2004 Elections: Democratic Party Contenders

Correction: it wasn't dateline, it was primetime. You have to see the diane sawyer interview. It was extraordinary. You have to see the primetime interview for yourself to see just how powerful it really was.

honestly, i don't see what the problem with the rant is. I LOVED IT. it was upbeat, open and passionate, qualities sorely lacking in politicians. I think such speeches could get a lot more young people to tpolls as well.

It engaged the audience and didn't come off as angry at all. I don't see where all this crap about anger comes from. He sounded excited, passionate but definately not angry.

This is even more apparent when you look at the context. He was talking to thousands of young volunteers who stood out in the bitter cold campaigning for him for the past several days only to be crushed. He was reinvigorating them, showing them that the battle is just beggining but that they're in it for the long haul.

The Diane Sawyer interview has convinced me Dean is a sincere and heartfeeling, ignorant, mean-spirited, incompetent. But at least he unlike Clark can remember what he has said.

They all, including Kerry and Edwards, want to tax more of each dollar those damn greedy rich guys make investing in the private economy, helping companies grow and employ more people whose salaries provide more tax revenue. Better if all those deserving people like me earning less than $200,000 become damn greedy rich guys whose dollars made from investing in the private economy are also taxed more than are the dollars I earn now.

Hell, damn greedy rich guys can more easily afford a higher tax rate. Yes, the Dem candidates want me to agree to cut off my face to spite my nose. But I never did like my nose.

Kerry has already proved to me that his financial decisions are reason enough for me NOT to vote for him. Mortgaging half his estate to stay in a race in which his chances aren't that great of winning.

Centroles
Centroles, I also was not put off by Dean's acceptance "speech" as I understood its context. Did you notice the people standing behind Dean, including Senator Harkin (a seasoned pro) who were enjoying and supporting his performance?

Dean's judgment mistake is that his behavior was appropriate for a rally not covered by cameras. It was not the best thing to do before a national audience and those that are out to get him.

I like a lot of Dean's positions on issues but don't think he can beat Bush. I also liked his wife, Judy as interviewed by Sawyer. It was so refreshing to see a woman who is not shallow.

My first choice several months ago was John Kerry. But his campaign performed so badly until he made staff changes which resulted in an improvement just before Iowa and I gave up on him and decided to go with Clark. Now, Kerry has found his voice and cadence and may, in fact, be electable in the northern states---but not in the South. To beat Bush, the candidate must meet the challenge of the electoral college states dominated by the South. Only Clark and Edwards have a chance there, even among veterans.

BBB

Well, Centroles, you're not alone in your assessment; a lot of ardent Dean supporters share that particular disconnect. And trust me, far more folks saw, heard, or read about The Rant and its replays and parodies than even are aware there is a program titled Primetime, let alone folks aware of, let alone familiar with, that paricular interview. The Rant itself is merely a component among myriad Dean Difficulties. No one of Dean's miscues or shortcomings has occasioned his slippage, rather it is the ever-accumulating mass of them that weigh him down as the Public-at-Large becomes more aware of his antics.

I do suspect younger voters will participate more heavilly in this year's election than has been recently common. Looking at the trending of leanings of the applicable demographic does not lead to a conclusion generally favorable either to Dean in specific or to The Democrats in general, though;

CBS observed, re Dean and both the The Youth Vote and The Liberal Vote in Iowa's recent contest,

Democrats can no longer count on winning margins among young voters, according to an October survey by Harvard University's Institute of Politics. More than twice as many young people identified themselves as Republican or independent than Democrat. The findings also showed a more conservative outlook among youth in general. Examing that Harvard study, The Washinton Times opined

There does appear to be a groundswell of public attitude in progress. The Left, considered either as a wing of The Democratic Party, or, on the grander scale, as a component of The Electorate At Large, does not, however, appear to have caught that wave.

Of course, its early inthe campaign season, and one thing that is sure is that the NH primary is capable of surprising folks. We shall see.

Gore failed to connect with the youth in this country and this in part cost him the election. I think Kerry would suffer a similar fate. But I honestly believe that Dean can make young people into democrats once again.

There is a widespread and well earned belief among the youth that Washington politicians say one thing and do another. The thing that the youth most respond to politicians is candor. They respond to people who speak their mind. An extraordinary amount of youth supported both McCain and Nader for this very reason. And I believe many more will support Dean once they start hearing him speak.

