Nation-Building

Washington Post Tuesday: Thanks to a wide-open field and the power of the Internet, Dean has gone from dark horse to serious contender at a time when many Americans are only vaguely aware that a nomination battle is underway. .... Dean's online gold mine -- he also has signed up 45,000 supporters to attend "meet-ups" across the country Wednesday night -- stunned his rivals. An adviser to another candidate said: "Ever since 1996, people have been talking about the potential of the Internet to organize and raise money, but no one figured out how to do it. Not even Al Gore. The thing about Dean is, not only is he using it, he is building an organization through it and he is raising money through that organization." The last hours of Dean's effort bore a faint resemblance to the woozy end of a Jerry Lewis telethon. Dean's Web site -- DeanforAmerica.com -- featured a running total of contributions received. Every half-hour, the number rolled a little ...

I've paid my dues, time after time I've done my sentence, but committed no crime And bad mistakes, I've made a few I've had my share of sand kicked in my face But I've come through We are the champions, my friends And we'll keep on fighting till the end We are the champions We are the champions No time for losers 'Cause we are the champions Of the World I've taken my bows, and my curtain calls You brought me fame and fortune And everything that goes with it I thank you all But it's been no bed of roses No pleasure cruise I consider it a challenge before The whole human race, and I ain't gonna lose We are the champions, my friends And we'll keep on fighting till the end We are the champions We are the champions No time for losers 'Cause we are the champions Of the World We are the champions, my friends And we'll keep on fighting till the end We are the champions We are the champions No time for los...

The Bat is at $6.95 Million !!! Just $50k to go! The Dean Nation Team tally is at $1900! Let's bring this baby home! SUH-WING BATTUH BATTUH BATTUH !

CNN Inside Politics today featured an extensive segment of how $7 Million Monday is redefining this race. Hat tip to Scott on the ZonkBoard for te link to the transcript, excerpts: SNOW: ... Judy, Moseley Braun's campaign treasurer says, "I'd like to steal some of Dean's fund-raisers, if I could." In fact, every campaign aide I spoke with today, all the other eight campaigns, most of them said they were watching Dean's Internet Web site, they had it up on their computers, Judy, and they wanted to how he was doing. They all said they were amazed by it. But they wonder whether it will hold -- Judy. I find the thought that all the other campaigns are glued to DeanForAmerica.com, hilarious! But Woodruff goes on to put all this in perspective - George Bush has raised $30 million in just six weeks. Bush raised $1.8 million during Monday lunch hour in Miami alone. But Woodruff is wrong that these insane sums demoralize Bush's opponents. It should ener...

Governor Dean has some special words of thanks for all his netroot supporters - click the link to hear his words! (MP3 format) Transcript: I'm Governor Howard Dean. I'm amazed by the incredible outpouring of support we've seen on the Internet today. We have 7 hours left until the midnight filing deadline. Thank you so much for all the help; thank you so much for making this history. This campaign is really moving, and I appreciate it. There are only 6 hours left until the deadline - so there's still time for you to donate to the campaign ! $7 Million Monday is almost over and we have only $250k left to go! That's only $40k an hour - we can do this !

Got something to say? Share your thoughts about this historic day with the rest of us. This is $7 Million Monday and the netroots will not be silenced!

Dean is mentioned in two segments on NPR's Morning Edition . Dean is featured in Doonesbury . Andrew Sullivan - of all people - says Dean would be better than Bush for the country's fiscal health. Josh Marshall's attention has been drawn away from the Texas redistricting by a "thunderclap" over the head of the Democratic Party. And the Bat rises - acknowledging at long last that today is $7 Million Monday ! Quickly - we only have until midnight - get your donation in and be counted ! The Dean Nation All-Star team has raised $1,105.42 out of our pledge goal of $10,000 and I know that we can do better! Just click the link above and you'll see our Dean Nation contribute page where you can add your voice to the growing chorus - the roar of the netroots, taking back America ! UPDATE: Howard Dean will personally phone 5 randomly-elected contributors today! Join us and donate NOW !

Kos of The Daily Kos succinctly summarizes the New Reality : Ooh. It's time for all the anti-Deanies to rise up in anger. Really, you guys should be angry at your chosen candidates for running thus-far inept campaigns, poking fun at Dean for "wasting his time" talking to "obscure bloggers" and dismissing meetups as something out of the Star Wars cantina. Oops, turns out that all those things were important after all. Who would've thunk it? It's a new world, and Dean was the only one to catch on. (and Mighty Joe, too, of course). TODAY is $7 Million Monday . Let's get that bat to pop its cork and break 7 Million Dollars by midnight tonight. We are the netroots. We are not "obscure bloggers" and our Meetups are not the pretensions of an elite caste. We are the American People. And we want our country back . We want it back TODAY - on $7 Million Monday. Join us and show the world that it's the power of the common ...

