeda. (NY Times, Schmitt, Eric, 9/28/2002, NY Times, Krugman, Paul, 7/15/2003)
8) Mr. President, we need to know why Vice President Cheney claimed last September to have “irrefutable evidence” that Saddam Hussein had reconstituted his nuclear weapons program, an assertion he repeated in March, on the eve of war. (AP, 9/20/2002, NBC 3/16/2003)
9) Mr. President, we need to know why Secretary Powell claimed with confidence and virtual certainty in February before the UN Security Council that, “Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent. That is enough agent to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets.” (UN Address, 2/05/2003)
10) Mr. President, we need to know why Secretary Rumsfeld claimed on March 30th in reference to weapons of mass destruction, "We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat." (The Guardian, Whitaker, Brian and Rory McCarthy, 5/30/2003)
11) Mr. President, we need an explanation of the unconfirmed report that your Administration is dishonoring the life of a soldier who died in Iraq as a result of hostile action by misclassifying his death as an accident. (Time, Gibbs, Nancy and Mark Thompson, 7/13/2003)
12) Mr. President, we need to know why your Administration has never told the truth about the costs and long-term commitment of the war, has consistently downplayed what those would be, and now continues to try to keep the projected costs hidden from the American people.
13) Mr. President, we need to know why you said on May 1, 2003 , that the war was over, when US troops have fought and one or two have died nearly every day since then and your generals have admitted that we are fighting a guerrilla war in Iraq. (Abizaid, Gen. John, 7/16/2003)
14) Mr. President, we need to know why your Administration had no plan to build the peace in post-war Iraq and seems to be resisting calls to include NATO, the United Nations and our allies in the stabilization and reconstruction effort.
15) Mr. President, we need to know what you were referring to in Poland on May 30, 2003, when you said, “For those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong. We found them.” (Washington Post, Mike Allen, 5/31/2003)
16) Mr. President, we need to know why you incorrectly claimed this very week that the war began because Iraq would not admit UN inspectors, when in fact Iraq had admitted the inspectors and you opposed extending their work. (Washington Post, Priest, Dana and Dana Milbank, 7/15/2003)
If you can’t or won’t answer these 16 questions, Mr. President, I call on the Republicans in Congress to stop blocking efforts to create an independent, bipartisan committee to investigate what is a matter of the highest importance: whether your decision to go to war was sound and just.
Dean has drawn some admiring comments for his use of the "16" theme - it reminds people of the 16 words, but goes beyond the relatively minor issue of Nigerian yellowcake and tackles those issues of much greater relevance.
Note that the Dean campaign has also launched another petition you can sign to demand Bush answer these questions. It's largely a symbolic gesture, but it feels good.
open thread: dream cabinet http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0393058506/ref=ase_unmedia-20
We ran a poll a month or two ago to vote on our favorite picks for Dean's Veep, and Wesley Clark destroyed the opposition (Bob Graham came in a distant second, no one else even registered). But why stop there?
After all, a Dean Presidency will have a lot of work to do. Unlike the ideolouges being assigned to every post in the Bush Administration, Dean will have to find the best of the best. And set them to work repairing the damage.
So chime in the open thread as to who you'd like to see serve on the Dean Dream Cabinet! I'll get the ball rolling by nominating Paul Krugman, for the position of Treasury Secretary. His forthcoming book, The Great Unraveling, is a collection of his best columns and new material, clear and principled analysis of how the United States in recent years has lost its way in economic policy. Who's your pick?
After all, a Dean Presidency will have a lot of work to do. Unlike the ideolouges being assigned to every post in the Bush Administration, Dean will have to find the best of the best. And set them to work repairing the damage.
So chime in the open thread as to who you'd like to see serve on the Dean Dream Cabinet! I'll get the ball rolling by nominating Paul Krugman, for the position of Treasury Secretary. His forthcoming book, The Great Unraveling, is a collection of his best columns and new material, clear and principled analysis of how the United States in recent years has lost its way in economic policy. Who's your pick?
Sunday, July 20, 2003
Boulder Dean Rocks 'n' Rolls http://www.dailycamera.com/bdc/county_news/article/0,1713,BDC_2423_2122729,00.html
Colorado for Dean and Dean National Chris Cypser got some excellent publicity for Howard Dean and their local efforts in Boulder, Colorado:
It's not surprising to hear Dean devotees wax enthusiastic about their candidate. But Boulder resident Hillary Hall, the chair of the Boulder County Democrats...confirmed that Dean enjoys the strongest support in Boulder County [with 300 volunteers signed up...and] Dean is in the lead. Hall agrees with Cypser and [Jennifer] Shumar that Dean is galvanizing people who were previously uninterested in politics. "I would say Howard Dean is getting people out of their chairs and participating," she said. "The people who are participating (for Dean) are new faces to me." [...]
"The true root of Howard Dean's support is simple — he's a leader to the core," Cypser said. "He states exactly what he believes and doesn't mince words or swing back and forth as the polls change from week to week."
Dean Nation's "Backbone" Award http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11104-2003Jul18.html?nav=hptop_tb
Dean Nation regular Ian Bellis posted a great idea yesterday on the ZonkBoard: a Dean Nation "Backbone" Award. Well, Ian, you got it! Next week, I'd like to open it up for nominations, but this week, there is little doubt of the winners. For courage under fire, standing their ground in the face of adversity, and speaking truth to power, the first Backbone Award goes to:
Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, Representative Charles Rangel, and Democrats in the House of Representatives
From the Washington Post account:
On a personal note of irony, Pelosi is my former Rep. from San Francisco and Thomas is -- unfortunately -- my current Rep. from Bakersfield, CA. Hey Nancy, in my heart, you'll always be my Representative in the House.
UPDATE: Send Rep. Nancy Pelosi an e-mail and Rep. Charles Rangel some feedback (type in an NY zip like 10027) and let them know that you are a Howard Dean supporter, and that you are proud that they stood their ground and drew "a line in the sand!"
The way to beat the Republicans is to stand up and fight!
Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, Representative Charles Rangel, and Democrats in the House of Representatives
From the Washington Post account:
Committee Democrats complained that the Republican majority had not given them enough time to review a substitute bill that they had received shortly before midnight Thursday. Most of the Democrats then moved to a nearby library to plot strategy after they demanded that Republicans read the legislation line by line.From the New York Times account:
Infuriated, Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas (R-Calif.) instructed the Capitol Police to remove the Democrats from the ornate library. Republicans said Democrats were being disorderly and did not have the right to occupy the libary. [...]
Thomas...conceded that the Democrats could demand a line-by-line reading of the substitute. The reading began, with Thomas interrupting at one point to say loudly, "In the House, the minority can delay. They cannot deny."
When the Democrats left for the library, Rep. Fortney "Pete" Stark (D-Calif.) stayed behind to prevent the Republicans from obtaining unanimous consent to dispense with the reading. After several minutes, Thomas again asked unanimous consent to dispense with the reading, and instantly brought down his gavel. Stark said later that he had objected, and Thomas had replied, "You're too late."
As protests go, it wasn't much. There were no nightsticks or tear gas, and nobody was arrested. But the conduct was far from orderly in the House of Representatives this morning, when more than a dozen Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee — infuriated by last-minute changes to a pension bill — stalked out of a hearing in the Longworth Office Building and holed up in an adjacent library, prompting Representative Bill Thomas, the committee's chairman, to summon the Capitol police. [...]More from The Post:
"The Greeks had a word for it: hubris," declared Representative Nancy Pelosi, the House Democratic leader, who initiated the motion to rebuke Mr. Thomas and then played the role of prosecutor. "It was about power, abuse of power."
"This is indeed not an isolated instance!" thundered Representative Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the Democratic whip, his face red, his finger wagging. He added, "You are trampling on the rights of the minority! You are trampling on the rules of this institution! This is America! This is not American!" [...]
Sergeant at Arms representative Don Kellaher slipped into the room less than 45 minutes later, saying his office decided "this is a committee matter" and would take no action. Rather than concluding the fracas, however, this simply emboldened House Democrats. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) used a point of personal privilege to introduce a resolution on the House floor protesting the incident.Video of Pelosi's reprimand of the Republicans on the House floor here. For other views, see Billmon at Whiskey Bar here and Kos at Daily Kos here.
On a personal note of irony, Pelosi is my former Rep. from San Francisco and Thomas is -- unfortunately -- my current Rep. from Bakersfield, CA. Hey Nancy, in my heart, you'll always be my Representative in the House.
UPDATE: Send Rep. Nancy Pelosi an e-mail and Rep. Charles Rangel some feedback (type in an NY zip like 10027) and let them know that you are a Howard Dean supporter, and that you are proud that they stood their ground and drew "a line in the sand!"
The way to beat the Republicans is to stand up and fight!
Saturday, July 19, 2003
audio: Radio Nation interview http://stream.realimpact.net/rihurl.ram?file=webactive/radionation/rn20030709.rm
This is a very lengthy interview of Dean by David Corn of The Nation's audio program, Radio Nation.
UPDATE: whoops! yup, this is a repeat, from march (I was fooled by the different .rm filename). Still, a great interview, and given th enumber of new people coming to the blog to find out more about Dean, well-deserving of a prominent spot for a while.
Radio Nation Interview
UPDATE: whoops! yup, this is a repeat, from march (I was fooled by the different .rm filename). Still, a great interview, and given th enumber of new people coming to the blog to find out more about Dean, well-deserving of a prominent spot for a while.
phase II: More on La Raza - Dallas Morning News (reg. req.) http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dallas/politics/state/stories/072003dntextexdems.9257a.html
Democrats Courting Texans
State a battleground for Hispanics, presidential campaign cash
State a battleground for Hispanics, presidential campaign cash
Dr. Dean spoke...beginning his speech in Spanish and ending with attacks against Mr. Bush.
"I believe that this president, who says he's a uniter and not a divider, is a terrible divider," Dr. Dean said. "He's divided us by race by use of the word quotas, and he's divided us by gender by his attack on a woman's right to make her own reproductive decisions. To bring everyone together, we have to reach out to every community."
Raul Yzaguirre, president of the National Council of La Raza and a Texas native, said that the Democrats should not rely on the past elections in which Hispanics largely supported their party. "We don't care what your political party is, and we are not intimidated by current popularity," he said. "What we care about is respect and results."
For now, some Democrats are looking over the field and some are making their picks. "People need to educate themselves about the candidates, and meetings like this help expose us to the candidates and the important issues," said Mr. Saldana, the advertising executive.
Cesar De Paz, a medical student from Galveston, said he's impressed by Dr. Dean and his emphasis on health care. "He's a governor, and he has put his words to work and he can back them up," he said.
phase II: Latino outreach http://blog.deanforamerica.com/archives/000723.html
Welcome new intern Rachel Gurvich to the Dean campaign! In a guest post on the blog, she details some of the specific actions that the campaign has taken to court the Latino vote.
The campaign can't do it alone. Anyone who has ideas on what we can do, please comment!
1) We have the position papers from the "On the Issues" sections translated (now that they've redone the Spanish policy page, our dedicated group of translators are retranslating all the material and working on a mirror site in Spanish). We have a bunch of recent news articles about the Governor in Spanish!
2) Join the Yahoo group HowardDeanParaPresidente2004. Join the ongoing dialogue about what *you* can do to reach out to the Latino community and spread the word about Howard Dean's candidacy. Then, check out DeanparaPresidente.com.
3) Volunteer to be a translator. If you have fluent Spanish, and some free time to give to the campaign, e-mail me at gurvich@email.unc.edu. We'll soon be coordinating a volunteer-run "Translation Task Force" -- so look out!
4) Here's a link to the portion of the Governor's recent comments at the NCLR forum that he delivered in Austin, TX (in what reporters have called "smooth" and "proficient" Spanish!).
5) Here and here are just a few Spanish language flyers - keep watching the Downloads section for new ones, which will be out in the next few days.
The campaign can't do it alone. Anyone who has ideas on what we can do, please comment!
video: League of Conservation Voters http://video.c-span.org:8080/ramgen/hdrive/c04062603_conservationleague.rm
Here's an older video that you might have missed. This forum was held just after the Declaration Celebration and just prior to $7 Million Monday. Dean and several other candidates address the League of Conservation Voters.
Dean @ Lessig: the broadband divide http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/archives/2003_07.shtml#001367
Dean's last post on Lessig's blog had a direct appeal for more information:
If you are knowledgeable on the topic, or are just a regular WiFi user, do comment!
As governor of Vermont, I made expanding internet access a priority. Vermont is a national leader, with over 99% of our schools connected to the Internet. In rural states like Vermont, the Internet can make a real difference by providing telemedicine and telework opportunities, as well as distance learning.
As a community that actively discusses these issues, I’m interested in your opinions on how to best bridge the digital divide. The US ranks 11th in the world on broadband penetration. How do we bring broadband to more people in the most cost-effective manner? What role will WiFi play? I understand that the emerging technology of WiFi may make it easier to bridge the digital divide. What would your recommendations be?
If you are knowledgeable on the topic, or are just a regular WiFi user, do comment!
Friday, July 18, 2003
Let The Bush-Tossing Begin! http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=721
A new poll from Zogby, with some surprising results. Even though 75% think it doesn't really matter whether or not we find WsMD, and even though they still give Bush job favorables (just barely) over 50%, they now believe it is time for a change:
UPDATE: Thanks to Theresa on the SquawBox for pointing out this Eleanor Clift column from MSNBC:
Question: Can rocks fly? Answer: Only if you throw them -- out!
For the first time, more likely voters (47%) say it's time for someone new in the White House, compared to 46% who said the President deserves to be re-elected.Zogby continues:
"What has been propping up the President in the past few months is his personal favorability rating. To me, what is most ominous is this alone has slipped 9 points in the past month. If he cannot count on a large majority of Americans to like him personally, this could spell doom for his re-election hopes because he has little support for his overall performance and how he is rated on the issues."Well, what goes up....see all the Zogby results here.
UPDATE: Thanks to Theresa on the SquawBox for pointing out this Eleanor Clift column from MSNBC:
Zogby cautions that these numbers are preliminary, but he expects the trend to hold. “He’s falling like a rock,” he says. Pitted against a Democrat, Bush comes in at 47.5 percent; the Democrat at 43 percent.
Question: Can rocks fly? Answer: Only if you throw them -- out!
Jingo All The Way http://pointswest.blogspot.com/
In a post from a couple of weeks ago, I made the point that the GOP and the neo-cons' hands-off approach to LGBT issues would crumble with Howard Dean in the race -- and that ultimately, this would be a plus for us. Already, most of the Dems are supporting civil unions, which would not have happened without Dean in the top-tier. And so the attacks begin....
New White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan' office attacked ABC News correspondent Jeffrey Kofman for being gay and -- gasp! -- Canadian. The shame of the nation, I tell ya. Why? Because he had the unmitigated gall to report on the horrible troop morale in Iraq. And with Frist as the designated attack dog (strange choice, I think) on even the specter of gay marriage they will continue to ratchet up their attacks. Already, they are trying to distort civil unions and re-label them "gay marriage." Eventually, I believe they will take it far too far into Buchanan 1992 land. The Radical Right won't have it any other way.
Read more with links and a hillarious Bill Frist quote here.
UPDATE: Rove must have forced Scott McClellan into a seizure, who in turn must have taken Drudge's head off. Drudge seems to have pulled the story off his site completely. I've searched for any trace of the story and it is gone. Thanks again for the scoop, Mister Grove. If anyone finds a link, please let me know!
RETALIATION BEGINS: This story from the SF Chronicle regarding Pentagon retaliation against GIs who spoke out to the media. I shouldn't be shocked, but I am. I sincerely hope that Howard Dean denounces this behavior towards our over-taxed troops that have been lied to repeatedly by Rummy & Co.
New White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan' office attacked ABC News correspondent Jeffrey Kofman for being gay and -- gasp! -- Canadian. The shame of the nation, I tell ya. Why? Because he had the unmitigated gall to report on the horrible troop morale in Iraq. And with Frist as the designated attack dog (strange choice, I think) on even the specter of gay marriage they will continue to ratchet up their attacks. Already, they are trying to distort civil unions and re-label them "gay marriage." Eventually, I believe they will take it far too far into Buchanan 1992 land. The Radical Right won't have it any other way.
Read more with links and a hillarious Bill Frist quote here.
UPDATE: Rove must have forced Scott McClellan into a seizure, who in turn must have taken Drudge's head off. Drudge seems to have pulled the story off his site completely. I've searched for any trace of the story and it is gone. Thanks again for the scoop, Mister Grove. If anyone finds a link, please let me know!
RETALIATION BEGINS: This story from the SF Chronicle regarding Pentagon retaliation against GIs who spoke out to the media. I shouldn't be shocked, but I am. I sincerely hope that Howard Dean denounces this behavior towards our over-taxed troops that have been lied to repeatedly by Rummy & Co.
FINALLY! Online event search at DFA http://www.deanforamerica.com/events/
Ask and ye shall receive... After many requests, DFA has finally hooked up an engine that allows you to search for events by state. So, if you're wondering when Howard Dean is coming to your town, all you have to do is pop over there and check your state. I would still like to see them implement a calendar, but this is a good start and a vast improvement over what they had previously, which was nothing at all. Kudos, DFA Web Team!
update It looks like I spoke too soon. Here's the calendar.
update It looks like I spoke too soon. Here's the calendar.
Trippi on Fox News 2:40 ET today
heads up from the official blog: Joe Trippi is going to be LIVE on Fox News, 2:40 ET today, talking about Internet strategy. Tune in if you have time, and let us know how it went!
Republicans for Dean http://republicansfordean.blogspot.com/
For all of you who are tired of President Bush's governing philosophies, antithetical as they are to ideas of limited government and fiscal prudence, our friend Dennis has created Republicans for Dean, adding to our broad coalition of Americans of all ideologies who are tired of being ruled by an extremist. Go check it out. They can call us liberals all they want, but we know the validity of that claim - we are Democrats, Independents, Libertarians, Greens, Republicans, and apolitical observers who are frightened by Bush's policies. We are the most diverse political coalition in memory and, despite attempts to pigeonhole us, we defy definition. We demand a leader who will evaluate policies outside of partisan heterodoxy, who can break lockstep and do what is best for this country rather than what is best for one side's agenda, and we believe Dean to be that leader.
update from Anna I also want to plug Independents for Dean. That link may have gotten lost in the flurry of posts from earlier in the week.
update from Anna I also want to plug Independents for Dean. That link may have gotten lost in the flurry of posts from earlier in the week.
Schizoid TNR? https://ssl.tnr.com/p/docsub.mhtml?r=sub&uri=%2Fpdf%2Fissues%2Fcurrent.pdf
I haven't read any of the articles yet (I've just downloaded this issue), but if anyone else has then feel free to leave a comment. This cover story on TNR, featuring articles titled Must He Be Stopped? The Case Against Howard Dean (by none other than my dear friend Jonathan Chait) and The Case Against the Case Against Howard Dean (by Jonathan Cohn) must be considered a GoodThing(TM). Ryan Lizza also contributes an article titled The Other Candidates Fight Back.
If TNR is seriously examining Dean's candidacy, that validates our contention that we're in phase two. Thank you, TNR, for giving our candidate the attention he deserves.
If TNR is seriously examining Dean's candidacy, that validates our contention that we're in phase two. Thank you, TNR, for giving our candidate the attention he deserves.
It's been a while; let's have an open thread
What's on your mind today, Dean Nation?
More Deansbury http://doonesbury.msn.com/strip/dailydose/index.html
We get an indirect mention today in Doonesbury, where the Deanophiles are urged to "start a Dean blog." Click above for today's strip, or, if you have a fast connection, here is my page with the collected strips.