The democratic party has commited many self inflicted wounds over the past several years while the republicans have reinvogorated themselves and their demographics. Republican candidates like Arnold donot help the cause. I think now, the term the grand old party is more appriopriate for the democratic party except that there is absolutely nothing "grand" about in it's organization, actions, or influence.

And it's biggest failure is in putting force a strong challenge to the conservatives. Led in part by Clinton and then Gore, the democrats politics simply became to say whatever they though the people wanted to hear. And this has cost them dearly.

Quote, "......failure is in putting for(th)ce a strong challenge....."

Dean became what he is by interacting actively with the youth. He was a blimp on the radar an year ago with a staff of seven, a few hundred thousand dollars in it's budget and absolutely no connections or endorsements whatsoever. There isn't a single journalist in this nation who would've have predicted that dean is any more viable a candidate than Al Sharpton.

But he managed to connect with the youth and they became the core of his campaign.

I am not a deaniac. I have never campaigned for the man and I never bothered to visit blogforamerica.com until two days ago when I was curious to see what the reaction to the Iowa results was. But that one visit was all it took to realize what makes Dean's campaign so unique.

The campaign is truly shaped by the spirit of the youth. In the forums, people can put forth their ideas of what Dean's campaign should do and the headquarter listens. Within hours of the concession speech, the forum was riffled with people suggesting that Dean's HQ should scedule himself on shows like Leno and Letterman. They suggested that Dean should laugh at himself and his video and that the should jokingly explain away the truth behind the video, that it was a speech designed to bring the spirits of the thousands of people who campaigned for him in the bitter cold for hours back up.

Sure enough, the very next day, Dean appeared on both Primetime and Letterman where he joked about the speech and followed this advice to the tee.

His forum has a section where one can talk to or debate with an expert on any of Dean's policy stances. And the major complaints and miscommunications get sent back up to his campaign headquarters.

Dean's campaign doesn't merely appeal to the youth. It is shaped by it, it is run by it, it defines the direction that the campaign takes. He generated his 42 million dollars or so entirely through 100 dollar donations from hundreds of thousands of people. Almost none of this money came from wealthy campaign contributors or special interests. These are ordinary americas. And this is what democracy is all about.

Can you imagine, a campaign run by the ideas contributed by hundreds of thousands of ordinary citizens?

This is both a blessing and a curse. A couple of his supporters remind me of pistoff (no offense) giving credence to conspiracy theories and such and suggesting that Dean bring them up.

But looking past that, the idea of a candidate shaped by the people than the linsiders, obbyists and special interests brings a warm felling in my stomach.

For comic value, I'll post a thread from the forum by practical-magic...



Can you imagine what his administration might be like should he win if it is organized similar to how his campaign is?

Millions of ordinary americans sharing their ideas on a forum on what should be done and others inputing their thoughts on the ideas. Millions of americans sharing their problems and concerns directly to his campaign headquarters. And the best most popular ideas, the gravest concerns being passed onto his administration himself.

Think of how much better this country would be if we all could give inputs on the policies that should be implemented, on how this country should be run, and the very best ideas, the gravest concerns, and the very best reasons and misconceptions are passed on and influence future policy.

I'm not convinced of your argument here. You may very well be right but I suspect that Nader and McCain drew the younger voters because their campaigns were based on idealism more than candor.

To some extent Dean had that idealism working in his favor too but IMO, that is what we've seen worn away here over the last few weeks. The idealism was replaced with a bit or pragmatism once he got into the spotlight and people started digging only to find that his "candor" changed on items depending on who he was in front of or where he was.

A lot of the MoveOn.org type folks have been espousing "truth" as a sort of campaign motto but teh general public found out that Dean was doing his own distorting of the truth as it suited him.

which reminds me of George Bush and Leave no Child behind-Compassionate Conservative-Uniter not Divider-WoMD followed by an ever endless list of empty propaganda sound bites.

It's politics as usual. None of these guys are going to go change Washington or shoot us straight.