Let's not get too giddy and think Dean's nomination is now inevitable. Read what Hotline's Republican analyst Mike Murphy has to say: Dean is the only candidate rising meaningfully in early state polls. He is raising decent money. He has the heat in the race; love him or hate him he is the candidate people are talking about. His anger shtick is selling; Democrat primary voters want a Bush-Fighter. The others are lagging behind. Sure, they can tell you how they are going to win, but they aren't doing it. Show me any triple, let alone home run, hit to date in this race by The Official Invincible Front-Runner Kerry. Explain to me how Graham gets nominated. Is Edwards still in the race? Where is Gephardt getting stronger? Where is Lieberman's money? I think this race will boil down to a two-man contest of Dean versus one of the others. . . . a snarling Stop Howard movement is now well afoot, with means, motive and plenty of murderous intent. With your help, they won...

Just got the mailing from Joe Trippi... "Today will be historic and we will be posting reports every half-hour on our progress, as we make this one day push towards $7 million by midnight tonight. Check our progress regularly throughout the day at: http://www.blogforamerica.com (as well as right here! stay tuned!)

Matt mentioned it in passing in his post below , and we're featuring the story over at Not Geniuses .

This weekend a bus load of Dean supporters left NYC for New Hampshire to volunteer for the campaign. Below is a portion of my reflection on this experience, the rest can be found on my website: I decided to start writing this blog out on paper long hand (yes, I am a revolutionary) on the bus back from New Hampshire with New York for Dean and to transcribe it when I get home (only after showering). I think we had a very successful weekend. While the other campaign offices we saw appeared empty and closed (except one young gentleman in the Lieberman office in Manchester who did a full body double take when he saw a bus plastered with Dean for America signs drive past), we were out knocking on door after door after door. We were told that we hit over 5,000 in two days (3,300 the first day in Manchester and the rest the next in Nashua). No, the trip was not glamorous. We slept on short, thin, and probably less than clean exercise mats at the Manchester YMCA. All we ate was pizza. W...

From Monday's NY Times: Howard Dean announced yesterday that he had raised close to $9 million this year, establishing himself as a top-tier candidate in the Democratic presidential field. The figure stunned his rivals and transformed Dr. Dean from a maverick into a more traditional contender. Much of the money was collected over the Internet, his aides said, leaving little doubt there are now ways to solicit contributions other than the telephone calls and elaborate fund-raisers that are the stock and trade for most mainstream candidates. Dr. Dean's aides said he would report raising at least $6.2 million in the three-month period that ends at midnight, on top of $2.6 million he raised over the first three months of the year. Dr. Dean announced the figure 36 hours before the filing period ends, timing the release for a slow-news Sunday afternoon. "We are thrilled," Dr. Dean's campaign manager, Joe Trippi, said. "Right now our new goal is $6.5 millio...

W's new sidekick at a Bush fundraiser in LA, according to Reuters: He had a special barb for one candidate, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, who has questioned the Iraq war, comparing him to Neville Chamberlain, the British prime minister who followed a policy of appeasement of Nazi Germany in the years before World War II. "He can roll up his sleeves all he wants at public events, but as long as we see that heart tattoo with Neville Chamberlain's name on his right forearms, he's never going anywhere," Miller said. This is the sort of ridiculous comparison that can only help Dean, by drawing more attention to him and getting people to see what he really has to say. I can just imagine W listening to Miller and thinking, "Neville who?"

in 7 days: 4,000 people joined Meetup 21,000 people donated $2.8m 23,000 unique visitors to Dean Nation 140,000 people voted for Dean in the MoveOn primary 264866 people say they would enthusiastically support Dean against Bush The vast, untapped potential of the grassroots should be clear the money collected so far represents an average of $130 per person, from only 7% of his potential donor base ! Already we've raised $100,000 in just a few hours Sunday morning! If we work together we can make the 7 Million Monday a reality .