Slate summarizes the Dean agenda http://slate.msn.com/id/2085791/
It's a bit strange that Saletan's summary neglects to mention Dean's determination to pursue a sane, pragmatic foreign and defense policy rather than one driven by ideologues. But since anyone paying any attention at all to politics probably already knows that, I have no complaints that he focuses attention on issues which may be a bit less familiar:
1. Extend health insurance coverage through existing programs. Dean aims to cover everyone under 25, establish an affordable federal alternative to private care, and keep the annual cost below $100 billion. His method is to patch together several programs. He would enlarge the State Children's Health Insurance Program into a federal Families and Children Health Insurance Program covering everyone under 25. This would also be available to adults with low incomes. Second, he would offer refundable tax credits (i.e., subsidies) to help uninsured adults join a Universal Health Benefits Program providing the same coverage currently enjoyed by federal employees. Already-insured Americans could buy into UHBP; uninsured Americans would automatically be enrolled into either FCHIP or UHBP. Third, the federal government would mandate and partially subsidize employer-based health insurance, even! for laid-off employees. Dean says that the plan would eventually cost $88.3 billion per year and that he would pay for it, along with other initiatives, by repealing the 2001 tax cut.
2. Increase homeland security funding. Dean would use part of the savings from the tax cut repeal to establish a Homeland Security Trust Fund dedicated to three objectives: preparation, protection, and prevention. Preparation would entail more than $5 billion in aid to local first responders. Protection would involve extra funding and more stringent security measures for ports and borders, plus money for detection and identification technology. Prevention would focus on foreign threats and would include greater U.S. financial and political involvement in programs to limit nuclear proliferation. It would be funded in part by some of the money previously set aside for missile defense.
3. Balance the budget. Of all the candidates, Dean is the most emphatic about not running deficits. In addition to canceling the 2001 tax cuts, he proposes to "restrict spending." This could include ideas he has previously floated, such as increasing the amount of income subject to the Social Security tax (at the moment, only the first $80,000 is taxable) and possibly raising the retirement age to 67 or 68. In the past, Dean has expressed support for a constitutional amendment requiring balanced budgets. But more recently, he has said he would probably not pursue such an amendment.
Demosthenes dissects DR http://demosthenes.blogspot.com/2003_07_13_demosthenes_archive.html#105850632466569733
Demosthenes has a lengthy analysis on Ruy and John's ongoing attempts to swallow the "Dean = McGovern" Kool Aid served chiled by the DLC. Its exactly the kind of lengthy, detailed, methodical analysis that Demosthenes is famous for, and deserves your time (and your comments). Here is Demos' conclusion:
On an unrelated note, I've seen that same disclaimer coming from many bloggers who have recently defended Dean: "I am not a Dean supporter." That's actually healthy - and I wonder if anyone who has not yet settled on Dean could perhaps lend their perspectives as to why, in the comments?
Again, this is not to say that I support Dean, although I do believe that his fight for a full-throated, proud, and angry Democratic party is sound and necessary. The arguments presented here, however, are in my opinion weak political science... and the constant "Dean=McGovern" refrains are at times tired, lame, and tendentious. They illustrate the dangers of analysis based solely on historical comparisons- they tend to obfuscate the present through the clouded lens of the past. Sorry Ruy and John, but this time, I think you're all wet.
On an unrelated note, I've seen that same disclaimer coming from many bloggers who have recently defended Dean: "I am not a Dean supporter." That's actually healthy - and I wonder if anyone who has not yet settled on Dean could perhaps lend their perspectives as to why, in the comments?
The Daily Show and phase II http://www.comedycentral.com/tv_shows/thedailyshowwithjonstewart/
In case you missed it Wednesday night, the Daily Show "reported" on the NAACP convention. As the video isn't yet listed in their archives, here's the transcript:
The Daily Show is right; Vermont doesn't have too many large communities of color (not to say there are none, for there is a large native American population), and few blacks. So right now it's very important for Howard Dean to show up.
As a doctor, he's trained to listen and formulate the most sound diagnosis of a problem. Listening tours - as they're sometimes called - are a critical part of phase two. You have to reach out to all of the traditional voting blocks that haven't been involved in phase one, sincerly listen to their concerns, and then work with them to formulate solutions. They are going to know more about the problems in their communities and how to solve them than anyone else, so it's important to listen to their voices and heed their advice. It's not about pandering, it's about that big-tent philosophy that democrats have always held dear.
Sorta off topic, I know that everyone reading this blog doesn't have cable, so I went through TDS's online video archives. If you get the chance, check out TDS's coverage of the race so far. They have a great sense of humor, and I think they've been fairly kind to our candidate. Perhaps it's time to renew the call and try and get him on the show? If you want to, here's their contact form.
Jon Stewart: But we begin tonight with the 2004 Presidential election and our periodic coverage of the Democratic candidates: Race From the White House. (Mfume clip from convention begins, with Stewart providing voice over) NAACP President Kweisi Mfume was not so happy this week after three of the nine candidates failed to show up for the organisation's annual convention (note - this was broadcast before the other candidates apologised and showed up - Anna). Mfume railed against no shows Joseph Lieberman, Richard Gephart, and Dennis Kucinich.
(video)Kweisi Mfume: If you expect us to believe that you could not find ninety minutes to come by and address the issues affecting our nation then you have no legitimacy over the next nine months coming into our communities and expecting our votes.
Stewart (graphic of Gephart appears): In response, a nervous Congressman Gephart said, "We have to go into your communities?" Represenative Gephart claimed the convention - which was held in Miami Beach - conflicted with a family engagement. (graphic of Kucinich appears) Congressman Kucinich was in Washington voting on a health care bill, and Senator Lieberman (graphic of Lieberman appears), well, he tries to avoid Miami Beach all together. Um, too many retired relatives to visit.
Stewart: Ironically the organisation's annual lawmaker report cards have previously given all three absentees top marks for their actual voting records. But those records have now been tarnished, because apparently at the NAACP, 80% of your grade is based on attendance. The candidates who did show up took the opportunity to establish a little street cred with the crowd. (Sharpton graphic appears) Reverend Al Sharpton announced that he was the only candidate who had ever been incarcerated. This is true. (Kerry graphic appears) Then Senator John Jerry countered that he too had spent a night in hail in the seventies after a Vietnam war protest. At that point, not to be left out, Florida Senator Bob Graham whipped off his shirt and displayed this tat. (photoshopped graphic of Graham appears. he's pulled up his shirt and there's a tattoo across his belly reading "thug life') The attempt to court the black vote made Graham the first candidate in history to be escorted from the stage by the Sand Man. (Dean graphic appears) Former Vermont governor Howard Dean was also in attendance. He drew applause for attacking President Bush's tax cuts and his progressive record of fighting for African-Americans, or as they're known in Vermont, "Neil". (graphic of a clean-cut black man in a suit appears)
The Daily Show is right; Vermont doesn't have too many large communities of color (not to say there are none, for there is a large native American population), and few blacks. So right now it's very important for Howard Dean to show up.
As a doctor, he's trained to listen and formulate the most sound diagnosis of a problem. Listening tours - as they're sometimes called - are a critical part of phase two. You have to reach out to all of the traditional voting blocks that haven't been involved in phase one, sincerly listen to their concerns, and then work with them to formulate solutions. They are going to know more about the problems in their communities and how to solve them than anyone else, so it's important to listen to their voices and heed their advice. It's not about pandering, it's about that big-tent philosophy that democrats have always held dear.
Sorta off topic, I know that everyone reading this blog doesn't have cable, so I went through TDS's online video archives. If you get the chance, check out TDS's coverage of the race so far. They have a great sense of humor, and I think they've been fairly kind to our candidate. Perhaps it's time to renew the call and try and get him on the show? If you want to, here's their contact form.
More on TEDM & Dean
On DR, Ruy's written a bit of defense to the questions raised about the seeming contradictions that I and others saw with the recent article written by John Judis:
As an aside, in reference to the high-bar, isn't Clinton's real electability found in that he had a social semi-conservative and fiscal surely-conservative run as an independent that banked his own campaign, and pulled down 18 percent, in 1992?
As for Dean's nation-wide electability, Dean has supporters in all 50 states. Orgainzed netroots/grassroots supporters. Dean was the first, even before Bush, to meet the FEC guidelines of having to raise $5,000 in 20 different states in amounts no greater than $250 from any individual. And, one of those Democrats who did turn out those type of Independent voters that DR is referring to, just endorsed Dean. Asked if he thinks Dean can beat President Bush, Metzenbaum replied: "I don't think I'd be here if he was a loser."
But John and Ruy are not working with the facts on the ground, instead, it's from a basis of historical electability and voting demographics from which they draw their conclusions.
The main social issue (the other electability issue that Judis raised was national security, which I'll try to address in a later post) that troubles Dean, McGovern-like, is VT's Civil Unions-- which Republicans refer to as gay marriage. I don't see it as big an electability issue as Ruy and John do, for two reasons. First, by the candidate Dean's response, and second, that the polling that shows this issue already having been generationally settled.
When I first heard Gov Dean talk on this issue a few years ago, he aptly described his background with the issue, framing it as one of equal rights, while at the same time differentiating himself from an advocate, by describing his own progression of affront to discomfort to acceptance. What DR might argue is that Dean's went on to become a preacher for the cause, but that's more interpretation than fact, and I've no doubt that Dean will seem centrist in his defense of his acceptance of this issue, and be able to differentiate it from marriage.
I would like for DR to spell out exactly how Dean is likely to have trouble with, in a way that any other Dem (well, make that just Kerry) would not?
Second, I'm sure that DR has seen the polling showing libertarian social tolerence escalates by a large factor with youth. If there is a group that the Republicans might wedge this social issue against Dean with, it's the elderly; whom might also be those social conservative workers that DR is referring to-- the same ones who backed Metzenbaum in Ohio, but by and large have dropped out of voting over the past few decades.
So the polling leads to ask: would the GOP risk having another '92-like session of intolerance on display in '04? I don't think Rove intends to go there. This administration is the most pro-GLBT Republican administration ever. I do think we'll see Reed play up to issue to the religious right, and some of that might spill onto the national coverage, but the upside for the Republicans making this an issue is very limited, especially in terms of influencing independents.
OK, that doubt aside, under the traditional voter roll, it is the type of independents that DR describes which a Democrat has needed to win. However, it's a really large pool of non-voters, 50%, so if Dean doesn't get it there, it's not like he doesn't have other places to gather that ~5 percent, right?
And this is the most important thing missed by Judis & DR in their electability equation-- that Dean is attracting people to politics that usually occasionally, or not at all, vote, much less, participate in the process.
DR is right, these are mostly white, affluent people. But you'll find at the meetups that 50% of them are independents, most of them involved in politics for the first time, new voters. I don't know how large a block the white working class and culturally conservative voters are that DR correctly sees as traditionally essential to a Democratic win at the Presidential level, but I would guess they shrink in comparison to the large numbers of those 50% of Americans who don't vote, but belong to the 50 million Cultural Creatives that are being attracted to Dean's campaign. Of course, these new voters belong to the emerging majority that would be Democrat-- if they vote.
That's a big if. Certainly Gephardt showed no know-how or leadership during the 2002 mid-terms in motivating them to vote. Kerry? Not to date. What Dean is doing is shifting the voter-turnout paradigm. This will have to be proved in the caucuses, primaries, and general, before it's a proven key to electability, but that's the case.
Also, Matt Zemak has a blog entry about Dissing Doctor Dean for further reading on Thoughts on Judis/Dean/McGovern.
DR is pretty familiar with the EDM thesis and can assure TAPPED and MyDD that there is no contradiction. The key point is that political leadership involves building coalitions that reach outside your base and absorb independent and moderate voters who are leaning your way. Clinton's strength was being able to synthesize the views of professionals with those of older elements of the Democratic coalition and present that synthesis in a way that made enough independent and moderate voters feel it was safe to vote Democratic. That includes the white working class and culturally conservative voters Dean is likely to have the most trouble with. DR believes that not all independents are created equal and that Dean's approach and persona is still likely to yield its most success with socially liberal, upscale independents in relatively liberal states.
As an aside, in reference to the high-bar, isn't Clinton's real electability found in that he had a social semi-conservative and fiscal surely-conservative run as an independent that banked his own campaign, and pulled down 18 percent, in 1992?
As for Dean's nation-wide electability, Dean has supporters in all 50 states. Orgainzed netroots/grassroots supporters. Dean was the first, even before Bush, to meet the FEC guidelines of having to raise $5,000 in 20 different states in amounts no greater than $250 from any individual. And, one of those Democrats who did turn out those type of Independent voters that DR is referring to, just endorsed Dean. Asked if he thinks Dean can beat President Bush, Metzenbaum replied: "I don't think I'd be here if he was a loser."
But John and Ruy are not working with the facts on the ground, instead, it's from a basis of historical electability and voting demographics from which they draw their conclusions.
The main social issue (the other electability issue that Judis raised was national security, which I'll try to address in a later post) that troubles Dean, McGovern-like, is VT's Civil Unions-- which Republicans refer to as gay marriage. I don't see it as big an electability issue as Ruy and John do, for two reasons. First, by the candidate Dean's response, and second, that the polling that shows this issue already having been generationally settled.
When I first heard Gov Dean talk on this issue a few years ago, he aptly described his background with the issue, framing it as one of equal rights, while at the same time differentiating himself from an advocate, by describing his own progression of affront to discomfort to acceptance. What DR might argue is that Dean's went on to become a preacher for the cause, but that's more interpretation than fact, and I've no doubt that Dean will seem centrist in his defense of his acceptance of this issue, and be able to differentiate it from marriage.
I would like for DR to spell out exactly how Dean is likely to have trouble with, in a way that any other Dem (well, make that just Kerry) would not?
Second, I'm sure that DR has seen the polling showing libertarian social tolerence escalates by a large factor with youth. If there is a group that the Republicans might wedge this social issue against Dean with, it's the elderly; whom might also be those social conservative workers that DR is referring to-- the same ones who backed Metzenbaum in Ohio, but by and large have dropped out of voting over the past few decades.
So the polling leads to ask: would the GOP risk having another '92-like session of intolerance on display in '04? I don't think Rove intends to go there. This administration is the most pro-GLBT Republican administration ever. I do think we'll see Reed play up to issue to the religious right, and some of that might spill onto the national coverage, but the upside for the Republicans making this an issue is very limited, especially in terms of influencing independents.
OK, that doubt aside, under the traditional voter roll, it is the type of independents that DR describes which a Democrat has needed to win. However, it's a really large pool of non-voters, 50%, so if Dean doesn't get it there, it's not like he doesn't have other places to gather that ~5 percent, right?
And this is the most important thing missed by Judis & DR in their electability equation-- that Dean is attracting people to politics that usually occasionally, or not at all, vote, much less, participate in the process.
DR is right, these are mostly white, affluent people. But you'll find at the meetups that 50% of them are independents, most of them involved in politics for the first time, new voters. I don't know how large a block the white working class and culturally conservative voters are that DR correctly sees as traditionally essential to a Democratic win at the Presidential level, but I would guess they shrink in comparison to the large numbers of those 50% of Americans who don't vote, but belong to the 50 million Cultural Creatives that are being attracted to Dean's campaign. Of course, these new voters belong to the emerging majority that would be Democrat-- if they vote.
That's a big if. Certainly Gephardt showed no know-how or leadership during the 2002 mid-terms in motivating them to vote. Kerry? Not to date. What Dean is doing is shifting the voter-turnout paradigm. This will have to be proved in the caucuses, primaries, and general, before it's a proven key to electability, but that's the case.
Also, Matt Zemak has a blog entry about Dissing Doctor Dean for further reading on Thoughts on Judis/Dean/McGovern.
Thursday, July 17, 2003
Is it too much to ask Jonathan Chait to "get it"? http://www.tnr.com/primary/index.mhtml?pid=549
Jonathan, Jonathan, Jonathan, here I am trying to play nice with you guys and you give me another reason to rip my hair out. From your TNR peice, in which you give our candidate an "F" in foreign policy:
Nice sweeping generalisation there, Jonathan.
All those "broader" arguments were never really presented to the public as major reasons for war. Are you trying to suggest that Bush's argument for the war was not largely based on what is now known to be false evidence? Are you suggesting that without the threat of WMDs that the public would still have supported Bush's war as he was arguing it? If so, you don't get it. Before Bush claimed that Hussein was trying to acquire nuclear material and those infamous aluminum tubes, support for the war was less than 50%. After Bush made those claims, support skyrocketed. To claim otherwise is to subscribe to Bush's version of "revisionist history".
I could list a few good reasons of my own for taking down Saddam Hussein, but the point is that Bush never argued in favor of liberation (nor did he mention any of those broader themes you’re talking about). His entire case for war was based on an "imminent threat" to America. And that case was based, as we now know, on lies. Had he taken the high road, and argued that it was our duty to liberate the people from Iraq from a violent dictator, there would have been no need to use false evidence. It was the President's job to lay out the reasons and go from there, and the reasons we were given were complete bullshit.
Actually Jonathan, Rep Kucinich is the leader of the truly "anti-war" faction. To lump Dean in with him is to do him a great disservice. Dean is not anti-war. He supported the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, he supported Gulf War 1, and he has never been known as a dove. Do your homework.
Well, if you want to get right down to the nitty-gritty, those who claim they were "misled" do have a credibility problem in my opinion. I don't know about you, Jonathan, but I'd prefer my President to have a fine-tuned bullshit detector.
What end result would that be, Jonathan? Iraq is far from stable, and I personally feel it's far too early to decide whether this was a success or a failure. Is this the end result I'm supposed to be happy about? Seriously though, you should not pass judgement on Dean until the end result in Iraq is clear. Take a breather Jonathan, this one’s going to last for quite some time.
The antiwar left and the pro-Bush right, oddly enough, share a glaring misapprehension: Both believe that it can be true that Bush was lying, or that the war was a good idea, but not both. Of course this is nonsense.
Nice sweeping generalisation there, Jonathan.
It's pretty clearly that the Bush administration cut corners (at the very least) in its case for war. But it's also clear that whatever the administration got wrong was only a small subset of its overall argument for war, and that the Bush administration's arguments for war were, in turn, only a small subset of the broader arguments for war.
All those "broader" arguments were never really presented to the public as major reasons for war. Are you trying to suggest that Bush's argument for the war was not largely based on what is now known to be false evidence? Are you suggesting that without the threat of WMDs that the public would still have supported Bush's war as he was arguing it? If so, you don't get it. Before Bush claimed that Hussein was trying to acquire nuclear material and those infamous aluminum tubes, support for the war was less than 50%. After Bush made those claims, support skyrocketed. To claim otherwise is to subscribe to Bush's version of "revisionist history".
Readers of TNR should by now be familiar with lots of arguments for war that deviated from, or frankly contradicted, the administration's own.
I could list a few good reasons of my own for taking down Saddam Hussein, but the point is that Bush never argued in favor of liberation (nor did he mention any of those broader themes you’re talking about). His entire case for war was based on an "imminent threat" to America. And that case was based, as we now know, on lies. Had he taken the high road, and argued that it was our duty to liberate the people from Iraq from a violent dictator, there would have been no need to use false evidence. It was the President's job to lay out the reasons and go from there, and the reasons we were given were complete bullshit.
It's unsurprising that Howard Dean, the de facto leader of the Democratic Party's antiwar caucus, is trying to seize upon news of the administration's dishonesty to discredit his pro-war rivals.
Actually Jonathan, Rep Kucinich is the leader of the truly "anti-war" faction. To lump Dean in with him is to do him a great disservice. Dean is not anti-war. He supported the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, he supported Gulf War 1, and he has never been known as a dove. Do your homework.
"I think those [Democrats] who supported the war are having a credibility problem," Dean tells The Washington Post. "It's not enough to say the president misled them."
Well, if you want to get right down to the nitty-gritty, those who claim they were "misled" do have a credibility problem in my opinion. I don't know about you, Jonathan, but I'd prefer my President to have a fine-tuned bullshit detector.
Is it too much to expect that someone who wants to be president should be able to understand that you can doubt Bush's credibility and still agree with the end result of one of his policies?
What end result would that be, Jonathan? Iraq is far from stable, and I personally feel it's far too early to decide whether this was a success or a failure. Is this the end result I'm supposed to be happy about? Seriously though, you should not pass judgement on Dean until the end result in Iraq is clear. Take a breather Jonathan, this one’s going to last for quite some time.
Blogger-In-Chief http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2425-2003Jul16.html
WaPo picks up the Dean-blogs-on-Lessig story:
President Dean's Cyber-side Chats: Coming in 2005 to a CPU Near YOU.
For a candidate hoping to make an end run around the political establishment, nothing could be more perfect. Dean has had a blog on his campaign Web site for some time, but he received a big boost this week when he was invited to sit in to pen the Web log of vacationing Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig, one of the nation's premier thinkers on cyberspace law, copyright and the power of the "creative commons" that the Internet can facilitate.