Yup, that's right. The bat reads $6 million dollars . Note that this is the total for the quarter, not just the amount raised since Friday. Joe Trippi posted to the official blog about this jaw-dropping figure, but didn't post here, so I'll excerpt: That is a surge in contributions of $2.8 million in just eight days. Of the $2.8 million over $2 million has come from Internet contributions -- including our first $500,000 day on Friday June 27th. To put this in perspective the McCain for President campaign had a surge of $2 million in Internet contrbutions -- but that happend in the days after Sen. McCain's victory in New Hampshire in January 2000. The bat only goes to $6.5m as a goal, but we can and we must help Dean reach the $7 million mark by Monday. Sunday and Monday need to be $500,000 days . Already the Dean Nation all-star Team has raised almost $800 towards our own $10,000 pledge goal - and we can do better. We need to make June 30th " 7 M...

I think the big story of Q2 will be Dean. The second story could very well be why the others (Kerry, Edwards, Gephardt, Lieberman) didn't break their Q1 numbers. Candidates unable to show momentum from Q1 to Q2 are in serious financial trouble. Traditionally Q1 leads to a larger Q2 followed by a smaller Q3 where the frontrunner continues to grow and most opposition tapper down signifigantly because of the dry summer months. Let's see what the others say. Post a comment with your predictions on the field.

From the official Dean Blog, "As of last Sunday morning, June 22, the Dean for America campaign had raised $3.2 million in this quarter. Since that morning--beginning with the Sunday Meet The Press interview, through our announcement of candidacy, continuing with our victory in the MoveOn primary and through Saturday June 28th--we have experienced an unprecedented surge in contributions, and have now crossed the $6 million dollar mark." Let's get Dean to the $6.5 million mark! We have just under 2 days left before the reporting period ends at midnight on June 30th. Do your part! 1. Make a contribution yourself - CLICK HERE 2. Email everyone you know and ask them to give $25. 3. If you run a blog or a Dean support group website, join Dean Nation's All-Star Team and link to our donation page ! Why not shock the world and hit the $7,000,000 mark? Kerry, Edwards and Gephardt better hope they reach what they raised last quarter... a candidate unable to bu...

Several people have been posting in the comments and the Zonk Board that the federal matching funds are for each donation, up to $250, so that you should donate in increments. This is false . Zephyr from the campaign clarifies: The FEC doesn't care how you give it--the sum total of contributions is all that matters. Every dollar, however, given, up to $250 is matched. An individual may donate up to $2000, but only the first $250 is matched dollar for dollar. Secondly, and more importantly, the donations must be accompanied by your occupation and employer information . These fields are included in both the online contribution form and the printable form (.pdf format). This information is required by the FEC, and the donation is matched by the FEC only if that info is included. As of this writing, Dean Nation has met $498 of our $10,000 pledge goal . There are only two days left in June before the FEC deadline, so please donate now !

from the story: Seven of the nine Democratic presidential candidates attended the fund-raiser at a Washington hotel, with 750 people who paid at least $1,000 apiece; comedian and author Al Franken was the host. Another 750 young Democrats met at a nearby restaurant later in the evening at a cost of $50 apiece. Candidate Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont, poked fun at his own tendency to shoot from the hip and apologize to his rivals later. "I am delighted to have all the candidates in one room so I can issue a blanket apology should one be needed later in the campaign,'' Dean said, as the crowd burst into laughter. ... Democrats are trying to remain competitive under the new rules of the campaign finance law that bans the unlimited soft money the party used to receive from corporations, unions and wealthy donors, said Terry McAuliffe, chairman of the Democratic National Committee. "It's a challenge, there's no question,'' ...

Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean said Friday that the Bush administration's energy and fiscal policies were putting U.S. soldiers and the nation's security at risk. "This president, because of his economic policies, is a threat to the security of the United States of America," Dean said during a campaign stop in San Diego. He said Bush's economic policy was driving the nation deeper in debt and weakening crucial programs. "Not only will we undercut Medicare and Social Security, ultimately we will undercut our ability to adequately defend ourselves if this president's fiscal policies continue the way they are," he said. Speaking before 500 people at a City Club of San Diego luncheon, Dean said that the American people may have been misled by the president into going to war. He said either the U.S. intelligence community were mistaken about the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, senior White House advisers withheld...

The Q2 deadline is June 30th, and all donations up to $250 are matched, dollar for dollar, by the federal government. Dean desperately needs to build on the incredible momentum of the past week - we have won the MoveOn primary, broken the 40,000 mark on MeetUp, and seen more coverage of our candidate in the major media than in the entire previous year combined! The Million Dollar Challenge is only $100,000 shy of the ultimate goal. And we here in Dean Nation can do our part - by contributing through the Dean Nation All-Star team , we can meet our pledge goal of $10,000. Please donate whatever you can afford - and add a penny for the internet. Imagine - if Dean breaks the million dollar mark in two days. Imagine - if we in Dean Nation can raise $10,000 dollars collectively for Dean. Imagine - if we, at the nexus of Dean's netroot support, are able to make such a powerful statement! 10,000 powerful statements, in fact ... We have over 2,000 daily visitors a day. If o...

Eleanor Clift gets it: IT'S NEARING THE end of the second quarter filing period, and Democrats will measure who's up and who's not by how much money they raised in the last three months. The buzz is that Howard Dean will post over $4 million. Two rival camps privately predict that Dean will come close to $6 million. There is panic in the air. Democrats on Capitol Hill see Dean and his anti-war populist campaign as "McGovern Redux." They worry he'll lead the party into a repeat of Democrat George McGovern's 49-state loss to Richard Nixon in 1972. It's not that the war in Iraq was that popular with Democrats. If the congressional resolution empowering President Bush to invade Iraq had been a secret vote, many more Democrats would have voted no. But lawmakers fear the unknown, and they don't know Dean the way they know the other contenders in the race. Plus he's running a campaign against them, and the way they have accommodated a popular pres...

I've received an avalanche of email asking about this, so here's a public anouncement. Bumper stickers are now back in stock ( general Dean stickers, regional , and crossovers ). Bulk discounts on merchandise is available for meetup organizers, please email azizhp at yahoo dot com for more details.

The media has been guilty of misrepresenting the discussion about globalization for a long time. Very few parties involved in the discussion support a viewpoint that could be considered “anti-globalization.” Almost all the participants in the global trade debate recognize that greater trade around the world is not only a reality, but it can benefit everyone involved. However, those who promote “fair trade” policies recognize both sides of global trade transactions must benefit for a healthy world economy to be the end result. Gov. Dean discussed fair trade in his speech this week at the Council of Foreign Relations… “…We must recognize the importance of spreading the benefits of economic growth as widely as possible. The growth of multinational corporations and the globalization of the economy have helped create wealth and economic growth. But we must make certain that people in the developing world are full and equal beneficiaries in this growth and are not marginalized by it. ...

Have you ever been pleasantly if mildly surprised by a movie the critics have panned? I had just such a feeling when I watched, two days late, a recording of Howard Dean's now infamous appearance last Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press." Dr. Dean, the Democratic presidential candidate and former Vermont governor, has gotten notice for bringing some energy to the dismal Democratic ranks. But after his appearance his candidacy was immediately suffused with bad buzz. "If Dean wants to have any chance of getting into the White House, he needs to learn some basic facts about our country," said Joe Scarborough of MSNBC. Even The Associated Press reported that Dr. Dean "did not help himself with an uneven performance." But many of Dr. Dean's answers seemed perfectly reasonable. His response to Tim Russert's pop quiz about the number of soldiers on active duty — he said one million to two million; the answer is 1.4 million — seems acceptable, es...

A message of thanks from Joe Trippi to all of us - link above goes to high-bandwidth version, click here for dial-up . (via Heath of DeanTV.org )

From the Dean Campaign... FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 27, 2003 Governor Howard Dean M.D. Statement on Passage of Medicare Prescription Bills “I am disappointed that attempts by Democrats to improve legislation to add a prescription drug benefit to Medicare have been defeated. “The bills that have emerged from the House and Senate are flawed, driven by Republican ideology intent on privatizing Medicare. The Senate bill, though better, will only get worse in conference with the House, where Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas has made clear that the real Republican agenda is to ‘end Medicare as we know it.’ “America’s seniors like Medicare as they know it. They want it improved not drastically altered and left to whims of the healthcare marketplace. “Both bills fragment the buying power of the 40 million seniors on Medicare and relinquish the leverage that would force drug companies to reduce their costs. “They reflect a false premise that private health p...

It is critical that Dean makes the case to supporters of Nader and the Green party. Only united can the common agenda be achieved - and the bitterness must be left behind. Dean's performance in the MoveOn primary has demonstrated his broad appeal, but there is a lot of work yet to be done. Complicating matters is Nader himself, who has been notoriously coy about his plans for 2004: For 2004, a second Green Party presidential candidacy may be in the works. "It's too early to say," commented Nader. Green party official John Strawn confirmed that Nader is among several potential candidates for the next election. "Many folks are actively promoting particular candidates, Ralph being one of them," he said. Nader says that if the Greens reject him, he might choose to run as an independent, or possibly even as a Republican, which would pit him against George W. Bush in the primary. It's a measure of Nader's detachment from reality ...