President Dean's Cyber-side Chats: Coming in 2005 to a CPU Near YOU.
Dean Statement http://mattbailey.blogspot.com/politics/2003_07_13_deanarchive.html#105846268774765633
From the Dean Campaign...
See link above for full press release.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 17, 2003
“I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts.” - Abraham Lincoln
STATEMENT BY GOV. HOWARD DEAN
CINCINNATI, OH – “Mr. President, the time for evasiveness, secrecy, contradictory statements and ducking responsibility is over. As a candidate, you repeatedly pledged to bring honor and integrity to the White House. It’s time you fulfilled that pledge by telling the American people the truth.
“We learned today that a White House official insisted upon inclusion of the discredited Niger uranium evidence in your speech against the recommendation of the CIA. As I said last week, that person knows who he or she is – and so does George Tenet and now, so do the members of the Senate Intelligence Committee. That person should resign immediately.
See link above for full press release.
Fmr. Sen. Metzenbaum Endorses Dean http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030717/ap_on_el_pr/brf_dean_metzenbaum_3
Don't you just love endorsements?
CINCINNATI - Former Democratic Sen. Howard Metzenbaum endorsed presidential candidate Howard Dean on Thursday despite the candidacy of fellow Ohioan Dennis Kucinich.
"I like Dennis Kucinich. I find no fault with him," Metzenbaum said during a joint appearance with Dean. "But Howard Dean provides all the qualifications ... we need in a president, and that's not to denigrate Dennis Kucinich. In any horse race, you have to pick one horse, and I picked Howard Dean."
Metzenbaum represented Ohio in the U.S. Senate for three terms before retiring in 1995.
Asked if he thinks Dean, the former Vermont governor, can beat President Bush Metzenbaum replied: "I don't think I'd be here if he was a loser."
You Know You're Doing Something Right...
... when hyper-conservative crazies like Paul Weyrich are worried about your appeal to the Republican base.
Weyrich is concerned:
This article from one of the leaders of the "movement" could signal a shift in the conservative conventional wisdom. Until now, Dean has been cast as the ultra-liberal they'd just love to go up against.
But as we at Dean Nation have known all along, Dean represents the greatest threat to Republicans because he fires up the Democratic base with his passion, but retains significant crossover appeal based on his record and decidedly moderate positions.
If Weyrich's interpretation gains traction in conservative circles, it may give them more time to prepare to take on Dean. But from the tone of this piece, it seems that Howard Dean has managed to do something we're not used to seeing Democrats do: put the other side on the defensive. Good for him, good for Democrats, and good for America.
Weyrich is concerned:
So far, [Dean] appears to be more a scandal-less Bill Clinton than Harry Truman when it comes to offering the voters straight talk on issues. My wager is that, should Dean obtain his party's presidential nomination, conservative groups will need to be aggressive and accurate in exposing his record to the harsh, unrelenting glare of the truth.I'll let my colleagues at the DDF handle the specifics of Weyrich's claims because frankly, this guy is a caricature of right-wingers ("...national gun registration is being ushered in through the backdoor,") and I can't stop giggling long enough to take his arguments seriously.
This article from one of the leaders of the "movement" could signal a shift in the conservative conventional wisdom. Until now, Dean has been cast as the ultra-liberal they'd just love to go up against.
But as we at Dean Nation have known all along, Dean represents the greatest threat to Republicans because he fires up the Democratic base with his passion, but retains significant crossover appeal based on his record and decidedly moderate positions.
If Weyrich's interpretation gains traction in conservative circles, it may give them more time to prepare to take on Dean. But from the tone of this piece, it seems that Howard Dean has managed to do something we're not used to seeing Democrats do: put the other side on the defensive. Good for him, good for Democrats, and good for America.
phase II: why the NAACP matters http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56161-2003Jul14.html?nav=hptoc_p
MIAMI BEACH, July 14 -- Three Democratic presidential contenders alienated the leadership of the nation's largest civil rights organization today by skipping the candidates forum at the annual NAACP convention, an event attended by 6,000 members from chapters nationwide.
NAACP President Kweisi Mfume described the absent candidates -- Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.) and Reps. Richard A. Gephardt (Mo.) and Dennis J. Kucinich (Ohio) -- as "persona non grata" whose "political capital is now the equivalent of Confederate dollars."
"When candidates choose to ignore the NAACP, they have no legitimacy when they go into our communities later asking for our votes," Mfume said.
I hate to disagree with Ezra or Joe, but I think that Kweisi Mfume's harsh rhetoric was, strategically speaking, critical. It sounds over the top, but it's the only imagery that the NAACP can invoke to demonstrate their resolve. Remember during the 2000 election - Big Labor briefly tried to pressure Gore by pretending to consider supporting Bush. Their gambit failed, because at that point it was obvious that supporting Bush was nonsensical from their self interest.
The NAACP has only one shot at putting their interests on the table - and that's during the primary. Once the primary is over, the only means of protest left is to stay home from the polls. However thats really self-defeating, so the emphasis is on the nomination.
and it worked:
Sens. John F. Kerry (Mass.) and John Edwards (N.C.) initially had not planned to participate in the forum, but changed their minds after Mfume criticized possible no-shows on Saturday. Sen. Bob Graham (Fla.) said he was reluctant to criticize candidates who miss forums because of scheduling conflicts. Former Vermont governor Howard Dean, asked about the controversy as he entered the Miami Beach Convention Center, said his missing rivals were being "disrespectful."
"The African American community is one of the most important parts of the Democratic Party," he said as he swept past a sign that read "Maple-powered Dean."
The bottom line is that you cannot be a credible candidate for the Democratic nomination if you aren't onboard with the NAACP. Clinton and Gore set a high standard - Gore won a staggering 90% of the black vote. Now the black vote faces a serious threat of being "taken for granted" and as a result the NAACP is looking for a candidate who addresses their issues - which need to be addressed.
It's clear that the candidates who didn't appear are trying to play games:
The flap between the Democratic candidates and the leaders of one of the party's most important interest groups underscored a brewing conflict within the campaigns on the need to court critical black votes but avoid potentially risky events where the candidates cannot control the circumstances.
...
According to NAACP officials, at least two campaigns -- Kerry and Edwards -- were involved in intense negotiations with the organization late Saturday, urging it to prevent a format in which the candidates appeared together.
...
Mfume suggested a different theory for the candidates' reluctance: a fear of matching wits with Sharpton or Dean, whose lively style and support for positions backed by the NAACP are likely to win enthusiastic applause.
(yup, our man Dean is on par with Sharpton in terms of appeal to the NAACP. Major victory for Phase II). As long as the other candidates are focused on trying to be "in control" of their appearances rather than actually make an honest attempt to address their constituent groups' concerns, the NAACP has reason to be concerned.
I think this pretty much sums it up:
When the five candidates stood to go, there were still four empty seats with four unclaimed name cards. One was for Bush, who spoke to the NAACP when he was running for president but has not returned to its convention since taking office.
phase II: Austin http://news.mysanantonio.com/story.cfm?xla=saen&xlb=180&xlc=1025536
In Austin:
Can anyone from the Texas Media Team provide links to Dean's San Antonio speech? It would make great DVD material for distribution.
Speaking in smooth Spanish and fiery English, Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean said he is the person to lead the nation to a better economy, improved education, universal health care and real immigration reform.
The former Vermont governor spoke at the annual conference of the National Council of La Raza, a national advocacy organization devoted to Hispanic rights.
In no-nonsense language, Dean told the crowd he intends to balance the budget and develop jobs, which will attract investment in the nation.
"No Republican president has balanced the budget in this country in 34 years," he said. "If you want to trust your hard-earned dollars, you'd better elect a Democrat because the Republicans cannot handle money."
...
Dean also took on what he called racial profiling of immigrants in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. He said if elected, he would seek to provide a fast-track citizenship process for immigrants if they have lived in the United States for a certain period of time, paid taxes and have no criminal record.
U.S. military service also should count, he said.
"You shouldn't have to come home in a box to get citizenship," he said.
Can anyone from the Texas Media Team provide links to Dean's San Antonio speech? It would make great DVD material for distribution.
open thread: caption this photo http://www.whitehouse.gov/stateoftheunion/behindthescenes/05.html
"Working at his desk in the Oval Office, President Bush reviews the State of the Union address line-by-line and word-by-word."--Official White House caption.
Surely we can do better!
Wednesday, July 16, 2003
Phase II: Reports Already! http://www.sanfranciscofordean.com/main/archive.asp?id=50
San Francisco for Dean Co-Chair Paul Hogan reports on their weekend tabling efforts to expand the Dean base! Lots of great photos, and this particular paragraph really struck me:
We made sure to include the Latino, Asian and African American communities in our outreach efforts this weekend. At our Mission District table we had bilingual flyers and a Spanish-speaking volunteer. We also had a Cantonese-speaking volunteer at our 6th and Clement location.Cantonese? Wow.
The response was great! We hope to expand this outreach as we involve all of San Francisco's culturally diverse communities in our efforts to take our country back!
Though it's impossible to post (or even reply to) all of the fantastic messages we get here at Dean Nation, as you post to your blogs and update your sites with Phase II reports, drop us a line. At the least, I'd like to do a Phase II Weekend Recap with links to City Dean and State Dean portals and blogs. Bravo to Paul and Shane and all of the awesome San Francisco Dean Team volunteers!
Howard Dean's Youth machine http://motherjones.com/news/update/2003/29/we_480_01.html
Slowly but surely, the media is starting to get us. Check out this Morth Jones article on Howard Dean's Youth Machine, of which I guess I'm part.
To personalize this a bit - Gray Brooks was my roommate until 3 days ago, and I work closely with Michael Whitney. It's a great group up here and the extent to which youth are powering this campaign is one of the most underreported stories in this election. Check out the article, it's well worth it and spot-on in its descriptions.
To personalize this a bit - Gray Brooks was my roommate until 3 days ago, and I work closely with Michael Whitney. It's a great group up here and the extent to which youth are powering this campaign is one of the most underreported stories in this election. Check out the article, it's well worth it and spot-on in its descriptions.
Phase Two: Outreach
I don't know how to say this delicately so I'm just going to say it. Phase one of the campaign is over, and it's time to refocus and move on to phase two. First, to all our readers and all the pro-Dean communities out there in blogtopia (ysctt!), thank you for being a part of this campaign's success. You have helped accomplish the goal for phase one, which was to make Howard Dean a viable candidate. Now that we've met that goal, where do we go from here?
I've been thinking about this for several weeks. After the Salon interview, my thoughts began to crystallise. I realised that this blog - like many others - was fixing to experience some growing pains. As Howard's profile rises, so does our's. And with that comes new challenges and opportunities. It's time to face them head-on.
So let's talk about phase two. See, we've already stolen the underpants (ten Dean Nation points if you get that reference - heh), so how do we reach phase three, which is electing Dean? I've got a few ideas swirling around in my cranium, and I'd like to solicit some feedback.
First, I see outreach efforts as being a major part of phase two. We need to go beyond blogtopia and out into the real world. What I'm talking about is using our collective brain power and energy and focusing on reaching out to non-white (cause let's be honest here, we are a mighty white campaign) communities both on and offline. I know that many of you folks - like me - are actively involved in your local meetup groups, and that's a start. But we can do better. We -must- do better.
We must reach out to online communities of color, and we must reach out to those offline constituencies who aren't plugged in to the online Dean machine. This is going to take real legwork. It's going to take us getting out from behind the keyboards and out on the streets. It's going to take coordination and effort and encouragement from Burlington. In case you didn't notice, Burlington has already begun phase two. Dean's appearance at the La Raza conference this week is an example, as was his appearance at the NAACP conference in Florida.
This outreach effort consists of more than reaching out to communities of color. It also includes reaching out to those inside the Beltway who are beginning to realise that Dean's been right all along. Like it or not, this is where the power structure rests and regardless of what we accomplish with this campaign, that is not going to change. Granted, we are certainly going to shake it up, but that's where the seat of power is and always will be. It is important for us (and Burlington) to begin this process as soon as possible.
And finally, like I mentioned yesterday, it's time to make friends with the press. I think we've done a really good job of changing their attitudes and assumptions about the Dean campaign. Months ago all we read were dismissive articles that totally missed the point, and now we are beginning to see these same institutions begin to "get it". From Chris Matthews to Slate, from TNR to Pat Buchanan - everyone is finally beginning to give DFA some serious credit for changing the way money is raised and campaigns are conducted. They are also finally giving us credit for sticking to our guns and having a consistent message (which is being validated on a daily basis). This change in punditry has come - like most change - from the bottom up. It started here and continued with the formation of DDF. And while we've done a great job of hammering home our points (perhaps Gary Trudeau should illustrate -us- as a hammer!), we also must give credit where credit is due when they finally begin to come around. And not only must we give credit, we must -encourage- this positive shift.
So, we have reaching out beyond the blogs, building bridges to communities of color, and making friends with the press and the Beltway insiders. I see all those things as major components of phase two. If we can execute these ideas properly and with conviction, we will go into the primaries knowing our candidate isn't going to get "Gored" and we will go into the primaries with solid support in all communities. That's how we're going to take our country back.
So, I'm going to make a pledge to the Dean Nation community. I'm going to try and follow these outreach stories for you, and I'll do my best to link to resources that will help us build those bridges. And to all the press people reading this (we know you're out there), I promise that I won't bag you out unless you're completely off the mark (which should make most of you safe, unless you work for FAUX "news"), and even then I will encourage you to change your mind.
So team, remember our long term goal, but concentrate on working hard on these outreach efforts. If you're doing specific outreach work in your community, please leave a comment so the rest of us can learn from your experiences.
I've been thinking about this for several weeks. After the Salon interview, my thoughts began to crystallise. I realised that this blog - like many others - was fixing to experience some growing pains. As Howard's profile rises, so does our's. And with that comes new challenges and opportunities. It's time to face them head-on.
So let's talk about phase two. See, we've already stolen the underpants (ten Dean Nation points if you get that reference - heh), so how do we reach phase three, which is electing Dean? I've got a few ideas swirling around in my cranium, and I'd like to solicit some feedback.
First, I see outreach efforts as being a major part of phase two. We need to go beyond blogtopia and out into the real world. What I'm talking about is using our collective brain power and energy and focusing on reaching out to non-white (cause let's be honest here, we are a mighty white campaign) communities both on and offline. I know that many of you folks - like me - are actively involved in your local meetup groups, and that's a start. But we can do better. We -must- do better.
We must reach out to online communities of color, and we must reach out to those offline constituencies who aren't plugged in to the online Dean machine. This is going to take real legwork. It's going to take us getting out from behind the keyboards and out on the streets. It's going to take coordination and effort and encouragement from Burlington. In case you didn't notice, Burlington has already begun phase two. Dean's appearance at the La Raza conference this week is an example, as was his appearance at the NAACP conference in Florida.
This outreach effort consists of more than reaching out to communities of color. It also includes reaching out to those inside the Beltway who are beginning to realise that Dean's been right all along. Like it or not, this is where the power structure rests and regardless of what we accomplish with this campaign, that is not going to change. Granted, we are certainly going to shake it up, but that's where the seat of power is and always will be. It is important for us (and Burlington) to begin this process as soon as possible.
And finally, like I mentioned yesterday, it's time to make friends with the press. I think we've done a really good job of changing their attitudes and assumptions about the Dean campaign. Months ago all we read were dismissive articles that totally missed the point, and now we are beginning to see these same institutions begin to "get it". From Chris Matthews to Slate, from TNR to Pat Buchanan - everyone is finally beginning to give DFA some serious credit for changing the way money is raised and campaigns are conducted. They are also finally giving us credit for sticking to our guns and having a consistent message (which is being validated on a daily basis). This change in punditry has come - like most change - from the bottom up. It started here and continued with the formation of DDF. And while we've done a great job of hammering home our points (perhaps Gary Trudeau should illustrate -us- as a hammer!), we also must give credit where credit is due when they finally begin to come around. And not only must we give credit, we must -encourage- this positive shift.
So, we have reaching out beyond the blogs, building bridges to communities of color, and making friends with the press and the Beltway insiders. I see all those things as major components of phase two. If we can execute these ideas properly and with conviction, we will go into the primaries knowing our candidate isn't going to get "Gored" and we will go into the primaries with solid support in all communities. That's how we're going to take our country back.
So, I'm going to make a pledge to the Dean Nation community. I'm going to try and follow these outreach stories for you, and I'll do my best to link to resources that will help us build those bridges. And to all the press people reading this (we know you're out there), I promise that I won't bag you out unless you're completely off the mark (which should make most of you safe, unless you work for FAUX "news"), and even then I will encourage you to change your mind.
So team, remember our long term goal, but concentrate on working hard on these outreach efforts. If you're doing specific outreach work in your community, please leave a comment so the rest of us can learn from your experiences.
2nd Quarter Fundraising Info
Actual total: $7.6 million! Now the Dean-doubters are having to shift their line from "Yes, Dean is interesting, but can he raise money?" to "Well, money isn't everything." Here are some details via the Note:
--Salaries plus payroll taxes: about $1.1 million. Fraction of total disbursements: about a third.
--Travel expenses are low, low, low. Why? A Dean campaign (not so) secret: the candidate and staff stay with supporters.
--Aside from salaries, direct mail was the second largest Dean disbursement.
--Dean raised more than $100,000 from 10 states and more than $50,000 from 18.
--The itemized Dean donor who comes first on the alphabet is David Aaker from Oneida, California. He lists his occupation as a "prophet."
--According to PoliticalMoneyLine.com's tabulation, at least 792 attorneys, nearly 200 college professors, and 101 artists contributed.
--Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Vermont was paid about $50,000 for comprehensive health insurance covering Dean employees.
--The Air Charter Team of Kansas, City, Mo. handled most of the flying around.
--There's also that $300,000 media expense we all know about.
The Balz-Edsall story has this to say about Dean and matching funds: "The Dean campaign said it received contributions from 73,226 individuals in the second quarter, and it estimated that more than 60 percent of the total it has raised this year qualifies for federal matching grants under the public financing program that provides taxpayer money equaling the contributions of $250 or less from individuals."
"The matching rate for Dean is much higher than the normal level which, according to the FEC, is usually in the 25 percent to 33 percent range. That will give Dean a built-in cushion in January, when the federal funds are dispersed, even if the other candidates outraise him in the next six months."
A Scary Scenario
I have long been a Dean optimist, convinced that Bush's lies and incompetence will sink him long before the election, and that Dean is the perfect candidate to defeat our Frat Boy in Chief. My caveat was always that a new terrorist attack or war would boost Bush's popularity. Now I am very concerned that there are signs that the neocons intend to use a new war to distract attention from the lies about Iraqi weapons. Consider three points from Slate's Today's Papers on Tuesday:
These days it can't hurt to be too cynical about the Bush cabal. And a cynic might guess that Karl Rove sees North Korea, Iran, and Syria as three aces he holds up his sleeve, to be played when things really get rough in the re-election game. Congressional hearings on Bush's lies heat up this fall? Launch air strikes on Iran. Bush lags behind Dean in the polls next summer? Hit Hezbollah camps in Syria. Bush reelection not assured come late October of 2004? Launch the first strike on North Korea, and don't be afraid to go to nuclear.
Washington people much more in the know than myself have told me that something like this is exactly what the Bush people have planned. The terrifying thing is that this strategy might work, particularly if another attack in the U.S. comes along.
This scenario presents quite a challenge for Dean because it will be difficult for him to question Bush's use of the military while we are at open war. Additionally, while Bush's overall approach--ignorant macho swagger instead of careful diplomacy--is ludicrous, he might rally support for particular actions as the situation unfolds. For example, if North Korea's response to Bush's taunts is to threaten to give nukes to terrorists, Bush could convince many of the need for a first strike, even at the risk of open nuclear war.
So what is Dean to do? Should Dean speak out on these issues now to head off such a scenario? Or will such speculative criticism distract from the more tangible attacks on Bush's lies? Please share your thoughts.