SAN DIEGO—While campaigning in California today, Governor Howard Dean, M.D. released the following statement regarding his victory in the Moveon.org primary: “On Monday, I stood in Burlington, Vermont and said that my campaign—our campaign—was built on ‘mouse pads, shoe leather, and hope.’ Today, we see just how far that combination can go: We have won the Moveon.org primary by a landslide. “We want to thank everyone who helped make this victory possible. To the volunteers and Dean supporters across the country, thanks for all of your work. To the 139,360 who supported me, thanks for casting the first votes to take our country back. You have demonstrated that you really do have the power. “This primary was participatory democracy at its finest. This week’s vote was not about money—other campaigns devoted far more resources to this primary than ours did—and it was not about special interest groups buying access to government. This primary, the first online primary of the modern...

Dean won the MoveOn poll, earning 43.9% of the vote. Kucinich earned 23.9% and Kerry 15.7%. Tis means that Dean doesn;t get the official endorsement - but we are very close. It looks like Kucinich is playing a spolier role to Dean for the progressive vote, which in unsurprising but still a major problem (and Dean certainly can't make any "electability" appeals to Kucinich voters!). It is also interesting to look at the results from the multiple-choice poll: BRAUN 155628 50.54% DEAN 264866 86.02% EDWARDS 172076 55.88% GRAHAM 153045 49.70% KERRY 231830 75.29% KUCINICH 210164 68.25% GEPHARDT 163110 52.97% LIEBERMAN 132447 42.01% SHARPTON 109249 35.48% This is actually the more important number - 86% of those who voted in the MoveOn primary would also support Dean. It's very probable that there will be more MoveOn primaries in the future and it's clear that Dean has demonstrated that he has the ability to win. Even without MoveOn's official endorsement, ...

An intriguing article from ChronWatch.com observes how Dean dominates the debate, and has reversed the pundits: There is some amusing role reversal going on in the press. ABC.com describes Dean’s recent Meet the Press appearance, ''Besides being evasive, Dean left himself vulnerable from the left, right, or both on the military, gay marriage, Social Security, and more. He looked thin-skinned, unprepared, stuttering.'' More conservative voices, The New York Post’s Deborah Orin for instance, praise him. ''If you think Dean won’t sell down south, he is sort of pro-gun and the NRA likes him. Yet that doesn’t seem to irk his liberal backers. He’s become the Teflon Dean among liberals.'' Look for this to change if Dean gets the Democrat nod. Old-line liberal outfits like ABC, who would like to see a more traditional (John F. Kerry) candidate, will reverse field faster than Roger Staubach. Quirks now observed with amusing contempt will become stat...

There is now another way to help Governor Dean's campaign raise money in your sleep.  You can now join the " Dean Team All Stars " and raise money online for the campaign. I've created the image in this blog entry for those who'd like to add a link to their Dean Team All Star page on their website or blog.  Every Dean supporter or regional Dean group with a site should sign up for this option.  If you'd like help adding this image to your site as a link once you've joined the Dean Team All Stars just let me know . UPDATE (Aziz) : I've registered Dean Nation as a donation "group" to the Dean campaign. By donating money to the campaign through this link , we DeanBloggers collectively get (symbolic) credit for raising funds. I've set a pledge of $10,000 for the Dean Nation Team to meet - so we have a long way to go! If the Dean campaign offers any tangible prizes to groups that raise the most money. we will hold an auction on th...

Good news! The top story on the Republican National Committee website is the following: Ed Gillespie, Senior Advisor to the Republican National Committee (RNC), today issued the following statement: “Democratic presidential candidates continue to find political expedience in appealing to the anti-war activists in their party. Howard Dean positions his opposition to the war as an act of ‘political courage’ and says he was ‘right all along,’ and other presidential contenders are following his lead. “But what are they ‘right all along’ about? Their policy is this: when presented with the widely shared conclusion that a dictator with a history of using weapons of mass destruction is developing more, in defiance of an international order, the United States will not act until after such weapons have been used - perhaps, even, against us. “That is a policy destined for failure, or worse, tragedy.” Pair this with Rush Limbaugh's near obsession with Dean and you might start to t...

The New Republic magazine backed McCain strongly during the Republican primaries. So it's with nostalgia that they report that McCain is definitely not running in 2004. However, their misery might well translate into Dean's fortune - when it comes to McCain's campaign advisor, John Weaver: But while McCain may be sitting out the '04 race, the same probably won't go for Weaver. Although he has been waylaid from politics for a few months due to illness, Weaver is working almost full-time again, and sounded eager to work on another presidential campaign. (For a Democrat, that is: Weaver changed parties last year.) Weaver hasn't signed up with any campaign yet, but it sounds as if he will. For that we're glad. We just wish his candidate could be McCain. we all know there's only one candidate in the field that can invoke the legacy of McCain's campaign... there are some interesting quotes from Weaver in an attack piece published in NRO last year t...

From the campaign... For Immediate Release June 26, 2003 Statement of Governor Howard Dean on Justice Scalia’s Dissent in Texas Sodomy Case “In today’s landmark Supreme Court ruling striking down the Texas sodomy law, six Justices understood that private consensual sexual conduct is just that – private. It is none of the government’s business, and it was unconstitutional for the State of Texas to make it a crime. Justice Scalia, Justice Thomas and Chief Justice Rehnquist opposed the civil rights of homosexuals. Scalia wrote a harsh dissent filled with words that will be hateful to many Americans. He spoke darkly of “the homosexual agenda” and echoed Senator Rick Santorum by writing that laws against homosexuality further “the same interest” as laws against fornication, bigamy, adultery, adult incest, bestiality, and obscenity. As a former Governor who appointed many judges to the Vermont bench, I value the quality of judicial temperament. Scalia’s i...

The Supreme Court today struck down anti-sodomy laws. There will be events this afternoon all over the country to celebrate. Show up and hand out flyers for Dean! Here are two flyers you can use: UPDATED FLYER: We have two updated versions of the one-page PDF of a flyer posted earlier. These versions include Dean's statement today (see below) plus the quotes from Dean on civil unions on the earlier flyer. Thanks to Jennifer for putting her graphic design skills to use on short notice! Here are version one and version two. A more detailed two-page PDF of his views on equal rights for all . Here's Dean's statement from the official blog: WASHINGTON, DC - "I applaud the Supreme Court ruling in the case of Lawrence v. Texas overturning the Texas anti-sodomy law. This decision marks a significant advance toward achieving equal rights for all Americans. For too long, laws like this have divided us by race, by gender and by sexual orientation. As a Governor who...

Mike Silverman writes: Apple's new g5 computers are incredible machines. Physically beautiful, and capable of sustained 150 FPS at 1024x768 playing Unreal Tourney 2003. In other news, Howard Dean supporters were politicking outside the main entrance to the convention hall. They were quite creative in using Mac-themes in their signs: "Re-boot America" and "Does Bush give you a kernel panic?" were two I can remember. How cool is that? Hey you Deaniacs out there who were at eth WWDC, please send us photos to share! It occurs to me that Apple is a natural target for Dean supporters - after all, Al Gore is on the board of directors. Wouldn't it be interesting if Dean were to feature in an Apple "Switch" ad? use the open thread to share your suggestions on cross-brand marketing between Apple and Dean for America!

Click for a full-page PDF.

Is anyone here a Republican or Conservative who has grown disillusioned with Bush and is interested in Dean (possibly because of his state's right or gun right's stances)? If so, I'd like to talk to you and would appreciate it if you could drop me a line at eklein@ucsc.edu. Thanks. UPDATE (Aziz): BTW, here are the requested bumper stickers ... we now have Libertarian, Green, and Republican for Dean.

In the latest Gallup Poll of registered Democratic voters, there's still a wide-open primary, but a few trends are developing. Dean & Graham are at 7% for the first time. Lieberman got a bounce, but has been flat for a few months, as has Edwards. Gephardt and Kerry are not showing any signs of momentum or growth. For Dean, it's not just the movement in national recognition, Graham has about the same trajectory. It's this in combination with his netroots & grassroots base, his fundraising, and his strong polling in the first two primaries. Dean has arrived. He's a top-tier candidate for the Democratic nomination. In the words of the WaPost CW : Dean has improved his position greatly in recent weeks and months. Once considered a second-tier candidate, down there with the Sharpton, Rep. Dennis Kucinich, Sen. Bob Graham and former Sen. Carol Moseley Braun, Dean now must be considered a first-tier candidate. He is polling second in New Hampshire and...