The Post goes inside with an interview with former defense secretary William Perry who said last fall that the crisis with Pyongyang was containable but now says that the administration has made things more dangerous by fiddle-faddling and not settling on a policy. " Damned if I can figure out what the policy is," says Perry. "We are on a path toward war."The U.S. action in Syria sounds very much like what Rumsfeld was pushing for in mid-April, according to this UPI story. (See the full story for details.)
The NYT goes above-the-fold with complaints from Syrians, both military and civilian, that the U.S. is regularly violating Syrian airspace, at times attacking across the border. The Times' reporter, Dexter Filkins, watched a U.S. chopper briefly dart across the border. Locals, who protest that they can't smuggle anymore, say that anti-U.S. propaganda is proliferating in the area and young men have started crossing into Iraq to attack GIs.
The Financial Times reports that Iran has offered to talk about its nuclear program with the U.S, while the White House has denied the overture.
WASHINGTON, May 2 (UPI) -- Anna Perez, White House communications counselor, Friday sharply contested a United Press International report that national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and political adviser Karl Rove shut down a Pentagon plan to expand the Iraqi ground war to Syria in closing days of combat.Given that the Bush Administration has lied about just about everything under the sun, the fact that Ms. Perez, White House "communications counselor," denied the story actually makes it even more likely the story is true. If such an explosive story were really a fabrication, wouldn't Rice, Rove, and Rumsfeld each have personally denied it, in order to make the denial as vehement as possible, rather than assign the denial to a low-level press underling?
....
UPI's report, published Friday afternoon, quoted unidentified administration officials as saying that a combination of Pentagon hawks and senior Israeli officials had been pressing the United States to expand the ground war to Syria. The officials spoke to UPI on condition of anonymity.
The U.S. strikes on Syria would have taken the form of brief across-the-border forays under "hot pursuit" rules of engagement, these sources said. They said contingency plans for such raids were being drawn up by Doug Feith, undersecretary of defense for policy, after the approval of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
....
[T]hese sources said, Rice repeated an assertion that the White House did not want any further military campaigns for the rest of Bush's first term, according to the sources. They said Rumsfeld objected, and, at one point, turned to Rove and asked his opinion. Rove said the president agreed with Rice, and the meeting came to an end, the sources said.
These days it can't hurt to be too cynical about the Bush cabal. And a cynic might guess that Karl Rove sees North Korea, Iran, and Syria as three aces he holds up his sleeve, to be played when things really get rough in the re-election game. Congressional hearings on Bush's lies heat up this fall? Launch air strikes on Iran. Bush lags behind Dean in the polls next summer? Hit Hezbollah camps in Syria. Bush reelection not assured come late October of 2004? Launch the first strike on North Korea, and don't be afraid to go to nuclear.
Washington people much more in the know than myself have told me that something like this is exactly what the Bush people have planned. The terrifying thing is that this strategy might work, particularly if another attack in the U.S. comes along.
This scenario presents quite a challenge for Dean because it will be difficult for him to question Bush's use of the military while we are at open war. Additionally, while Bush's overall approach--ignorant macho swagger instead of careful diplomacy--is ludicrous, he might rally support for particular actions as the situation unfolds. For example, if North Korea's response to Bush's taunts is to threaten to give nukes to terrorists, Bush could convince many of the need for a first strike, even at the risk of open nuclear war.
So what is Dean to do? Should Dean speak out on these issues now to head off such a scenario? Or will such speculative criticism distract from the more tangible attacks on Bush's lies? Please share your thoughts.
Video of Human Rights Campaign forum http://www.hrc.org/speakingofequality/webcast.asp
I'm on a dialup connection these days and so haven't been able to watch it. If you have, please give us a report on Dean's performance.
Transcript of Dean on NPR. July 15 http://demog.berkeley.edu/~gabriel/dean2004blog/Dean_NPR_July_15_03.htm
Lessig blog: an opportunity http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/archives/2003_07.shtml#001363
Below is the text of the comment I posted in response to Dean's latest post on Lessig Blog.
fellow commentators - remember Dean’s last post. It looks like Dean is posting here to ask us about what issues we feel are important, not to tell us what his positions are. It’s clear from his previous post that he is looking for facts upon which to base is policy issues.
We are a resource for him. That means we need to take this rare opportunity to educate a candidate for President of the United States on the issues about IP, copyright vs patents, Eldred, DMCA, SBCEA, etc.
Asking questions of Gov. Dean at this point is counter productive. I know exactly where Seth is coming from because I shared his complaint until Dean’s previous post - when I realized that the purpose of this guest blog was 180 degrees from my earlier assumption.
Here on Lessig blog is a vocal and articulate community on IP issues. Let’s use our knowledge and give Dean the facts he needs.
Asking him what his Veep choice will be or why he enters politics is as much as wasted oipportunity for ourselves. Here we can help shape a possible President’s views on IP and we’re asking him the Friday Five?
We clearly aren’t going to get a detailed policy statement from Dean about IP this week. But if we play our cards right, we might get one before the primary. For once we have the power, which is what the Dean campaign has always been about.
Money Changes Everything http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/nj/powers2003-07-14.htm
Excellent piece by the National Journal's media columnist via Atlantic Online. The NJ has a relatively small readership, but it is where many columnists and talking heads go for ideas. Excerpt:
Should fundraising prowess trump everything else in the coverage of presidential contenders? If a candidate isn't good at persuading people to write checks, does that mean, ipso facto, he'd be bad at running the country? How does a profession that worries so much about the role of money in politics square that position with its own daily complicity in the game?
In a long interview I had with Howard Dean last year, he predicted that no matter what ideas and experience he brought to the table, he wouldn't be taken really seriously by the politico-media establishment until he'd mastered the fundraising game. Since then, he's enjoyed a lot of positive coverage, but none of those front-page, paradigm-shifting stories in which the news class clears it throat and announces: "America, this could be your next president."
Until now. And it only cost $7 million. Dr. Dean may be even smarter than we realized.
Read My Lips: Trust, Honor & Dignity http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56336-2003Jul14.html?nav=hptop_tb
There has been relatively little posting on the blogs today about the following George Bush quote from this story in the Washinton Post offered as a justification for war with Iraq:
Salon.com's Joe Conason has this to say, and you'll need a day pass:
Howard over at Hoffmania! has this to say:
And so, my final point: with this quote, and Nigergate, and no WsMD to be found, will Dubya's campaign promise...
....become as emblematic of his failures as his father's promise of "Read my lips: no new taxes!" eventually became?
I mean, Dubya ran on this statement as much as Clinton ran on "It's the economy, stupid." And lies aside, this administarion clearly exagerrated, and they ran their 2000 campaign against Al Gore by defining him as a serial exagerrator that couldn't be trusted. Hey, George, it's about trust, honor and dignity, stupid. Remember?
And who has been the candidate who was willing to call Bush on this stuff long before the press or any other Democrat was willing to? Yup, Howard Dean. (Larger excerpts can be found on my blog Points West.)
"We gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in."
Salon.com's Joe Conason has this to say, and you'll need a day pass:
Now a presidential statement so frontally at variance with the universally acknowledged facts obviously presents a problem for the White House press corps. He wasn't joking, and he didn't sound disoriented or unwell. Although Dana Priest and Dana Milbank wrote the story as delicately as they possibly could, they couldn't make it seem less weird:
The president's assertion that the war began because Iraq did not admit inspectors appeared to contradict the events leading up to war this spring: Hussein had, in fact, admitted the inspectors and Bush had opposed extending their work because he did not believe them effective."
....
What possessed the president to make an assertion that everyone on the planet knows to be untrue? And who is going to take the responsibility for this one? Did George Tenet vet Bush's statement? Do the British have a secret dossier proving that Saddam never actually admitted Hans Blix and the UNMOVIC teams? Will Condi Rice or Donald Rumsfeld show up on Fox News next weekend to explain why Bush's statement is "technically accurate," even though he shouldn't have said it?
...
The sentence quoted above doesn't appear in today's New York Times report, for example. Yet there is no question about what he said -- undoubtedly to the amazement of both Kofi Annan, who was sitting beside him at the time, and the dozens of reporters who were present during their brief joint press conference.
...
Another recent president once said something that was blatantly untrue, if fairly trivial, and the videotape of his statement was replayed again, and again, and again, and again...
Howard over at Hoffmania! has this to say:
So the main cause for war WASN'T:
Weapons of mass destruction, buying yellowcake from Niger, the oppression of the Iraqi people, Saddam threatening Bush I, harboring and training al Qaida, selling nukes to terrorists, direct or indirect help with 9/11, Saddam making crank calls to Cheney, or disarming Saddam of...well...nothing we can find.
And so, my final point: with this quote, and Nigergate, and no WsMD to be found, will Dubya's campaign promise...
"I will bring honor to the process and honor to the office I seek. I will remind Al Gore that Americans do not want a White House where there is 'no controlling legal authority.' I will repair the broken bonds of trust between Americans and their government"
....become as emblematic of his failures as his father's promise of "Read my lips: no new taxes!" eventually became?
I mean, Dubya ran on this statement as much as Clinton ran on "It's the economy, stupid." And lies aside, this administarion clearly exagerrated, and they ran their 2000 campaign against Al Gore by defining him as a serial exagerrator that couldn't be trusted. Hey, George, it's about trust, honor and dignity, stupid. Remember?
And who has been the candidate who was willing to call Bush on this stuff long before the press or any other Democrat was willing to? Yup, Howard Dean. (Larger excerpts can be found on my blog Points West.)
Tuesday, July 15, 2003
Dean: “I Seek Accountability” http://mattbailey.blogspot.com/politics/2003_07_13_deanarchive.html#105830342960369668
From the Dean Campaign...
See link above for full press releases.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 15, 2003
Dean: “I Seek Accountability”
WASHINGTON—While campaigning in the nation’s capital today, Governor Howard Dean, M.D. made the following statement regarding recent developments: “It only becomes more and more clear every day what a mistake this administration made in launching a pre-emptive war in Iraq. The evidence mounts that not only did the Administration mislead the American people and the world in making its case for war but that it failed to plan adequately for the peace.
“Today, we are paying the price: in lives lost, in a $100 billion price tag that only rises daily, and in the toll on our reputation around the world.
“There was a time and a place for questioning the veracity of the evidence being presented about the war. There was a time for asking the tough questions about the rationale for war, the planning for peace and the cost of the mission—and that time was before the first shot was fired. It was the duty of our elected representatives in Congress to ask the toughest possible questions about our purpose and our plans before signing a blank check for the Bush administration to wage pre-emptive war.
See link above for full press releases.
Dean and Independent voters http://www.cuip.org/chipResponses/dean070803.pdf
The Committee for Unified Independent Party submitted a questionaire to all the candidates, and Dean's responses have been turned in and published (warning, the above link is a pdf). I've always said that this campaign is capable of appealing to voters of all persuasions, and I think the Governor's answers on this survey reinforce that. Here are some snippets, although I suggest you read the survey in it's entirety:
update Todd Heywood and Scott Gamel sent me a note to remind me that Independents For Dean is online and working towards building bridges to that huge chunk of the electorate. Keep up the great work, guys, and sorry I missed linking that originally.
The trend in the direction of political independence has continued unabated during the last ten years. A recent CNN/USA Today poll shows the electorate in a three-way split, with independents comprising a plurality at 35%. To what do you attribute this growing dis-alignment from the major parties? I believe that both parties are guilty of not giving people a reason to vote. It’s certainly a problem within the Democratic Party. We’ve become so afraid to stand up for what we believe that the public has almost no idea what our principles are. The Republican Party has moved further and further to the right, and the Democratic Party has followed them, to the point where Democrats look like Republicans, and Republicans talk like “moderates” but govern like right-wing extremists. I think that voters want candidates to be clear about who they are and what they believe, and that’s exactly what my campaign is all about. Voters may not always agree with me on every position, but they will always know where I stand.
A consistent concern of independent voters is the extent to which the electoral, governmental and policymaking processes have been infected with partisanship. The Florida recount process revealed extreme partisanship on both sides – among election officials and within the court system. But Florida was not an anomaly. Among other examples of partisanship, ballot access laws favor incumbents over insurgents, and major party candidates over independents; judges have strong ties to party machines; and many legislative bodies reinforce partisan allegiance over
public service.
a) In your view, what is the role of partisanship in American politics?
I don’t think that anyone should govern based on ideology -- the Bush Administration’s ideological narrowness has set this country down a terrible path. Now, I do believe in having a strong governing philosophy, but that need not equal ideology or partisanship. Our political system should always involve a debate over ideas and philosophy -- that debate is what makes our democracy thrive.
b) Do you believe that partisanship contributes to the negative aspects of our political culture?
Partisanship becomes a detriment when adhering to a certain ideology is more important than making the best decisions for the American people. That said, it is important that the parties stand for something and give voters a choice between competing ideas.
c) How would you characterize the state of our political culture?
The state of our political culture is dismal right now. We have one party that runs every branch of government and believes that it can get away with just about anything, and another party that’s too afraid of the President’s approval ratings to stand up and fight.
update Todd Heywood and Scott Gamel sent me a note to remind me that Independents For Dean is online and working towards building bridges to that huge chunk of the electorate. Keep up the great work, guys, and sorry I missed linking that originally.
What's this? Someone inside the beltway gets it? http://www.msnbc.com/news/938837.asp?0cv=CB20
I've always been somewhat suprised that people inside the Beltway have dismissed Dean's candidacy as coming out of left field. These folks have obviously not taken a good look at his solid, moderate record. In addition, some pundits have suggested that Dean's going to have a hard time working with the insiders due to his blunt, passionate observation that those inside the Beltway have forgotten about those of us on the outside.
Well, think again.
Dean's team has begun a concerted effort to build bridges with those inside the Beltway. This is a GoodThing(TM). There are some inside the Beltway who should naturally be on the Dean bandwagon, including more moderate (ie "centrist") Democrats, and even the southern wing of conservative Democrats.
This MSNBC article gives a hint of what's to come:
But as improbable as it would have seemed three months ago, some Capitol Hill political realists have now accepted — even embraced — the notion that Dean will end up as the Democratic nominee. “I want to beat Bush and I think Dean is the best guy to do that,” said a senior Senate Democratic staffer, who spoke to MSNBC.com on condition that he not be named. “I’m convinced he’s going to win the nomination.
So are we, whoever you are. =)
Team Dean has also begun to reach out to the Democratic "Super-delegates", who make up 40% of the attendees at the National Convention. To do this, they've enlisted former Carter staffer Nikki Heidepriem (who has done extensive lobbying work for mental health and women's issues, and has also done work for the Polling Report) and former House staffer Maura Keefe. These ladies "get it":
One lesson of the 2002 elections was that Democratic candidates who voted with Bush on tax cuts and the Iraq war lost anyway. “You had to do some self-examination” about that strategy, Heidepriem said — and that meant finding a candidate who sharply defines differences with Bush.
Heidepriem wants the congressional Democrats to understand that Dean “values members of Congress.” She said, “at first I’d occasionally get a call from a senior staffer or member of Congress saying, ‘it’s hard to help someone when he’s saying that we’re not doing our job.’ But the response to him has been so overwhelming that I hear a lot less now from members and staff about him being dismissive or harsh or overly critical.”
This is all part of a broader strategy which will help sew up support for Dean in Washington DC. This groundwork will pay off later, especially when the convention rolls around. This campaign has grown far beyond anyone's expectations, and has had to begin working on strategies that weren't planned for rollout until later. Reaching out to the Beltway is critical, as is making friends with the press. We've reached that point, and it's only going up from here.
Well, think again.
Dean's team has begun a concerted effort to build bridges with those inside the Beltway. This is a GoodThing(TM). There are some inside the Beltway who should naturally be on the Dean bandwagon, including more moderate (ie "centrist") Democrats, and even the southern wing of conservative Democrats.
This MSNBC article gives a hint of what's to come:
But as improbable as it would have seemed three months ago, some Capitol Hill political realists have now accepted — even embraced — the notion that Dean will end up as the Democratic nominee. “I want to beat Bush and I think Dean is the best guy to do that,” said a senior Senate Democratic staffer, who spoke to MSNBC.com on condition that he not be named. “I’m convinced he’s going to win the nomination.
So are we, whoever you are. =)
Team Dean has also begun to reach out to the Democratic "Super-delegates", who make up 40% of the attendees at the National Convention. To do this, they've enlisted former Carter staffer Nikki Heidepriem (who has done extensive lobbying work for mental health and women's issues, and has also done work for the Polling Report) and former House staffer Maura Keefe. These ladies "get it":
One lesson of the 2002 elections was that Democratic candidates who voted with Bush on tax cuts and the Iraq war lost anyway. “You had to do some self-examination” about that strategy, Heidepriem said — and that meant finding a candidate who sharply defines differences with Bush.
Heidepriem wants the congressional Democrats to understand that Dean “values members of Congress.” She said, “at first I’d occasionally get a call from a senior staffer or member of Congress saying, ‘it’s hard to help someone when he’s saying that we’re not doing our job.’ But the response to him has been so overwhelming that I hear a lot less now from members and staff about him being dismissive or harsh or overly critical.”
This is all part of a broader strategy which will help sew up support for Dean in Washington DC. This groundwork will pay off later, especially when the convention rolls around. This campaign has grown far beyond anyone's expectations, and has had to begin working on strategies that weren't planned for rollout until later. Reaching out to the Beltway is critical, as is making friends with the press. We've reached that point, and it's only going up from here.
open thread: Dean @ Lessig http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/archives/2003_07.shtml#001360
Dean has posted his second entry to Lessig's blog:
It sounds like Dean is posting more for information-gathering purposes than to lay out his own ideas about copyright, patents, and intellectual property. What do you think? comment on how you think Dean has made use of the forum granted to him by Lessig thus far, and what you'd like to see.
Let me be perfectly honest. In the space of this week on the blog, I will not be able to answer every specific question. I know that people here care deeply about intellectual property. I’m here to listen.
As a doctor, I’m trained to base my decisions on facts. ... Facts are a better basis for decisions than ideology.
It sounds like Dean is posting more for information-gathering purposes than to lay out his own ideas about copyright, patents, and intellectual property. What do you think? comment on how you think Dean has made use of the forum granted to him by Lessig thus far, and what you'd like to see.
Dangerous Analogies http://deandefense.org/archives/000276.html
(This is a cross-post from DeanDefense.org)
Chris Suellentrop has a piece about Dean and the net over at Slate. We applaud his recognition of our fine organization, but we take issue with his opening analogy:
Music fans switched from Napster to Gnutella because Gnutella was more resilient. Today, they are using Kazaa or heaven knows what because it is still workable.
Someone commented that the internet often goes through four or five news cycles while the rest of the world goes through one. Well, campaigns have to be four or five times more dynamic on the 'net.
In the end, though, Dean's supporters aren't together by his campaign's use of the 'net (which, while impressive, is only a small portion of the Dean Matrix that comprises all of the online Dean-world), but by their desire to build the candidate known as Howard Dean.
And, just as music continued to succeed, even as Napster had problems, even if Dean's own 'net campaign crashes, he'll still be the strongest candidate on the internet, cause Gnutella is here.
Chris Suellentrop has a piece about Dean and the net over at Slate. We applaud his recognition of our fine organization, but we take issue with his opening analogy:
It's too early to say for certain, but Howard Dean may turn out to be the Napster of presidential politics: the force that enables the Internet to upend an entire industry, threatens to transform the way it collects money, and opens the eyes of the average person to yet another way to use the Net. But if Dean is a political Napster, it will probably mean more for politics in general than it means for Howard Dean. After all, two years after Napster went dark, people are still logging on to the Internet to swap music files. Ultimately, Napster empowered music users more than it empowered itself. Something analogous will probably be true with Internet politics. That's good news for political junkies, but it could be bad news for Howard Dean.The great power of Napster existed not just for Napster but for the spread of music. Likewise, the power of any internet campaign is to promote the spread of the candidate. Even if Dean's own internet campaign loses its pull on the 'net (unlikely, given the popularity of its blog among supporters), it will likely be because the supporters found better methods.
Music fans switched from Napster to Gnutella because Gnutella was more resilient. Today, they are using Kazaa or heaven knows what because it is still workable.
Someone commented that the internet often goes through four or five news cycles while the rest of the world goes through one. Well, campaigns have to be four or five times more dynamic on the 'net.