DailyKos has been running a series of analyses on the major candidates and how they could win the Democratic nomination. Today he has posted his analysis of how Dean could win, and it's notable because he also throws in an alternate scenario of how Dean could lose. This is an essential post and comparing the two scenarios only underlies how important the fund-raising effort will be. Kos goes into a chronological detailed list of each state's primary dates. For brevoty, I'll just excerpt the summaries. Here is Scenario 1, a Dean win: Dean wins the nomination if he takes California, Connecticut, Maryland, Mass, Minnesota, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Hawaii and Washington. He could lose Georgia, North Dakota, and Texas, and still sew up the nomination. The "moderate's" task will be to steal at least two of those states. Bottom line : My scenario is fairly CW, not too controversial. It assumes that the NH loser in the Dean/Kerry battle will be fo...

This insightful article by Michael Tomasky (one of my favorite writers at The American Prospect ) addresses the change in rhetoric needed by Democrats in order to address why the tax cuts are bad for America. The strategy usually pursued by Democrats is to argue that tax cuts are not "fair" - the average guy only gets $400 and the rich guys walk off with $17,000. This is, in essence, a selfish argument, and is usually accompanied by countering tax plans that are also tax-cut oriented but tilt the cuts toward the middle class instead of the rich. In doing so, philosophical ground is actually ceded to the GOP because tax cuts in and of themselves are not being portrayed as harmful, just the distribution. Unfortunately, all the major Democratic candidates (including Dean) have presented variants of this strategy. Tomasky proposes instead a strategy based on self-interest , which is not intrinsically negative the way that selfishness is: Again, 20 years of right-wing rhet...

There's a long and great article on the Technology Reports website about Dean. Excerpt: Campaign 2004 is quickly shaping up to be our very first digital presidential showdown since the birth of our republic - and the next resident of the 1600 Pennsylvania Ave could well be America’s first Digital President. .... While many of us are asleep at night, deep within the vast expanse of cyberspace, there is a bona fide digital insurgency going on – being led by candidate Howard Dean, onetime governor of one of America’s smallest states, Vermont – lightyears, it seems, from the techno-dynamos of Silicon Valley or Alley. Dean, a physician, is running an insurgent campaign modeled somewhat on that of Jimmy Carter, himself a governor of another state not well known technological prowess, who managed to built a grassroots insurgency that took him all the way to the White House.

CARLSON: General Clark, you went up to Capitol Hill last week, and apparently were very warmly received by Democrats, a measure of how weak the current field is. I want to give you one example. Howard Dean, former governor of Vermont, on NBC this weekend, admitted he had no idea how many military personnel there are in the United States. That's embarrassing, isn't it, that he didn't know that? CLARK: No, I don't think that's necessarily embarrassing. He gave an answer, as I recall. He said 1 to 2 million. So, I mean, when you count the active and the reservists, he's certainly in the ballpark. CARLSON: Do you think he has the experience to be president? CLARK: I'm not going to pass judgment on that. I think that's for the American people to decide after they hear the issues and compare the candidates.

The campaign released a memo to reporters on the speech that Gov. Dean gave to the CFR today. In it, they summarized the message's key points as well as the foreign policy of a Dean Administration. The key points: - Our foreign and military policy must restore American leadership in the world. We need to turn back to policies that have America leading the world rather than pitting America against the world. - We should not be dividing the world into us versus them, but rallying the world around fundamental principles of decency, responsibility, freedom and mutual respect. - We must lead by example, not by force; we must continue to be the light unto the nations - setting a moral example through our behavior. - While we must be prepared and ready to use force, it must be to defend against actual or imminent threat to ourselves or our friends and allies and, in concert with others, to deal with grave humanitarian crises. - The Bush administration has abandoned a...

Sometimes, the Right Thing to Do cannot be described by a soundbite. This puts any attempt by Democrats to reclaim the title of Foreign Policy mastery from the GOP at a disadvantage, given that the media is not designed to convey ideas larger than soundbite size accurately to the American public. However, Howard Dean recognizes that an articulate vision of foreign policy is essential - not just for politics, but for America's own sake. His speech to the Council on Foreign Relations is a boldly comprehensive and exhaustive vision, laid out with the attention to detail that demonstrates his knowledge that foreign policy demands more than mere disagreement with President Bush. It's a long speech but it's essential reading in full. Here is the very core of his vision, however: America is not Rome. We do not dream of empire. We dream of liberty for all. In November 2004, the American people will seek a President who is prepared to use our brave and remarkable armed ...