In the end, though, Dean's supporters aren't together by his campaign's use of the 'net (which, while impressive, is only a small portion of the Dean Matrix that comprises all of the online Dean-world), but by their desire to build the candidate known as Howard Dean.
And, just as music continued to succeed, even as Napster had problems, even if Dean's own 'net campaign crashes, he'll still be the strongest candidate on the internet, cause Gnutella is here.
the Open Source campaign http://slate.msn.com/id/2085610/
Chris Suellentrop has an intriguing article in Slate about the double-edged sword that is Dean's embrace of the grass roots as the engine driving his bid. It's truly a fresh analysis of the phenomenon that now transcends meetup:
(it's been a good week for Dean Nation in the press!). Suellentrop puts this diversity in the context of unintended consequences, but I think he doesn't realise just how deliberate this actually is. TYhe correct model is not "peer to peer", it is Open Source. As Joe Trippi commented on Lessig's blog yesterday:
This open-ness and transparency is exactly what draws jaded citizens to Dean and fuels his appeal - because unlike with the rest of the candidates, there is room for idealism about our system of government again. Declining turnout is not a function of increased voter apathy or the "dumbing down" of America - it's because the barrier to entry for the average citizen has been raised too high - and only deep pockets have the will to climb it. Trippi has torn that wall down - in many ways, June 30th ($7 Million Monday) was our Bastille Day - the day we stormed the barricades and took back control.
Suellentrop recognizes this, but doesn't grasp its meaning:
What he doesn't understand is that we shouldn't need to go through him. Dean is the catalyst here, not the solvent. Suellentrop is making a dark prediction about what we will do after storming the Bastille - but that'[s a reflection of the fact that he's still perhaps bound by the mentality that a central broker is required to lend legitimiacy to your movement. Hence he still thinks Napster (closed-source, central server) is actually the desirable model, and Gnutella (open source, decentralized) is How Things Go Wrong. That's exactly backwards. We never were Napster, we've been using Gnutella all along - and that's the reason for our success.
In addition to the Meetup.com gatherings (which grew out of a posting on the unofficial "Dean Nation" blog) that have been garnering press for Dean across the country, Dean supporters have organized themselves into unofficial groups such as a "Dean Media Team" that (among other things) is distilling Dean speeches into streaming, Internet-friendly sound bites and the "Dean Defense Forces" that organize letter-writing responses to negative articles in the press. It's peer-to-peer politics—voters connecting to other voters without the middleman of official campaign sanction.
But by encouraging so much spontaneous organization, Dean has—knowingly or unknowingly—ceded a lot of control to these unofficial groups. It's a gamble that may pay off, but it's still a gamble. If television took some power away from political parties and handed it to the candidates, the Internet has the potential to transfer that power again—this time by handing it to the voters or, more accurately, to organized activist groups like the ones that are now swarming around the Dean campaign. Dean hopes to assimilate the growing online liberal Borg, but it's possible that the Borg will assimilate Dean.
Small, unofficial, decentralized campaign offices (like the ones on the left on this page) could narrow-cast the Dean message, doing to the Dean campaign what fan fiction does to Harry Potter: They could create their own narratives and highlight their own issues and points of emphasis. It's possible that this approach would be wildly successful, allowing Dean's campaign to target a broad variety of voters with distinct messages. Gays for Dean? Go to this site. Geeks for Dean? Click here. Nurses for Dean? Right this way. Let a thousand Dean campaigns bloom.
(it's been a good week for Dean Nation in the press!). Suellentrop puts this diversity in the context of unintended consequences, but I think he doesn't realise just how deliberate this actually is. TYhe correct model is not "peer to peer", it is Open Source. As Joe Trippi commented on Lessig's blog yesterday:
I spent some time as an advisor to Progeny Linux Systems (the Debian flavored Linux) — the time spent there really influenced my thinking about an open source campaign.
I mean the political system today is exactly the same thing — a small group trying to keep control of a system they designed and that they hold the keys to — and an open source campaign is one that conducts open converstions, open collabortation — and in the end the contributions of many individuals in terms of time or resources when marshalled together will have the power to take government by the people back. Its the whole thinking behind a new politics of meaning — because without the people getting involved again politics has no meaning. I don’t know maybe I am rambling — but it is how we are trying to do this — maybe its a strecth but the fact is it was the time spent in Linux related endeavors that has shaped my thinking.
This open-ness and transparency is exactly what draws jaded citizens to Dean and fuels his appeal - because unlike with the rest of the candidates, there is room for idealism about our system of government again. Declining turnout is not a function of increased voter apathy or the "dumbing down" of America - it's because the barrier to entry for the average citizen has been raised too high - and only deep pockets have the will to climb it. Trippi has torn that wall down - in many ways, June 30th ($7 Million Monday) was our Bastille Day - the day we stormed the barricades and took back control.
Suellentrop recognizes this, but doesn't grasp its meaning:
The Napster analogy is instructive: What did file swappers do after Napster went down? They turned to Gnutella, a system that doesn't require a central broker. Dean wants to be Napster, but his supporters are more like Gnutella: They don't need to go through Dean to connect with one another.
What he doesn't understand is that we shouldn't need to go through him. Dean is the catalyst here, not the solvent. Suellentrop is making a dark prediction about what we will do after storming the Bastille - but that'[s a reflection of the fact that he's still perhaps bound by the mentality that a central broker is required to lend legitimiacy to your movement. Hence he still thinks Napster (closed-source, central server) is actually the desirable model, and Gnutella (open source, decentralized) is How Things Go Wrong. That's exactly backwards. We never were Napster, we've been using Gnutella all along - and that's the reason for our success.
Salon and Judis smacked by readers http://www.salon.com/news/letters/2003/07/15/dean_judis/
Salon has published some of the letters that they received in response to Judis' "The Trouble with Howard Dean" article. They are excellent, detailed, and persuasive. Here's excerpts from two of my favorites:
there are two full pages of these, well worth reading all!
At a recent meeting of Howard Dean supporters in St. Paul an attendee brought with her a petition for the repeal of a recent Minnesota law permitting the carrying of concealed weapons in our state. Although we were all there to attend a Dean MeetUp and not to discuss the gun issue, people eagerly signed her petition. At one point a young woman said something like, "I don't know if Dean would sign that," and we all had a chuckle. As a governor whose moderate position on guns earned him the endorsement of the NRA, we were well aware that Dean's position on guns was more to the right than many of ours.
...
Most of us who are supporting Dean are fully aware of the issues on which we agree, and do not agree with him. I looked at the available candidates and loved Dr. Dean's candor, passion, and his principled decision to speak out about issues even as others around him disagreed with him. People suffering from Beltway blues such as John Judis are so blinded by Dean's antiwar position (and their own blind kowtowing to President Bush's disastrous foreign policy) that they fundamentally misunderstand why Dean has attracted such a strong, loyal following. Many of us have looked at his record, seen him as a centrist who is electable, and have become supporters.
It's the backbone, stupid.
So, the Weekly Standard insists that Howard Dean most resembles Clinton, and John Judis counters that Dean is the next McGovern. I guess that's what news analysts do -- take a cursory glance, then thumb through the history books for an easy analogy.
Everyone with a news column is trying to pigeonhole Dean: He's the anti-Iraqi war candidate, he's the Internet candidate, or he's the doctor turned governor. While the analysts cluck their tongues that Dean doesn't have a chance, close to 200,000 people have signed up as supporters for the Dean campaign six months before the primary. In my community, I've met hundreds of people who are excited about democracy again because of Howard Dean.
Judis' suggestion for "bland" Democratic candidates is laughable. The election of 2002 showed us that it wasn't enough for the Bush administration and Republicans to return to ruinous fiscal and foreign policies for Democrats to win. The Democratic Party had to show real leadership and stand up for our common principles. Howard Dean has stepped forward to provide that leadership. Ultimately that's the source of the excitement around his campaign.
there are two full pages of these, well worth reading all!
No More Mister Nice Guy http://www.tnr.com/etc.mhtml
From TNR's &c.
What to say but "ummm-hmm."
STYLE POINTS: Ron Brownstein is right when he suggests, in today's LA Times column that candidates (read: Howard Dean) who satisfy "the visceral longing among Democrats for denunciation of Bush ... will frighten away centrist voters--the way conservatives did with their overheated attacks on Bill Clinton throughout his presidency." But in some sense that's not really the relevant question. After all, given the way the Democratic Party is configured--with the far left exerting considerable influence over the nominating process--there's no way to win the Democratic nomination without alienating centrist voters. The relevant question is therefore how you minimize the number of centrist voters you alienate en route to winning the nomination.
Once you realize that's the question, then Howard Dean's "visceral longing" strategy doesn't look like such a disaster. There are, after all, only two ways to satisfy the party's left-leaning base. The first is on the level of policy--that is, taking liberal positions. The second is on the level of tone--that is, angrily denouncing the president with overheated rhetoric. The beauty of the latter is that it's essentially contentless: It satisfies the base without locking you into any particular policy positions, meaning you're free to fill in the details of those positions as you see fit. And in Dean's case, those details happen to be pretty centrist (with the exception of his opposition to the war; more on that below): He's a relative moderate on gun control, the death penalty, trade, and fiscal matters.
Now you could certainly argue, as Brownstein does, that Dean's anger will scare away some swing voters. But, again, the question isn't whether it scares away swing voters. The question is, how many? And, any way you slice it, you probably scare away fewer swing voters by moving to the left of them tonally than you do by moving to the left of them ideologically.
At the same time, it becomes much, much easier to tack to the center after you win the nomination if you've appealed to the left through style rather than substance. Whereas someone like Dick Gephardt would risk alienating his blue-collar supporters when he began waffling on an issue like trade to lure moderates in the general election, Dean could further moderate his policies without any risk of defection on the left, since his support on the left had little to do with ideology in the first place.
On top of all of that, it's entirely possible that Brownstein overestimates the extent to which centrist voters might be turned off by Dean's anger. Yes, conservatives scared away moderates when they overreached against Bill Clinton. But it wasn't so much conservatives' rhetoric that alienated moderates. It was their policies: in particular, their policy of impeaching Clinton over an offense the average voter thought was none of Congress's business. Furthermore, there's probably something to be said for playing against type. One of the main problems Republicans have when it comes to winning over moderates is that moderates--particularly moderate women--tend to think of Republicans as nasty and mean. Well, when Republicans start saying things that actually are nasty and mean, it simply reinforces that image and makes the Republicans' job that much harder. But, of course, Democrats have the opposite problem: Moderates--particularly white males--think Democrats are too touchy-feely and soft. That means that a Democrat who comes off as angry and tough could actually help himself among moderates. At the very least it's hard to argue that he'd suffer to the extent that a Republican would.
The one curve ball in all of this is, of course, Iraq, which stands as the glaring exception to Dean's otherwise moderate pedigree, and, which, should Dean win the nomination, risks reinforcing an image of Democrats as weak and overly-suspicious of American power. But even here Dean seems likely to benefit from the tone/substance dichotomy outlined above. While Iraq was certainly the issue that first won Dean a lot of support on the left, that development had more to do with the tone of Dean's opposition to the war than the substance. (That's not to say Dean would have won support on the left had he been angry and in favor of the war. Just that he wouldn't have attracted those supporters had he been subdued and opposed.) Which means that it's entirely possible that Dean will be able to moderate the substance of even his foreign policy to appeal to moderates down the road. You can imagine, for example, Dean attacking Bush from the right on homeland security (which he's already begun to do) and the war on terror (the failure to catch Osama bin Laden, the administration's softness on the Saudis). As long as he does it with his trademark bluntness, it's tough to imagine him losing much support on the left.
What to say but "ummm-hmm."
The McGovernator http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/sunday/commentary/la-oe-mcgovern13jul13193420,1,4071304.story?coll=la-sunday-commentary
Okay, okay, I know that McGovern can be a sensitive topic for Dean lovers, but this LA Times op ed hit me like a two-by-four while visiting with friends in Los Angeles this weekend. I actually read it aloud to a large-ish group of largely non-political but progressive friends who knew little about Dean, and it really floored them all. This of course launched a larger conversation about Dean himself, and we picked up some supporters! I realiized while we chatted that not one of us in the crowd was older than ten during the 1972 election, and most of us were far younger. None of us really knew some of the facts that McGovern relates so effectively in this essay. Though McGovern does not -- wisely, I think -- mention Dean by name, it is hard to imagine that he is not a Dean fan. Snips:
I'm glad that McGovern is here with us and chose to defend his real record rather than allow the Republican and DLC spin to stick without a fight. It's well worth a full read, and I'm curious what others think, so please post your comments!
These days, my name is back in the news. I'm being held up as some kind of sober warning to Democratic candidates. Don't be another George McGovern, the warning goes. Don't be too liberal. Don't be too outspoken. Watch what you say and play to the middle, so that you don't end up losing 49 states, too.
It may not surprise you that I regard this as political baloney. I said exactly what I believed in 1972. I told the truth while my opponent betrayed the American public and violated the law repeatedly, engaging in campaign finance dishonesty and illegal wiretapping, invading the confidential files of a doctor, urging the CIA to halt an FBI investigation — to say nothing of running unethical and unlimited campaign advertising that distorted my positions on major issues. These kinds of tactics got him elected — but they also made him the only president in our history forced to resign in disgrace.
...
Of course, we all like to win — especially against great odds. And I think it's extremely important for the Democrats to win in 2004. But not at the price of their souls. I won a lot of elections in my life, many of them as a liberal in conservative South Dakota, by saying what I believed. As a junior senator from a sparsely settled farm state, I won the presidential nomination in a field of 17 tough contenders, including Hubert Humphrey, Ed Muskie and Henry Jackson. I began with these words: "I make one pledge above all others: to seek and speak the truth."
...
Nixon had said in seeking the presidency in 1968 that he had a secret plan for ending the war. But once in office, he continued the war for four more years, during which time we suffered the loss of 40% of the Americans who died in that war. I believe that despite my loss, my campaign in 1972 made clear to the public, Congress and the world that nearly 30 million Americans wanted a president who would end the war immediately. No war could have continued long after that election.
...
I also wish more of our elected officials would raise hard questions about the Patriot Act, which really ought to be called the Anti-Bill of Rights Act. Some searching questions should also be directed to the so-called Homeland Security Act, which has created an enormous, costly bureaucracy that will add little to our security while increasing taxes and red tape.
With the 2004 race about to begin in earnest, I would only add: Give me a presidential candidate who speaks the truth as he sees it and I'll show you a candidate whose campaign, win or lose, will be good for the nation.
I'm glad that McGovern is here with us and chose to defend his real record rather than allow the Republican and DLC spin to stick without a fight. It's well worth a full read, and I'm curious what others think, so please post your comments!
Monday, July 14, 2003
The Newest Fineman Article http://www.msnbc.com/news/937672.asp?0cl=c1
I've been a bit busy as of late, so I haven't been posting as much. But I was surprised that nobody posted this today - so I took a few minutes to do it myself! It's the most recent article by Newseek's Howard Fineman. Entitled, Feeling Dean's Pain, it is aimed at learning "what makes Dean tick."
The article is especially good for people who are new to Gov. Dean. It covers items such as the death of his brother Charlie (the main focus of the article, I'd say), his "similarities" to George W. Bush, his upbringing, his medical career, and his political rise. Time limits will keep me from writing commentary, but feel free to do it yourself in the comments section!
The article is especially good for people who are new to Gov. Dean. It covers items such as the death of his brother Charlie (the main focus of the article, I'd say), his "similarities" to George W. Bush, his upbringing, his medical career, and his political rise. Time limits will keep me from writing commentary, but feel free to do it yourself in the comments section!
Dean Would Label Racial Profiling http://mattbailey.blogspot.com/politics/2003_07_13_deanarchive.html#105823382868504214
From the Dean Campaign...
See link above for full press release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 14, 2003
Dean Would Label Racial Profiling as ‘Discrimination’
AUSTIN—Governor Howard Dean said today that he would take federal action, including withholding federal funding, against state and local law enforcement agencies that engage in racial profiling. As president, Dean would use the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to label racial profiling by law enforcement as a form of discrimination. “Let’s start calling racial profiling what it is—discrimination based upon race,” Dean said.
In comments today to the annual meetings of the National Council of La Raza here and the NAACP in Miami, Dean took issue with the recent memorandum circulated by Attorney General John Ashcroft on the subject of profiling and with the Bush administration’s position that this is a state and local issue over which the federal government has little control. “This is a civil rights issue, and that makes it a federal issue,” Dean said. “Racial discrimination is illegal in hiring, housing, and voting. It should be illegal as a law enforcement technique too.”
See link above for full press release
Dean blogs about the FCC http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/archives/2003_07.shtml#001355
Dean has posted his first entry to Lessig's blog, addressing the issue of FCC and media deregulation. Rather than excerpt it, I encourage everyone to read it in full - it is well-argued and Dean makes his point effectively.
However, I confess to being somewhat surprised. This is Lessig's blog, after all - and while the media deregulation is a problem, it's also somewhat tangential to the issues that Dean could be addressing (and the ones that he needs to address, if he wants to court the Slashdot demographic).
Here is my comment to his post:
What do you think? Is Lessig's blog the right place to be talking about the FCC? Is the FCC more important than the DMCA and the SBCEA?
On my original comment post to Lessig's blog, I mistakenly called Lessig's book "The End of Ideas" instead of "The Future of Ideas." I've corrected it above. Though with the current atmosphere of silencing fair use, it might amount to much the same thing.
However, I confess to being somewhat surprised. This is Lessig's blog, after all - and while the media deregulation is a problem, it's also somewhat tangential to the issues that Dean could be addressing (and the ones that he needs to address, if he wants to court the Slashdot demographic).
Here is my comment to his post:
Governor,
It’s a privelege to be able to discuss these issues with you, and I greatly appreciate the opportunity.
I agree that the FCC-sanctioned media consolidation is a threat, but there will always be other information channels. In fact, most interest groups tend to simply flock to channels that reflect their own views rather than search out any truly independent medium - this is the sole reason for FOX News vast success, not any FCC actions per se. With former Vice President Al Gore proposing a liberal cable news channel, the trend is reflected on the opposite side of the partisan divide and there’s no intrinsic reason that media consolidation needs to be a threat to liberal ideas alone.
A much greater threat, IMHO is that of copyright abuse. As you are no doubt aware, Professor Lessig has been extensively discussing how copyright extensions pose a serious threat to the inventive engine of society, on this blog and in his book, “The Future of Ideas” (which I assume you’ve read). Today the DMCA and the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, tomorrow the Thou Shalt Not Reverse Engineer Act and the end of the public domain as we know it.
What is your position on the threat to the public domain? And what policies do you intend to support to address that threat?
Regards, Aziz H. Poonawalla
Dean Nation 2004 blog
What do you think? Is Lessig's blog the right place to be talking about the FCC? Is the FCC more important than the DMCA and the SBCEA?
On my original comment post to Lessig's blog, I mistakenly called Lessig's book "The End of Ideas" instead of "The Future of Ideas." I've corrected it above. Though with the current atmosphere of silencing fair use, it might amount to much the same thing.
Dallas rally report http://annatopia.com/home.html
Hey everyone, I've finished my report on Dean's Dallas visit. Pop over to my site (linked above) and check it out. It's the first five posts on the blog. =)
Joe Klein Warms Up to Dean http://www.time.com/time/columnist/klein/article/0,9565,464429,00.html
His Dean-Kerry comparison comes up pointing at Dean as the guy to beat. On Dean:
There is a misapprehension that the Dean phenomenon was created by the Internet. It was created by Dean's mouth—and by the fury of many Democrats at what they perceive to be a radical Republican Administration.On Kerry:
....
Such sentiments have been misinterpreted by assorted Beltway savants as a leftward lurch by Democratic Party activists; it seems more a reaction to the rightward lurch of the Republicans. Dean, who has been mischaracterized as the reincarnation of George McGovern, is certainly no traditional liberal or even a traditional dove. "I told the peace people not to fall in love with me," he told me over breakfast in Manchester, N.H., last week. He said he had opposed Vietnam, but he had supported the first Gulf War, the interventions in Bosnia and Kosovo, and the war in Afghanistan. In the 1980s he had "mixed feelings" about Ronald Reagan's support for the contras in Nicaragua and opposed a unilateral nuclear freeze. "I'm not a pacifist. I believe there are times when pre-emptive force is justified, but there has to be an immediate threat, and there just wasn't in this case."