Getting back to the subject of language which I addressed in my earlier post, I'd like to direct everyone to this article from the American Prospect. For the past two years, we've been told that we're unpatriotic because we've questioned the wisdom behind the Iraq intervention or the wisdom behind tax cuts for the wealthy. We've been (in some cases) spat upon, berated, shouted down, and branded as traitors or communists by the GOP Fedayeen. For too long, many of us have walked in fear, afraid to stand up and make our case against the rabid nationalism that permeates the GOP leadership. The GOP has shamelessly co-opted patriotism, our flag, and religion to further their radical agenda. Folks, it's time to remove the star-spangled blinders. Howard Dean has been slowly but surely working his way towards reclaiming patriotism and morality for the Democratic Party. Take - for example - his speech and actions at the Wisconsin Democratic convention. (I actua...

In the recent RNC/MTP mugging of Howard Dean by Tim Russert , Dean seemed halfway to the seeing the sweet spot of the swing for 2004: MR. RUSSERT: But you would consider increasing the payroll tax? DR. DEAN: Absolutely. You don't have to increase the amount of the payroll tax, you increase the salary that it's applied to. You see what I mean? MR. RUSSERT: Yes. DR. DEAN: You’ve got to look at expanding the amount of money that gets taxed for Social Security. You know, if you make $100,000 a year, the last $15,000 doesn’t have to pay Social Security tax for it.... $85,000, maybe you raise it to $100,000 or whatever the numbers are. We've got to look at the numbers to figure out what you do. You get the Social Security problem off the table first by fixing it... First off, Dean eludes to something that makes his idea a bit of a non-starter. The cap on FICA wages are tied to the rise of inflation, so they are raised every year. The cap for 2002, which D...

Sure, we've all got our gripes with TNR's grading system sometimes, so we've got to give them props when we believe they get it right. John Judis searched the websites of all the Democratic candidates with the intention of finding foreign policy statements. He notes that only Dean , Lieberman , and Edwards have foreign policy sections on their websites. He observes that the Democrats would be better served if they all brushed up on foreign policy, and offers this reasoning: Why is it, one must ask, that in a recent Washington Post/ABC poll a quarter of Americans think that Iraq used WMD against American troops in the war? It's because in the absence of any discussion by the Democrats, the Republicans and the Bush administration are able to operate in an informational cocoon of prejudice, myth, and plain nonsense that they have spun. And as the Democrats should have learned in November 2002, foreign policy issues are not going to go away. They can either make thei...

In this Nation article, clinical psychologist Dr Renana Brooks analyzes Bush's use of emotional language as a political tool. She's meticulously poured through Bush's speeches and has outlined a few techniques that Bush successfully employs. This article is extemely interesting, as it exposes Bush's language for what it is: President Bush, like many dominant personality types, uses dependency-creating language. He employs language of contempt and intimidation to shame others into submission and desperate admiration. While we tend to think of the dominator as using physical force, in fact most dominators use verbal abuse to control others. I'd like to contrast Bush's techniques with some text from Dean's Great American Restoration speech. The first technique Brooks analyzes is the use of empty language . Empty language is the use of broad and abstract statements that contain so little substance that the listener is distracted and unable to examin...

Thank you for all your amazing work on getting out the MoveOn vote! Thank you for all your incredible work getting together the 30,000 person national rally on June 23rd (see some beautiful slides from the rally, along with excerpts from the speech, here ). Now, we are almost to the end of this critical month of June. There are only 5 more days until the end of the second quarter fundraising filing deadline. In the last two days, over 5,000 NEW contributors donated to Dean for America. Meetup members have started to max out--people who have never given to any political campaign are now donating hundreds of dollars to Dean for America . People who have never talked to their friends about political candidates are asking their friends to join them and donate to Dean. We have five days to take the momentum from the June 23rd event and transform it into an incredible fundraising quarter--but we need the help of every person who cares deeply about this campaign. This is your campaign. Pl...

This is the full text of Dean's "Great American Restoration" speech, delivered at the Declaration Celebration: 30,000 Americans in over 400 cities and towns gathered today to listen to Howard Dean announce his candidacy for President of the United States Burlington, Vermont -- Today I announce that I am running for President of the United States of America. I speak not only for my candidacy. I speak for a new American century and a new generation of Americans -- both young people and the young at heart. We seek the great restoration of American values and the restoration of our nation's traditional purpose in the world. This is a campaign to unite and empower people everywhere. It is a call to every American, regardless of party, to join together in common purpose and for the common good to save and restore all that it means to be an American. Over a year ago I began to travel the country in the usual way one does when seeking the Presidency. I be...