A sense of aloofness has always been a Kerry problem—"You shouldn't hold John's looks against him," former Senator Bob Kerrey once told me—and Dean's chesty informality has only exacerbated Kerry's air of dour Brahmin solemnity. In truth, he isn't so much aloof as he is courtly, in a formal, afternoon-tea sort of way. The shoutathon of modern politics discomforts him. He is a serious, experienced, thoughtful man; his policy speeches have been among the best of any Democrat's. But he is also a cautious man who has surrounded himself with an overstuffed stable of consultants and pollsters—the very same geniuses who brought you the dreadful 2000 Gore campaign and the Democrats' even more dreadful 2002 campaign. Their presence reinforces Kerry's tendency to carefully edit every word he utters. His campaign seems massaged, tactical—an act of marketing rather than of conviction. His Senate vote authorizing the war in Iraq is Exhibit A. Unlike Dean, Kerry has longtime antiwar credentials. He investigated the Reagan Administration's support for the contras and opposed the first Gulf War. He turned more hawkish in the 1990s, supporting Bosnia and Kosovo and of course Afghanistan, but the question persists: Did Kerry vote for this war with his heart or with his ambition?
From the road: Dallas TX
Hey Aziz, mission accomplished! I'm going to hijack this blog for a moment and personally thank everyone who came out to Dallas today. The local meetup volunteers deserve serious props - if I may say so myself - because they did a great job planning and running the event under the tutelage of our state coodinator, former state Rep. Glen Maxey.
People came from as far away as Austin and Oklahoma this evening to meet and rally deep in the heart of Bush Country! Organisers report that over 2,000 people (conservative estimate, and yea, that's Dean on the far right in the blue shirt) braved 100+ degree weather to sign ballot petitions, register to vote, and register their support for the largest grassroots movement in Presidential history. You must understand what it means to do this in Dallas. First, to put it in perspective, there weren't this many people at the last anti-war rally back in Spring. Also, if you want to know anything about George W Bush and the people who "made" him, cast your eye on Dallas and Houston. This is literally the heart of Bush country. The people who put Bush where he is now were born and bred down here. The movement that elected him governor of Texas was born here. So for us to be able to get thousands of people to rally in support of changing our country, well, that's something quite significant.
***
All the local television stations covered the rally. Meetupers were featured on FOX, ABC, Univision (spanish-language channel), and CBS. I don't know if NBC was there, as I didn't record that station (can any Dallasites fill in that blank for me?). Also, local print media and photographers were out in force. I'm pretty sure we issued more than our allotted 30 press passes. From what I've heard, the pieces (especially CBS) were very favorable. I saw the FOX and ABC broadcasts and they showed great clips from the speech, and each station reported that Dean was "gaining traction" or "gaining legitimacy". All in all, it was a complete and utter success. =)
*** image links removed to conserve my bandwidth. please visit annatopia's dean archives to view them
People came from as far away as Austin and Oklahoma this evening to meet and rally deep in the heart of Bush Country! Organisers report that over 2,000 people (conservative estimate, and yea, that's Dean on the far right in the blue shirt) braved 100+ degree weather to sign ballot petitions, register to vote, and register their support for the largest grassroots movement in Presidential history. You must understand what it means to do this in Dallas. First, to put it in perspective, there weren't this many people at the last anti-war rally back in Spring. Also, if you want to know anything about George W Bush and the people who "made" him, cast your eye on Dallas and Houston. This is literally the heart of Bush country. The people who put Bush where he is now were born and bred down here. The movement that elected him governor of Texas was born here. So for us to be able to get thousands of people to rally in support of changing our country, well, that's something quite significant.
***
All the local television stations covered the rally. Meetupers were featured on FOX, ABC, Univision (spanish-language channel), and CBS. I don't know if NBC was there, as I didn't record that station (can any Dallasites fill in that blank for me?). Also, local print media and photographers were out in force. I'm pretty sure we issued more than our allotted 30 press passes. From what I've heard, the pieces (especially CBS) were very favorable. I saw the FOX and ABC broadcasts and they showed great clips from the speech, and each station reported that Dean was "gaining traction" or "gaining legitimacy". All in all, it was a complete and utter success. =)
*** image links removed to conserve my bandwidth. please visit annatopia's dean archives to view them
Sunday, July 13, 2003
Slashdot picks up Dean-Lessig story http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/07/12/1725210&mode=thread&tid=103&tid=99
This is fantastic exposure for the campaign - Slashdot has posted a story about the guest blogging of Dean for Lessig. There are already almost 800 comments on that thread. Dean supporters, so participate in the discussion there, as we are really laying the concrete groundwork for a possible Slashdot interview!
It is essential that Dean make a serious play for the Slashdot demographic. The singular advantage is that people who read Slashdot tend to have very diverse political positions regarding liberalism/conservatism - but on certain issues (especially patent law, copyrights, and fair use), they are almost single-issue.
With Dean's guest blogging for Lessig, he has the advantage of credibility. Lessig's tacit endorsement is significant. However, Dean has not yet made any issue statements about these topics. In that respect, he is already falling behind Kucinich, who is probably best-positioned to compete for the hearts and minds of the Slashdot bloc. Kucinich has already published a piece in the Nation this week, "The Case for Public Patents". Dean needs to clartifyu his own positions on these issues, especially with respect to the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, and the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act.
It is essential that Dean make a serious play for the Slashdot demographic. The singular advantage is that people who read Slashdot tend to have very diverse political positions regarding liberalism/conservatism - but on certain issues (especially patent law, copyrights, and fair use), they are almost single-issue.
With Dean's guest blogging for Lessig, he has the advantage of credibility. Lessig's tacit endorsement is significant. However, Dean has not yet made any issue statements about these topics. In that respect, he is already falling behind Kucinich, who is probably best-positioned to compete for the hearts and minds of the Slashdot bloc. Kucinich has already published a piece in the Nation this week, "The Case for Public Patents". Dean needs to clartifyu his own positions on these issues, especially with respect to the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, and the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act.
Saturday, July 12, 2003
open thread: Dean haiku
sometimes less is more
the summer of Dean's ascent
poetry shall guide
the summer of Dean's ascent
poetry shall guide
Gov. Dean to guest-blog on Lawrence Lessig's http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/lessig/blog/archives/2003_07.shtml#001348
Yup, Howard Dean will guest-blog for Larence Lessig while Lessig is on vacation, all next week! I wish we could convince the Governor to cross-post to Dean Nation :)
My feeling is that this is important, in laying the groundwork for a Slashdot interview. The Slashdot/EFF crowd is a natural demographic for Dean. Next week will be immensely important, so bookmark Lessig and keep tuned here on Dean Nation, we will probably reprint his posts in full.
UPDATE: Lessig clarifies in comments:
So it is time for me to take a break from this space too. But I’ve arranged for a much more interesting guest blogger while I’m gone: former governor, and presidential candidate, Howard Dean.
This is, I believe, the first time a presidential candidate has been a guest blogger. But it is an obvious extension of blogs and the process of becoming President. Campaigns are all about meeting different groups and talking about ideas. Where better than a blog?
I have great respect for Governor Dean, and especially the clarity of his voice. I have even greater respect now that I see the doctor makes house calls. So Governor, welcome to this tiny server at Stanford: You’ll find perfect acoustics provided by MovableType, and an interesting mix of views provided by the readers.
And to everyone else, enjoy the week of something totally different. Dean is on starting Monday. I should be back the week following.
My feeling is that this is important, in laying the groundwork for a Slashdot interview. The Slashdot/EFF crowd is a natural demographic for Dean. Next week will be immensely important, so bookmark Lessig and keep tuned here on Dean Nation, we will probably reprint his posts in full.
UPDATE: Lessig clarifies in comments:
Good point, and I should have made this clear: Dean’s guest blogging says nothing about Dean’s views about the issues I’ve been pushing here. I’ve never discussed these issues with any member of the Dean campaign. And as we don’t (yet) determine elections, I’m not even sure that Dean has worked these issues out himself.
So please don’t read anything into this more than the obvious: This is yet another way in which the Dean campaign has understood something about the net.
Newsweek poll: Bush falls, Dean rises http://www.msnbc.com/news/938073.asp?cp1=1
I mused earlier if the Bush Administration had jumped the shark. Newsweek's new poll suggests cause for optimism on that score:
38 percent may be significantly different from 45 percent, but it is significant by itself. And as Bush's facade of competence frays, Dean continues his ascent:
Summary: From January to July, Lieberman declined 9% (22 -> 13). Dean has risen from virtually zero to 12%. A long way to go but so much grouund covered already!
My earlier estimate of 100,000 Meetup subscribers by July may have been optimistic, but not that much so. We currently stand at 60760 signups. If growth is merely linear, we still break 75,000 by august!
Forty-five percent of Americans say the Bush Administration misinterpreted intelligence reports that proved Iraq was hiding banned chemical or biological weapons before the war, says a new Newsweek poll. And while a significantly smaller number—38 percent—believe the administration purposely misled the public, President Bush’s approval ratings have declined significantly in recent months, the poll shows.
WHILE 55 PERCENT of those polled say they approve of the way Bush is handling his job as president, his ratings have fallen 6 points from the end of May, 16 points from mid-April when Baghdad first fell to American soldiers, and nearly 30 points from the weeks immediately following the September 11 attacks.
38 percent may be significantly different from 45 percent, but it is significant by itself. And as Bush's facade of competence frays, Dean continues his ascent:
In January 2003, when registered Democrats-and those whose beliefs fall more along Democratic party lines-were asked who they would like to see nominated as the Democratic presidential candidate, 22 percent opted for Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, 14 percent for North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, and 13 percent each for former House Democratic leader Dick Gephardt and Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry. Florida Sen. Bob Graham, Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and Reverend Al Sharpton, who were also on the list, each received 6 percent or less. Numbers for former Illinois Sen. Carol Mosely Braun and Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich—who have also entered the 2004 presidential race—were not available in January. In the current poll, Lieberman’s ratings have fallen to 13 percent and he now lags behind Gephardt by 1 point. Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, who barely made a blip on the poll in January, is now in third place, with 12 percent of those polled backing his nomination.
Summary: From January to July, Lieberman declined 9% (22 -> 13). Dean has risen from virtually zero to 12%. A long way to go but so much grouund covered already!
My earlier estimate of 100,000 Meetup subscribers by July may have been optimistic, but not that much so. We currently stand at 60760 signups. If growth is merely linear, we still break 75,000 by august!
What connection to Al-Quaeda? http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAYJRUT1ID.html
As I said in the comments section of Aziz's earlier post, the dam has burst. This AP article contains the following gem:
But wait, there's more:
And that's not all. Go read the whole thing.
In addition, Bush is now claiming the uranium controvery is a closed subject. I beg to differ, Mr President, and I'm calling bullshit. In the MSNBC article which reported Bush's terse "case closed" remarks, we find this nugget:
So, CIA officials warned Condi's team about the bogus uranium claim. In addition, members of Bush's own intelligence team are saying the Al-Quaeda claims were bogus as well. So, the two biggest reasons that the public supported the war ("They're gonna nuke us!" and "They're harboring Al-Quaeda!") have turned out to be complete and utter bullshit.
Mr President, the buck stops with you. What did you know and when did you know it?
It also looks like the American public is beginning to realise that they were snookered. If the press doesn't keep pounding this issue, then it's up to Americans like you and me. Write and call your local papers and demand that they continue to follow up on the biggest scandal since Watergate.
update LOL! Go freep the beard (props to skippy)! Today's questions is "Who do you blame for the mistake in the president's State of the Union address on Iraq?" Guess where America thinks the buck stops??
Now, two former Bush administration intelligence officials say the evidence linking Saddam to the group responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks was never more than sketchy at best. "There was no significant pattern of cooperation between Iraq and the al-Qaida terrorist operation," former State Department intelligence official Greg Thielmann said this week.
But wait, there's more:
Another former Bush administration intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, agreed there was no clear link between Saddam and al-Qaida. "The relationships that were plotted were episodic, not continuous," the former official said. A United Nations terrorism committee says it has no evidence - other than Secretary of State Colin Powell's assertions in his Feb. 5 U.N. speech - of any ties between al-Qaida and Iraq. And U.S. officials say American forces searching in Iraq have found no significant evidence tying Saddam's regime with Osama bin Laden's terrorist network.
And that's not all. Go read the whole thing.
In addition, Bush is now claiming the uranium controvery is a closed subject. I beg to differ, Mr President, and I'm calling bullshit. In the MSNBC article which reported Bush's terse "case closed" remarks, we find this nugget:
National security adviser Condoleezza Rice and other officials asserted this week that the president’s statement was justified at the time because the CIA cleared the address in its entirety, including the uranium claim. They said the CIA never told the White House that the claim was suspicious. But U.S. officials told NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell that Tenet himself advised Rice’s top deputy, Steven Hadley, to remove a reference to the uranium report from a speech Bush delivered Oct. 7 in Cincinnati, establishing that the nation’s top intelligence officials suspected that the allegation was false more than three months before they approved Bush’s repeating it in his nationally televised address on Jan. 28. The Washington Post reported Friday that the CIA also told British officials about its doubts and passed word along to several U.S. agencies before the State of the Union address.
So, CIA officials warned Condi's team about the bogus uranium claim. In addition, members of Bush's own intelligence team are saying the Al-Quaeda claims were bogus as well. So, the two biggest reasons that the public supported the war ("They're gonna nuke us!" and "They're harboring Al-Quaeda!") have turned out to be complete and utter bullshit.
Mr President, the buck stops with you. What did you know and when did you know it?
It also looks like the American public is beginning to realise that they were snookered. If the press doesn't keep pounding this issue, then it's up to Americans like you and me. Write and call your local papers and demand that they continue to follow up on the biggest scandal since Watergate.
update LOL! Go freep the beard (props to skippy)! Today's questions is "Who do you blame for the mistake in the president's State of the Union address on Iraq?" Guess where America thinks the buck stops??
Dean's coming to your town! July 11-18
I've republished this post as a weekend reminder. If you've attended any of these events, let's hear how it went!
Howard and Kate are going to be racking up those frequent flyer miles this week. Here is a list of events scheduled for July 11-18. This schedule is subject to change. All times listed are local. For more information or to confirm a particular event, please contact Deputy Press Secretary Kathy Lash at 802-651-3200.
Friday July 11, Dean campaigns in Ohio and Virginia
9:00 A.M. Address to the IAM (Machinists Union). 525 Elm Street at the Cincinnati Convention Center, Cincinnati, OH.
5:30 P.M. NOW Presidential Candidate Forum. Crystal Ballroom at the Doubletree Crystal City, Crystal City, VA.
Saturday July 12, Dean campaigns in Arizona
11:30 A.M. Conodino County Democratic Party Picnic, Fort Tuthill, Flagstaff, AZ. (details here)
2:15 P.M. Gov. Dean meets with local supporters at the University of Arizona Marriott, Tucson, AZ (details here; for more info contact this email box)
5:30 P.M. Gov. Dean attends a reception. Phoenix Mtn. Preserves Reception Center, 1431 East Dunlap, Phoenix, AZ.
6:00 P.M. Gov. Dean attends Arizona State Democratic Party Volunteer Dinner. Phoenix Mtn. Preserves Reception Center, 1431 East Dunlap, Phoenix, AZ.
Sunday July 13, Dean campaigns in Texas
7:00 P.M. Gov. Dean meets with local supporters at the Big D Rally for Dean, City Hall Plaza, Dallas, TX. (details here)
Monday July 14, Dean campaigns in Texas and Florida
8:30 A.M. Latinas Breakfast, National Council of La Raza. 500 East Cesar Chavez Street, Austin Convention Center. Austin, TX.
2:30 P.M. Gov. Dean attends NAACP Presidential Candidate Forum. Miami Convention Center. 400 S.E. Second Avenue, Miami, FL.
Tuesday July 15, Dean campaigns in Washington DC
12:30 P.M. Gov. Dean attends Human Rights Campaign Presidential Candidate Forum. International Trade Center, 1300 Pennsylvania Ave, NW, Washington, DC.
Thursday July 17 and Friday July 18, Dean campaigns in Iowa
Contact Dean for America IA Office for details on public events scheduled -- IA Press Secretary Sarah Leonard: 515-243-5433
As always, if you know of a public appearance in your town, leave a comment and we'll help publicise the event. And to all the Dean groups in the towns listed above, if you are planning rallies to coincide with these events, please let us know so we can help spread the word.
Howard and Kate are going to be racking up those frequent flyer miles this week. Here is a list of events scheduled for July 11-18. This schedule is subject to change. All times listed are local. For more information or to confirm a particular event, please contact Deputy Press Secretary Kathy Lash at 802-651-3200.
Friday July 11, Dean campaigns in Ohio and Virginia
9:00 A.M. Address to the IAM (Machinists Union). 525 Elm Street at the Cincinnati Convention Center, Cincinnati, OH.
5:30 P.M. NOW Presidential Candidate Forum. Crystal Ballroom at the Doubletree Crystal City, Crystal City, VA.
Saturday July 12, Dean campaigns in Arizona
11:30 A.M. Conodino County Democratic Party Picnic, Fort Tuthill, Flagstaff, AZ. (details here)
2:15 P.M. Gov. Dean meets with local supporters at the University of Arizona Marriott, Tucson, AZ (details here; for more info contact this email box)
5:30 P.M. Gov. Dean attends a reception. Phoenix Mtn. Preserves Reception Center, 1431 East Dunlap, Phoenix, AZ.
6:00 P.M. Gov. Dean attends Arizona State Democratic Party Volunteer Dinner. Phoenix Mtn. Preserves Reception Center, 1431 East Dunlap, Phoenix, AZ.
Sunday July 13, Dean campaigns in Texas
7:00 P.M. Gov. Dean meets with local supporters at the Big D Rally for Dean, City Hall Plaza, Dallas, TX. (details here)
Monday July 14, Dean campaigns in Texas and Florida
8:30 A.M. Latinas Breakfast, National Council of La Raza. 500 East Cesar Chavez Street, Austin Convention Center. Austin, TX.
2:30 P.M. Gov. Dean attends NAACP Presidential Candidate Forum. Miami Convention Center. 400 S.E. Second Avenue, Miami, FL.
Tuesday July 15, Dean campaigns in Washington DC
12:30 P.M. Gov. Dean attends Human Rights Campaign Presidential Candidate Forum. International Trade Center, 1300 Pennsylvania Ave, NW, Washington, DC.
Thursday July 17 and Friday July 18, Dean campaigns in Iowa
Contact Dean for America IA Office for details on public events scheduled -- IA Press Secretary Sarah Leonard: 515-243-5433
As always, if you know of a public appearance in your town, leave a comment and we'll help publicise the event. And to all the Dean groups in the towns listed above, if you are planning rallies to coincide with these events, please let us know so we can help spread the word.
spinning gold http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/07/11/cnna.karl.dean/index.html
I confess to extreme pessimism about whether the media will do due diligence on the YellowGate scandal in the wake of Tenet's astonishing hara-kiri. But Dean is staying on message, mining gold from the straw exactly as Billmon predicted earlier. Here is the full transcript of Dean's appearance on CNN last night.
Dean is on fire in this interview. Note the discipline of his message - bringing each point back to the underlying basic themes of Bush's deceit, the Administration's incompetence, and his own electability and experience. As usual, he will be the only one asking the tough questions in public - and that will draw even more people to him. Don't expect the other major candidates, who voted for the war on Iraq, to join Dean in questioning Yellowgate and Tenet's highly suspicious (even to conservatives) timing.
Dean: Bush's 'intelligence-handling a disaster'
Saturday, July 12, 2003 Posted: 8:54 AM EDT (1254 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The White House said a claim in the president's State of the Union address that Iraq sought large quantities of uranium in Africa was not accurate.
CIA Director George Tenet issued a statement late Friday saying his agency made a mistake in clearing the language in the president's speech.
Democrats have stepped up their criticism of Bush in recent days over the statement and the president's reasons for going to war.
CNN congressional correspondent Jonathan Karl talked to Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean about the dispute Friday before Tenet's statement was released:
KARL: The president and his national security adviser are saying that the CIA, and George Tenet specifically, cleared this speech and signed off on it. Does that get the president off the hook?
DEAN: We don't know that. The fact is that [former U.S.] Ambassador [to Niger Joseph] Wilson, in a public statement in The New York Times, has indicated that his report showing that there was no involvement between Niger and Iraq in terms of the uranium deal went to the office of the vice president, the secretary of state and the CIA. So I don't know what the president knew and when the president knew it, but I know that this intelligence-handling is a disaster for the administration at best, and either no one got to the secretary of defense or the president, or his own senior advisors withheld information.
So this is a serious credibility problem, and it's a lot deeper than just the Iraq-Niger deal, it has to do with assertions by the secretary of defense that he knew where weapons were that turned out not to be there, it has to do with assertions by the vice president there was a nuclear program that turned out not to exist, and assertions made by the president himself, not just about the acquisition of uranium, but also about the ability of [deposed Iraqi President] Saddam [Hussein] to use chemical weapons on the United States. We need a full-blown public investigation not held in Congress but by an outside bipartisan commission.
KARL: Condoleezza Rice specifically mentioned George Tenet, and now the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee is specifically saying that George Tenet had a responsibility to tell the president about this but didn't.
DEAN: It's beginning to sound a little like Watergate. They start throwing people over the side. The deeper you go, the more interesting it will be. It's very clear that it may be George Tenet's responsibility, but that information also existed in the State Department and it also existed in the vice president's office, so they will not get away with simply throwing George Tenet over the side.
KARL: How big a deal is this?
DEAN: The big deal is not so much that we went to war over a deal between Iraq and Niger which didn't exist and that the administration knew ahead of time it didn't exist. The big deal is the credibility of the United States of America and the credibility of the president in telling the American people the truth and the rest of the world the truth. That's a very big deal.
KARL: What about your colleagues as presidential candidates? A number of them who supported very strongly the president's action going to war with Iraq are out there like you raising strong questions about this.
DEAN: Well, I think those that voted for the war in Iraq are on very thin ice. They did not exercise their senatorial requirement to advise and consent knowing all the facts. They jumped five months ahead of time, voted for a pre-emptive strike based now on what appears to be evidence that they did not question. I think that's a problem for them as well.
KARL: Do you think they were fooled?
DEAN: I can't speak to that, but you have to ask why they didn't ask the questions I was asking at the same time. I'm not even from Washington, and I could figure out that the president wasn't making the case, and the question is why didn't they figure that out.
KARL: You put out a very strong statement saying somebody should resign for this.
DEAN: I believe that.
KARL: Who?
DEAN: Well, we don't know yet. ... I hope we'll get to that conclusion soon.
KARL: Is there a larger question regarding Iraq and the continued violence? Has the president really leveled with the American people?
DEAN: We had estimates before we went into Iraq that this was going to be over within 18 months, then it got to two years, then four years. I believe that we are going to be there for a very long time. I have repeatedly called for the internationalization of the occupation force in Iraq, both with NATO and United Nations troops. They have a better record of peacekeeping than we do, they have a better record of administering foreign countries than we do that are under protectorates. We need to start pulling our reserve units out of Iraq, and we cannot do that. We cannot afford to lose the peace in Iraq under any circumstances, and yet this president seems to be handcuffed in terms of his ability to straighten the situation out over there.
KARL: The conventional wisdom has been that if the Democrats are going to beat Bush they're going to beat him on the economy and that national security is his strong suit.
DEAN: I have said that I think I am the most electable candidate because people have continually underestimated me. My national security people who I was just meeting for an hour and a half before you got here are pretty smart people. I've been talking to them for a year and a half. Don't underestimate governors from small states. We can learn in a hurry.
Dean is on fire in this interview. Note the discipline of his message - bringing each point back to the underlying basic themes of Bush's deceit, the Administration's incompetence, and his own electability and experience. As usual, he will be the only one asking the tough questions in public - and that will draw even more people to him. Don't expect the other major candidates, who voted for the war on Iraq, to join Dean in questioning Yellowgate and Tenet's highly suspicious (even to conservatives) timing.
Dean Nation breaks $10,000 http://www.deanforamerica.com/site/TR?pg=personal&fr_id=1090&px=1179278
We did it! Dean Nation has raised $10,000 for Dean - and the donations are still coming!
We should all rest on our laurels for a bit - we have really accomplished something astounding. We demonstrated thet $7 Million Monday was not just post-Declaration hype or anger aganst Tim Russert. We have really demonstrated that we are committed to regime change in 2004 and we have staken our claim on our candidate.
Every dollar we raise for Dean is a shot fired across the bow of Big Money Politics. It's an edifice that will require a lot more shots to bring down, though. Our job is not done!
Let's bask in our success this weekend. Then on Monday I'll replace our thermometer with the thermometer of a different Dean Team, so leave your team URL in the comments if you want to be considered. We will rotate through Dean Teams until the start of the new month, when we will raise our own Dean Nation goal and begin the $5k a month drive.
We should all rest on our laurels for a bit - we have really accomplished something astounding. We demonstrated thet $7 Million Monday was not just post-Declaration hype or anger aganst Tim Russert. We have really demonstrated that we are committed to regime change in 2004 and we have staken our claim on our candidate.
Every dollar we raise for Dean is a shot fired across the bow of Big Money Politics. It's an edifice that will require a lot more shots to bring down, though. Our job is not done!
Let's bask in our success this weekend. Then on Monday I'll replace our thermometer with the thermometer of a different Dean Team, so leave your team URL in the comments if you want to be considered. We will rotate through Dean Teams until the start of the new month, when we will raise our own Dean Nation goal and begin the $5k a month drive.
Friday, July 11, 2003
Tenet takes the blame http://www.boston.com/dailynews/192/wash/WASHN_statement_said_:.shtml
Tenet takes the fall, despite fantasies that he might have backbone and show the Administration that the CIA is not a lapdog:
does this kill the scandal? will the press go back to licking Bush's boots? discuss.
Tenet said the responsibility for vetting the allegations included in Bush's State of the Union address about Iraqi efforts to get uranium from Africa beloing to the CIA and ultimately with himself.
''Let me be clear about several things right up front,'' he said. ''First, CIA approved the president's State of the Union address before it was delivered. Second, I am responsible for the approval process in my agency. And third, the president had every reason to believe that the text presented to him was sound.''
Tenet said CIA officials reviewed portions of the draft speech and raised some concerns with national security aides at the White House that prompted changes in language concerning allegations that Iraq sought to buy uranium from the African nation of Niger. But he said the CIA officials failed to stop the remark from being uttered despite the doubts about its validity.
''Officials who were reviewing the draft remarks on uranium raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the intelligence with National Security Council colleagues,'' Tenet said. ''Some of the language was changed. From what we know now, agency officials in the end concurred that the text in the speech was factually correct that the British government report said that Iraq sought uranium from Africa.''
''This should not have been the test for clearing a presidential address,'' the statement continued. ''This did not rise to the level of certainty which should be required for presidential speeches, and CIA should have ensured that it was removed.''
does this kill the scandal? will the press go back to licking Bush's boots? discuss.
transcript: ABC This Morning
courtesy Jordan from Chicago:
Terry Moran: Now to the challenge to the Bush Administrations credibility. President Bush, as you well know, is under increasing fire for standing in front of the country making his case for the war with Iraq and including in it a false statement about Iraq’s nuclear weapons program. At issue, the president’s January State of the Union charge that Saddam tried to buy nuclear bomb ingredients in Africa.
Bush (1/28/03): “Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to buy high strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production.”
TM: The White House now admits that was false. Their intelligence information was wrong. Howard Dean, the former Governor of Vermont, running for the Democratic presidential nomination is the first major presidential candidate calling on administration officials to resign.
Governor Dean, yesterday your campaign released a press release, a statement saying there are those in this administration that misled the president, mislead the nation and mislead the world in making the case for war against Iraq. They know who they are and they should resign today. Who are you talking about? Are we talking about Secretary Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Secretary Rumsfeld?
Howard Dean: We don’t know exactly who misled the president. What we do know is that about a year before the President’s State of the Union address, Ambassador Wilson went to Niger to find out what was going on in terms of uranium being sold to the Iraqis. What he found was that there was no evidence whatsoever that was going on. A year later the President of the United States told the American people that in fact Iraq was buying uranium in Africa. That was not true. Ambassador Wilson a year earlier had filed those reports with the Secretary of State’s office, with the Vice President’s office and with the CIA. So they knew at the time the president told the American people that what the president was telling the American people was false. That is pretty serious. Whoever it was that withheld that information needs to resign.
TM: I’ll get to that in a moment, but is it possible that the president in your mind that the president lied.
HD: Anything is possible. I think we need is a full scale investigation which I’ve been calling for about three weeks; bi-partisan investigation outside the congress. Which clearly the Republican majority is stonewalling these kinds of investigations. We need to find out what the president and when he knew it. This is a serious credibility issue for the United States government and it needs to be resolved publicly and now.
TM: Are you a Democrat who would like to see a special prosecutor again like Ken Starr come back and open up an investigation again of the President?
HD: Well the special prosecutor law was so badly abused during the last administration that that’s a difficult issue. It may be that is the only way we can get at this because clearly the President’s people have been absolutely stonewalling any investigation. We still haven’t seen the report on what went wrong before 9/11. We need a lot of information about what’s the matter with our intelligence, why these agencies aren’t talking to each other. Secretary Rumsfeld said a few days ago that this was all news to him, he only found out three or four days ago, that the information the President had a year ago was false. No something is very wrong if the Department of State, the CIA, and the Vice President’s office know something’s false and the Secretary of Defense doesn’t know it’s false. This government either is inept or simply has not told us the truth. We need to know what the answers are here.
TM: And that is a possibility: Either deliberate deception or ineptitude. But you’re already calling on someone to resign based on deception, isn’t that sentence first, verdict afterward. Aren’t you already coming to the conclusion before the investigation?
HD: There’s too much misinformation that’s been put into effect around this war. Four of my colleagues running for president voted for the war. Evidently they must have based their vote on misinformation as well. We have a serious problem in the Congress; a serious problem in the executive branch. We need to know the answers; the credibility of the United States is at stake here.
TM: Alright, Howard Dean democratic candidate for president once again stirring up the pot. Thanks very much for being with us.
And he’s been good at that but the question in Washington is: Does this charge stick?
Claire Shipman: Certainly works for Howard Dean so far in terms of his popularity, which is an interesting strategy. Thanks.
Deadly for who?
One of the consistent memes out there is that Dean's opposition to the iraq war makes him unelectable. This is advanced by everyone from Rove, to the DLC, to Lieberman. But let's examine this quickly, because I think the CW is being proven wrong here.
Dean's position has two components - before and after. Before the war happened, Dean felt it was the wrong war at the wrong time and we shouldn't have entered into it. So had he been president in early March, we would not have entered into this conflict - the evidence wasn't persuasive, the threat wasn't imminent, the time wasn't right and the support wasn't there. Now, the after component recognizes we did go to war, and there is no point in simply resenting reality, so we must chart the correct path forward considering our current situation. In light of the numerous attacks on our soldiers and the general danger of the climate there, Dean proposes to move in more troops, both American and international, and devote our considerable resources to correctly cleaning this mess we've made.
Now, the CW argues that the Iraq war was overwhelmingly popular and will be the President's ace in the hole come election season (God knows he's not going to run on the economy). But is that still true?
As the evidence mounts that Bush lied to get us in there and the body count increases, public support for the war is plummeting. In May, 78% of Americans approved of G.W's handling of the war, now it's down to 58% and dropping. The 9/11 report comes out in two weeks, the Yellowcake scandal will only grow. Troops will keep dying, especially as the Iraqi opposition smells political blood in the water. And through all this, Dean can attack Bush from the left and the right!
He can be on the right side of the original judgment question - the evidence was faked, he didn't believe it. That'll play perfectly with the left, he was anti-war and he remains antiwar. It's not that the other candidates are evil for being fooled, but don't you want a president with a good bullshit detector? And he can hit from the Right, saying that if we're in there, he doesn't want our troops dying and it is our obligation to fulfill our promises and help their country get back on its feet, and so we need more troops in. He's sorry we're in this mess, but as long as we are, he wouldn't let political considerations stop him from doing the right thing.
The mess Bush created in Iraq has the potential to end his presidency and initiate Dean's...we just can't let up on the pressure.
Dean's position has two components - before and after. Before the war happened, Dean felt it was the wrong war at the wrong time and we shouldn't have entered into it. So had he been president in early March, we would not have entered into this conflict - the evidence wasn't persuasive, the threat wasn't imminent, the time wasn't right and the support wasn't there. Now, the after component recognizes we did go to war, and there is no point in simply resenting reality, so we must chart the correct path forward considering our current situation. In light of the numerous attacks on our soldiers and the general danger of the climate there, Dean proposes to move in more troops, both American and international, and devote our considerable resources to correctly cleaning this mess we've made.
Now, the CW argues that the Iraq war was overwhelmingly popular and will be the President's ace in the hole come election season (God knows he's not going to run on the economy). But is that still true?
As the evidence mounts that Bush lied to get us in there and the body count increases, public support for the war is plummeting. In May, 78% of Americans approved of G.W's handling of the war, now it's down to 58% and dropping. The 9/11 report comes out in two weeks, the Yellowcake scandal will only grow. Troops will keep dying, especially as the Iraqi opposition smells political blood in the water. And through all this, Dean can attack Bush from the left and the right!
He can be on the right side of the original judgment question - the evidence was faked, he didn't believe it. That'll play perfectly with the left, he was anti-war and he remains antiwar. It's not that the other candidates are evil for being fooled, but don't you want a president with a good bullshit detector? And he can hit from the Right, saying that if we're in there, he doesn't want our troops dying and it is our obligation to fulfill our promises and help their country get back on its feet, and so we need more troops in. He's sorry we're in this mess, but as long as we are, he wouldn't let political considerations stop him from doing the right thing.
The mess Bush created in Iraq has the potential to end his presidency and initiate Dean's...we just can't let up on the pressure.
Some Moderate Democrats Could Like Dean http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=536&ncid=536&e=3&u=/ap/20030711/ap_on_el_pr/democrats_dean
The Ranks of those who Get It™ continue to grow:
The ABC Good Morning America appearance was this morning - if anyone has a transcript, please share!
Republicans and even some moderate Democrats have portrayed Dean as the next George McGovern, who won the 1972 Democratic nomination by appealing to anti-war liberals only to get trounced by a sitting Republican president, Richard Nixon. But behind Dean's liberal image is his record as Vermont governor of reforming welfare, slashing state spending and cutting taxes for businesses.
Moderate Democratic Rep. Cal Dooley of California says Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman (news - web sites) is the best Democrat to take on Bush next year. He says Democrats in moderate districts wouldn't want to see Dean on the top of the ticket right now, but that could change if Dean changes his rhetoric and starts talking about his record.
"He's not nearly as liberal people perceive him," Dooley said.
Dean is still evolving his national image as he climbs to the top of the field in fund raising. That rise and his strong views on Iraq (news - web sites) earned him an appearance Friday on ABC's "Good Morning America."
He had entered the race largely unknown nationally with a record that cannot be simply defined as liberal or conservative.
The ABC Good Morning America appearance was this morning - if anyone has a transcript, please share!
checkmate on Tenet
Billmon raises the intriguing possibility of a lose-lose proposition for Bush in the wake of Dean's petition (go sign!) :
Even if these scenarios were unintended, they shouldn't be now. I think the Dean campaign has a nice blueprint for its rhetoric regardless of what Bush does. Either way, the heat stays on Bush - where it should be.
the White House is obviously angling for George Tenet's resignation -- something that the neocon firebrands have been demanding since Bush took office.
But now, if Tenet resigns, it will look like Dean has drawn blood -- and an implicit confession that there is something very serious and very wrong going on inside the Bush administration.
...
On the other hand, if the White House backs down, and keeps Tenet, Bush will look like he's either:
a.) Conceding his responsiblity for the Niger uranium fiasco.
or:
b.) Allowing a lying, incompetent CIA director (and even worse: a lying, incompetent Clinton-appointed CIA director) to remain in office because he doesn't want to take the political heat for firing him.
Even if these scenarios were unintended, they shouldn't be now. I think the Dean campaign has a nice blueprint for its rhetoric regardless of what Bush does. Either way, the heat stays on Bush - where it should be.
Et tu, Salon? http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/07/11/dean/index.html
I almost didn't tackle this article because some of my fellow bloggers are more adept at putting down this type of criticism. However, this is getting major netplay, so I decided that we should tackle it as a group. First, go get your Salon Day Pass and read the article, then come back here.
Now, I could probably pick through the article line by line, because it contains many assumptions that completely miss the mark. But I don't want to pick a fight with John Judis. If converted, he (and Salon - although they sure have shown some pro-Kerry bias in the past) could be a powerful ally. Judis's articles are usually pretty damned good, and I'd rather take a moment to try and convince him why his article isn't accurate.
We've covered the McGovern thing extensively in the past (yes, those are all separate posts), but for some reason our message hasn't sunk in yet. I won't attempt to discern why the media keeps regurgitating this ridiculous comparison. Instead, I'd like to go through the rinse-repeat cycle of reasons why Dean is not McGovern.
1. This isn't 1972, and Iraq isn't Vietnam.
2. McGovern's platform focused on the anti-war angle. Dean's platform began on health care, picked up steam due to his war opposition, and is now based on a great American restoration. I honestly don't believe McGovern was as far-sighted.
3. Dean isn't anti-war; he supported the war in Afghanistan.
4. The public is beginning to see that Howard Dean was right.
5. Mostly importantly, the Democratic base is committed to uniting behind the eventual nominee, unlike 1972 where McGovern's victory left the party bitterly divided.
Go ahead, add your own. I'm getting tired of this comparison, but I know it's going to come up again. So, gentle readers, help us put together a list of reasons Dean isn't McGovern, and I'll make sure I repost them every time the subject comes up.
UPDATE (Aziz): TAPPED comes to Dean's defense!
Pretty devastating, read the whole thing! Though frankly, I think Anna nailed the response better. Anna, they should hire you :)
Now, I could probably pick through the article line by line, because it contains many assumptions that completely miss the mark. But I don't want to pick a fight with John Judis. If converted, he (and Salon - although they sure have shown some pro-Kerry bias in the past) could be a powerful ally. Judis's articles are usually pretty damned good, and I'd rather take a moment to try and convince him why his article isn't accurate.
We've covered the McGovern thing extensively in the past (yes, those are all separate posts), but for some reason our message hasn't sunk in yet. I won't attempt to discern why the media keeps regurgitating this ridiculous comparison. Instead, I'd like to go through the rinse-repeat cycle of reasons why Dean is not McGovern.
1. This isn't 1972, and Iraq isn't Vietnam.
2. McGovern's platform focused on the anti-war angle. Dean's platform began on health care, picked up steam due to his war opposition, and is now based on a great American restoration. I honestly don't believe McGovern was as far-sighted.
3. Dean isn't anti-war; he supported the war in Afghanistan.
4. The public is beginning to see that Howard Dean was right.
5. Mostly importantly, the Democratic base is committed to uniting behind the eventual nominee, unlike 1972 where McGovern's victory left the party bitterly divided.
Go ahead, add your own. I'm getting tired of this comparison, but I know it's going to come up again. So, gentle readers, help us put together a list of reasons Dean isn't McGovern, and I'll make sure I repost them every time the subject comes up.
UPDATE (Aziz): TAPPED comes to Dean's defense!
Judis is much deeper in the numbers on this stuff than Tapped. And we respect his opinions highly. But we're not convinced. First of all, here's a very interesting Associated Press story about interest in Dean among the Southern Democrats who one would expect would be slamming him (the way they slammed Al Gore, for instance). No one's endorsed him yet, but several indicate that his support for children's health care, combined with his support for gun rights, could play well in their districts. So that's pretty interesting.
Second, it's not clear that Dean is a attracting a purely McGovernite, left-liberal constituency. In New Hampshire, according to this poll John Kerry beats Dean among Democrats 28 percent to 18 percent. independents who plan to vote in the Democratic primary are what make Dean a contender there -- they support him 26 to 15 percent. (And the poll in question, by American Research Group, undersamples independents.) We'd be interested in seeing how Dean did among independents elsewhere in the country. (And speaking of Northeastern liberals, Judis doesn't adequately explain why Kerry, whom he favors, would do better than Dean.
...
Third, hasn't Judis been telling us since the publication of his book (with Ruy Teixeira), The Emerging Democratic Majority, that the professional class is the key to Democratic victory over the long term?
Pretty devastating, read the whole thing! Though frankly, I think Anna nailed the response better. Anna, they should hire you :)
Nader's run http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/11/national/11NADE.html
Ralph Nader buys into the "Dean = liberal" meme:
By equating Dean with Kucinich, Nader is doing damage to Dean. And his statement that Dean or Kucinich give him less reason to run is actually a veiled threat - one that the DLC will pick up on out of fear and use to bash Dean even harder. Nader is leveraging the dissension in the Democratic Party to - paradoxically - give him an excuse to run, as the "rightful" progressive (he knows that Kucinich will not win the nomination, and even if Dean wins he can claim Dean "moved to the center"). Either way, Nader insulates himself.
We must widen the gyre - and convince Greens that it is Dean, not Nader (or Kucinich) who can advance their interests.
Speaking to reporters at a breakfast this morning, the 69-year-old Mr. Nader said his decision would depend in some measure on the fortunes of the two current Democratic contenders whose politics appear to most closely resemble his own: Representative Dennis J. Kucinich of Ohio and former Gov. Howard Dean of Vermont.
Mr. Nader said any growth in support for Mr. Kucinich, among the most liberal members of Congress, would give him "less reason to go into the election — not no, just less."
As for Dr. Dean, Mr. Nader said he liked what the former governor said in speeches but feared that he would ultimately move toward the center to broaden his appeal.
By equating Dean with Kucinich, Nader is doing damage to Dean. And his statement that Dean or Kucinich give him less reason to run is actually a veiled threat - one that the DLC will pick up on out of fear and use to bash Dean even harder. Nader is leveraging the dissension in the Democratic Party to - paradoxically - give him an excuse to run, as the "rightful" progressive (he knows that Kucinich will not win the nomination, and even if Dean wins he can claim Dean "moved to the center"). Either way, Nader insulates himself.
We must widen the gyre - and convince Greens that it is Dean, not Nader (or Kucinich) who can advance their interests.
the widening gyre http://www.palit.com/2003_07_06_tkl_archive.asp#105787700066321148
The question of "electability" is perhaps our greatest short-term challenge. Part of answering that to Dean's favor is to demonstrate his broad appeal to a wider base than the hard-core left. This is where outreach and principle come into play - to forge a broad coalition, we Dean supporters have to invite and embrace those voters who are amenable to his message. We have had discussion about outreach to Greens before, and we also need to start thinking abouut Libertarians.
Suman Palit is another notable blogger, staunchly libertarian, but also possessed of a pragmatic streak that the more ideological libertarians disdain. It's a very positive sign that he is also looking at Dean and is intrigued by what he sees:
(be sure to read his entire post). Of course he is not yet a supporter, but how can we engage libertarians like Suman in a constructive way to address their concerns? Read Suman's entire post and lets address his concerns. We stand to reap a great harvest from the effort.
UPDATE: The conservatives want to yank Bush farther right. Dont misread this NRO article as good news! But it does give us more to talk to libertarians about - the common cause.
gyre, n.
1. A circular or spiral form; a vortex: “rain swirling the night into tunnels and gyres” (Anthony Hyde).
2. A circular or spiral motion, especially a circular ocean current.
bonus points to anyone who correctly identifies the reference (no fair googling...)
Suman Palit is another notable blogger, staunchly libertarian, but also possessed of a pragmatic streak that the more ideological libertarians disdain. It's a very positive sign that he is also looking at Dean and is intrigued by what he sees:
Dean does not appear to have a position paper on SS reform. If the words coming out of his mouth sound like "... must tax evil corporations to pay for selfish baby-boomers.." then I'm out of here. Otherwise, I'm willing to listen to the man, and what other things he has to say..
Why, you ask..?
Easy. I'm by no means a conservative, and by no stretch of the imagination could I be called a progessivist (the new label for liberals on the left). Hawkish Libertarian, if you really want a label to slap over my forehead. Moreover, Bush is beginning to disappoint. He's had his moments, I'll give him that. Shaking up the UN, putting an end to the charade of inspections and no-fly zones in Iraq were both master strokes, and I believe history will judge him as the first President to wrench US foreign policy away from it's Cold War butt-freeze.
I also believe history will judge him as having bitten off more than he could chew.
Iraq is also where Dean is both at his weakest and his strongest. His weakness.. he is boldly and openly anti-Iraq-war. His strength.. he is boldly, openly, and consistently, anti-Iraq-war. That resonates with me at a gut level. I mean, he's got to have guts to stick to an unpopular ground, right..? (Note to leftie-pacifists, an unpopular opinion is not necessarily the right one, the jury will be out on the relevance of the Iraq war to the US for many years to come..!). I admire that in him. I also disagree with his reasons.
(be sure to read his entire post). Of course he is not yet a supporter, but how can we engage libertarians like Suman in a constructive way to address their concerns? Read Suman's entire post and lets address his concerns. We stand to reap a great harvest from the effort.
UPDATE: The conservatives want to yank Bush farther right. Dont misread this NRO article as good news! But it does give us more to talk to libertarians about - the common cause.
gyre, n.
1. A circular or spiral form; a vortex: “rain swirling the night into tunnels and gyres” (Anthony Hyde).
2. A circular or spiral motion, especially a circular ocean current.
bonus points to anyone who correctly identifies the reference (no fair googling...)
Looking Ahead: what it takes to win http://demosthenes.blogspot.com/2003_07_06_demosthenes_archive.html#105791347652558965
Demosthenes is one of the Blogsphere's oldest voices of liberal sanity. His analyses are always thoughtul and prophetic. His latest post of what it will take to win the general election in 2004 is no exception:
This is not pessimism, it is realism. What makes Dean a powerful inspiration is his issues, but the Republicans have built a systematic political machine out of ignoring the issues and tilting the playing field (witness 2000). Victory in 2004 starts with the right candidate - Howard Dean - but it does not end there. And we all have to play our part.
I think the thing that people should keep in mind is that the successful candidate will need practically every advantage possible to take down the Bush machine. He'll have to have the Dean-esque volunteer machine. He'll have to have the party behind him, in a way that Gore never did with the DLC. He'll have to be able to handle, nay, control the media coverage of his campaign. He'll have to get Dem-leaning pundits out in force in order to support him (yes, this does mean the bloggers doing their part, as well as American Prospect/Washington Monthly/American Guardian types getting into the act and onto TV as much as possible). He'll need to have some sort of basic story for his campaign that makes him fit into an archetype that Americans can accept (like Bush's "folksy" bit).
Most importantly, he'll need to train every remaining resource he has on checking the Republican oppo research and responding in kind. (Yes, this is also a role for the bloggers. It's one of the things we're good at.)
Honestly, if even one of these things is ignored, Bush will likely get re-elected. Each would provide a hole through which the Republicans could fit a wedge that would crack the Democrats wide open, and no candidate so far has all of these covered. If Dean can make peace with the media, he could be close, but right now the Republicans are defining the Democratic race- witness Russert- and that's a huge, election losing problem.
This is not pessimism, it is realism. What makes Dean a powerful inspiration is his issues, but the Republicans have built a systematic political machine out of ignoring the issues and tilting the playing field (witness 2000). Victory in 2004 starts with the right candidate - Howard Dean - but it does not end there. And we all have to play our part.
Make it $10k today!
Let's push Dean Nation over the top today! I just contributed another $15 bucks. We are 94% toward our goal of raising $10k for Dean, all of which goes to the Dean's campaign. All we need are 50 others to pitch in $15 (add a penny) to reach our goal. Thanks to everyone that makes a contribution.
Reed's Right 'Rithmetic http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0307/10/ip.00.html
Well, hey, San Francisco For Dean's Paul Hogan and yours truly have been pushing the Dean-as-Reagan-for-the-Dems meme, and then glory-be! here comes Ralph Reed. From Thursday's Inside Politics, with Candy Crowley filling in for Judy Woodruff. Take it away, Ralph and Candy:
Thanks, Ralph. From your lips to God's ears. Keep up the good work. Comments?
UPDATE NOTE: After reading some of your comments, a quick clarification on the Dean-as-Reagan meme. The comparison of Dean to Reagan is largely political and in no way reflects on policy or personal characteristics. To wit:
Reagan lead a conservative Republican insurgency during the primary that pundits said made him unelectable in the general. Moderates clutched their worry beads and fretted about "another Barry Goldwater."
Democrats were giddy and lulled into an "unbeatable" complacency. Yet, time and time again, Reagan surprised and confounded his critics, outmaneuvering them at every turn.
He was demeaned and dismissed by his foes, including Poppy Bush, and the attacks only seemed to make him stronger.
His core supporters would stop at nothing, and ultimately, he presided over a great political reallignment that we as Democrats are still battling today.
He did this by first -- you guessed it -- shoring up the base in his party and letting them know that their ideas and their voices counted, that they should be proud of their party again, and that they could make a difference.
Sound familiar?
CROWLEY: Let me ask you. There's a ... memo out recently that said, boy, Republicans really ought to run against Howard Dean. He'd be the perfect candidate to run against. Do you agree?
REED: Well, I don't really think that way. I really...
CROWLEY: There's nobody you'd rather run against than...
REED: Not really. I think you can get in a lot of trouble in politics trying to pick your opponents.
CROWLEY: I think you can, too, but we wanted to try anyway.
REED: I can remember when the Democrats were sort of, you know wrapping their hands together in anticipation of running against Ronald Reagan, and then they lost 43 states, as I recall.
Thanks, Ralph. From your lips to God's ears. Keep up the good work. Comments?
UPDATE NOTE: After reading some of your comments, a quick clarification on the Dean-as-Reagan meme. The comparison of Dean to Reagan is largely political and in no way reflects on policy or personal characteristics. To wit:
Reagan lead a conservative Republican insurgency during the primary that pundits said made him unelectable in the general. Moderates clutched their worry beads and fretted about "another Barry Goldwater."
Democrats were giddy and lulled into an "unbeatable" complacency. Yet, time and time again, Reagan surprised and confounded his critics, outmaneuvering them at every turn.
He was demeaned and dismissed by his foes, including Poppy Bush, and the attacks only seemed to make him stronger.
His core supporters would stop at nothing, and ultimately, he presided over a great political reallignment that we as Democrats are still battling today.
He did this by first -- you guessed it -- shoring up the base in his party and letting them know that their ideas and their voices counted, that they should be proud of their party again, and that they could make a difference.
Sound familiar?
Thursday, July 10, 2003
Hesiod gets it; when will the press catch on? http://counterspin.blogspot.com/2003_07_06_counterspin_archive.html#105785799882497581
I felt compelled to share this link with everyone, especially those who continue to question Dean's "electability". Some excerpts:
He goes on to explain why the American public is moving in Dean's direction, using supporting polling data from Public Opinion Watch. On these two issues, he concludes the following:
Let me note that this isn't a knock on Kucinich. It's simply an explanation of the differences between Dean and Kucinich regarding their war stances.
Hesiod does note that when the term civil union is replaced with gay marriage, the numbers take a dive. We can take that as a warning, because we all know the GOP will try and distort the issue of equal rights by using divisive language. After all, this is just another result of the tactics outlined in Nixon's Southern Strategy and it seems par for the course for BushCo these days. Now go read the whole thing.
The biggest knocks on Dean, by the pundits, have been his opposition to the Iraq war, and his support for Civil Unions for gays and lesbians.
The conventional wisdom is that both of these issues will hurt Dean in a general election match-up with George W. Bush next fall, and therefore his "electibility" should be an issue in the Democratic primary.
The problem is, both of these assumptions are not supported by much evidence.
He goes on to explain why the American public is moving in Dean's direction, using supporting polling data from Public Opinion Watch. On these two issues, he concludes the following:
First, with respect to Dean's position on the Iraq war, Texiera crunches some numbers of recent polls, and finds that the American public is steadily moving TOWARD Dean's position... Rather than being a drag on his electibility, his principled, pre-war opposition might actually turn out to be an asset... Even other anti-war candidates, such as Dennis Kucinich, would have problems, because their opposition to the war is and was not limited to the specifics of that conflict. It's born of an overall opposition to war, any war, in general. Dean actually supported the war in Afghanistan, which makes his criticism of the Iraq war all the more credible.
Let me note that this isn't a knock on Kucinich. It's simply an explanation of the differences between Dean and Kucinich regarding their war stances.
While support for and opposition to "Civil Unions," is split down the middle, it turns out that significant majorities of the American public are now fully in support of various other "gay rights" issues. To take one striking example, a whopping [historically] 56% of those surveyed in a recent poll, say they would be willing to vote for a Gay Presidential candidate. In other words, Dean's position on Civil Unions is quite in tune with public opinion generally regarding gay rights. And even "Civil Unions" are at an historically high 50% in recent Gallup polls.
Hesiod does note that when the term civil union is replaced with gay marriage, the numbers take a dive. We can take that as a warning, because we all know the GOP will try and distort the issue of equal rights by using divisive language. After all, this is just another result of the tactics outlined in Nixon's Southern Strategy and it seems par for the course for BushCo these days. Now go read the whole thing.
petition: demand truth http://www.deanforamerica.com/site/PageServer?pagename=petitiontt
Don't forget to sign the petition that those who misled the country regarding Iraq resign immediately! The Dean campaign has officially started a petition to that effect and by signing it, we bring real pressure to bear on Bush and his minions. Sign now!
I demand truth from my government in Washington.
It is now clear that some officials in this Administration misled the nation and misled the world. These people must be held accountable for their failure to give us the truth before we went to war.
But we should not have to wait for investigations to rid our government of those who misled the American people.
They know who they are, and they can resign on their own today. I demand the resignation of those who engaged in this deception.
Add my name to this petition:
VOTE IN WOLFE BLITZER POLL NOW
Take 2 minutes and vote in the Wolfe Blitzer poll right now.
Did President Bush make an honest mistake in his State of the Union address, or did he deliberately mislead the American public about Iraq?
:: CLICK HERE TO VOTE
The poll is in the left column half way down.
Did President Bush make an honest mistake in his State of the Union address, or did he deliberately mislead the American public about Iraq?
:: CLICK HERE TO VOTE
The poll is in the left column half way down.
DEAN SAYS THOSE IN ADMINISTRATION WHO MISLED NATION SHOULD RESIGN
From the campaign...
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 10, 2003
DEAN SAYS THOSE IN ADMINISTRATION WHO MISLED NATION SHOULD RESIGN
Manchester, NH – Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean issued the following statement today:
“Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld's statement yesterday – that he only found out that the Niger documents were forgeries – “within days” was stunning.
”What is now clear is that there are those in this administration that misled the President, misled the nation, and misled the world in making the case for the war in Iraq.
”They know who they are. And they should resign today.
”There will be investigations, and the truth will come out – the American people must know the truth – and those in this administration must be held accountable for their failure to give us the truth before we went to war.
”But we do not need to wait for the investigations to rid these people from our government – they can resign on their own today.
”I am now convinced more than ever that it was a mistake to have given this administration a blank check to engage in this war – as too many in Congress did when they supported the Iraqi war resolution.”
####
open thread
Lafayette, nous sommes arriver!
photoshop Dean! http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35759-2003Jul9.html
I'm taking a page from FARK's playbook here - but how about a photoshop thread? All you budding graphics experts, do your Photoshop magic and post the link to your creation in the comments. Let's bend reality to our will!
link goes to a letter to the WaPo that suggests a place for Dean on Mount Rushmore. How's that for inspiration?
link goes to a letter to the WaPo that suggests a place for Dean on Mount Rushmore. How's that for inspiration?
transcript of WaPo discussion about Dean http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34674-2003Jul9.html
The Washington Post had an online chat to discuss the 2004 race and the Democratic field - which really centered on Dean. Staff writer David Von Drehle fielded questions and the transcript is interesting to read. Some excerpts:
Seattle, Wash.: Sir, you seem to Howard Dean confused with someone else. He is certainly a moderate by all but the most radical standards.
Fiscal responsibility -- reining in spending, balancing budgets -- used to be considered a conservative trait. When did a candidate with these priorities become a "liberal?"
Perhaps you were confused by his anti-war stance? Governor Dean is no pacifist. He merely believes -- along with most Americans -- that there must be compelling reasons for war. As we are now discovering, the Bush Administration's reasons may have been wishful thinking.
I do not see a Dean success taking America to the left. I see it as helping America re-discover its true center.
David Von Drehle: I agree with your description of Dean -- that's why I put a paragraph to that effect in the story.
I also stand by what I said, which is that the terrific energy behind the Dean campaign so far has been largely from the left. If you want to know what Dean's campaign would look like if he making a centrist appeal, look at Bob Graham.
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Andover, MA: Why are the media continuing to paint Dr. Dean's
supporters as left liberals, when a great many that I
meet (including myself) are moderates and
independents who value his fiscal and gun positions
as much or more than his anti-Iraq invasion (-not-
anti-war) and civil union positions?
Any why is his appeal to white, suburban voters
considered a liability, when those are exactly the
swing voters the Democrats will need to tae the
White House?
David Von Drehle: Your words, not mine.
Given where the Democrats were a few months ago, I would think they might welcome energy wherever they might find it.
But as I said before, the Dean movement is not being powered from the middle.
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New York City, NY: If Dean does not, in the edn, get the nomination, won't the party bennefit in the long run from his operation, fundraising and net organizing?
David Von Drehle: It sure seems that way to me.
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Baltimore: I feel like I am reliving the Reagan and Nixon landslide victories all over again. If this stupid, happy talk from Left-leaning Dems continues, we as a Dem party are going to lose bigtime...again. It is like seeing a tsunami coming and half the party is not seeing it!;
David Von Drehle: Here's the other side of the argument, very clearly and succinctly put. Thanks!
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Milwaukee, WI: Howard Dean is actually very much a moderate, given his stances on fiscal responsibility, unfunded federal mandates on states, and gun control. Why do you think that the DLC and the media miss this reality?
Kevin Collins
David Von Drehle: Well, I wrote it in my story, and my colleague Dan Balz had it earlier in the week in his Dean piece, so I don't think everyone misses it.
The DLC looks at Stan Greenberg's polling that shows the following two things: 1) Americans say national security is the top issue in this campaign and 2) Americans give the GOP a 30-point advantage on national security. And they conclude that it is a mistake to nominate an anti-war candidate.
Are they right about that? I don't know. Are they allowed to say it? Sure.
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New York, NY: Dr. Dean was a DLC darling as governor and his
positions are more centrist and moderate than
anyone in the press is letting on. Why would the
DLC rather lose with Lieberman than put up the
best fight possible with Dean?
David Von Drehle: You're right that the DLC liked Dean as governor.
As for why they oppose him now, I would suggest a visit to their website, ndol.org, where they can speak for themselves.
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Fort Lauderdale: Hello David, thanks for answering questions. You keep saying that what Dean appeals to is not the middle, and that the middle is what is needed to defeat Bush. I consider myself 'middle', but apparently it is a subjective term, and I am curious what it means to you. Can you explain what exactly you mean by 'the middle'?
David Von Drehle: I have not meant to say that Dean does not appeal to the middle. Most of the middle has no idea who is running at this point -- by "middle" I mean the 10-15 percent of non-aligned and loosely aligned voters who generally decide our national elections. They tend to tune into the campaigns late and make their decisions even later.
Whether Dean will be around to appeal to those people 14 or 15 months from now ... and whether he will succeed ... is rank speculation and I'm not speculating.
What I am saying is that the juice behind Dean now is coming from the left. It is rooted in three places: 1) anti-war; 2) personly anti-Bush; 3) pro-gay marriage.
Roger Simon Interview with Dean http://www.rogersimon.com/archive/001013.html#001013
Simon, the "Larry King of political journalism" according to the Note, has a very interesting short interview with Dean. Click to read the whole thing. Post your comments on Simon's site, as well as here.
The Complete Deansbury http://demog.berkeley.edu/~gabriel/dean2004blog/deansbury.html
I've put all the strips on one page. It's a good bet that Dean will show up at the house party!