Perhaps it reminds a lot of people of Bush. Maybe that's why they didn't vote for Dean???

yeppers but then I still favor Kucinich

Dean's Gallup to the rear keeps its momentum:



Tracking Polls, Jan-20-22

Kerry: 34% (previous - 30, 28, 25)
Dean: 22% (previous - 25, 30, 32)
Clark: 17% (previous - 18, 19, 21)
Edwards: 12% (previous - 11, 9, 7)

Lieberman appears stuck at 8%, while Kucinich, following a momentary leap to 4%, slips to 3%, and Sharpton remains below 1% in tonight's Gallup update. While absolute numbers differ, Zogby and ARG trends are roughly parallel. Only Kerry and Edwards are showing any upward movement, as has been the case in NH uniformly since the week preceeding the Iowa Caucuses. Still, Dean's core support is deeply committed, and comprises an experienced, well-tuned machine. A disaster similar to Iowa could remove Dean from serious contention following NH. A decent second or third place finish likely would serve to keep him viable at least into the next round. Edwards appears assured of sufficient strength to carry on at least in to March scramble, where a tight contest with Clark for Southern voters could be the determinant for one or the other. The rest, Lieberman included, appear doomed, given current indicators and trends. At this point, I'm gonna conjecture a Kerry win in NH, with a toss for Clark or Edwards in second and Dean drawing another third. My guess could change between now and Tuesday night, likely it will change more than once, but the trending is what catches my attention, much moreso than the actual numbers at any point.

I can't figure out what the heck you're reffering to.

Dean has repeatedly taken very unpopular positions. He advocated the complete elimination of Bush's tax cuts. We all know deep down that there is no way any candidate can deliver a balanced budget, and universal healthcare without making some sacrifices. So why are people so quick to swallow Edward's and Kerry's lies that they will balance the budget, keep the middle class tax cuts, offer universal healthcare, universal preschool, give more funding to homeland security, reform education and still manage send increase college scholarships?

These are the people distorting the truth to get elected.

Over the past few weeks, the media has vehemently and insidiously attacked Dean.

They repeatedly stated that what was nothing more than a cheery pep rally was a display of anger. When Dean left the Martin Luther King rally saying that all the reporters hounding him with questions were disrupting it, he was repeatedly portrayed as the bad guy. When Dean said that he can't balance the budget, offer up healthcare, reform education and still keep the tax cuts intact, he was repeatedly criticized for it while no mention was made of how the other candidates were promising things they couldn't possibly deliver.

The media does not want Dean to win. He has stated that the media monopolies in the US have far too much influence and he suggests that they should be broken up. He repeatedly critiqued George Bush's policies and called him a liar and the said that the media did a poor job of telling people the truth about WMDs and not presenting the multitudes of evidence presented by everyone from the CIA to Colin Powell prior to 9/11 that Iraq does not have WMDs. He stated that he would reform the DNC and overhaul it's leadership when almost all of the liberal media program hosts were members of clinton's campaign and were made popular by the DNC.

It is not in the interests of the media for Dean to become the president. Acting either unconciously or consiously, the media will do what it can hurt Dean every step of the way.

Dean's pep rally was not a display of anger, it was a display of enthusiasm meant to raise the spirits of dejected volunteers. The world was not made any safer by Saddam's capture. All candidates try to appeal to the south by talking more openly about their religious beliefs. The reporters knew that Dean was not being rude by leaving the Martin Luther King rally stating that the media hounding him was disrupting the rally. The Iowa caucuses ARE dominated by special interests. Dean simply states outright what politicans and journalists already know to be true.

But the media (both conservative and liberal) has consistently failed to present both sides of the story in all these cases. They repeatedly attacked Dean for these statements when they had an obligation to present both sides of the story and knew in their hearts that Dean was right.

Dean was forced on the defensive by these attacks. But he never wavered from his stance on them. So I don't know how you can possibly state that Dean is the one doing flip flops.

If anything it is Kerry, Clark and Edwards that now say they disagreed with a war that they spoke and voted in favor of. It was them that started out as moderate mini versions of Bush until Dean became popular and they were forced to coopt his stances and make them into their own.

Centroles, your lament there would be almost poignant, were it not for the fact it was The Mainstream Media which brought about Dean's emergence from obscurity and thrust him to the forefront in the first place. Your hypothesis is absurd. The Media hype was all Dean really had going for him. Frankly, I suspect much the same will prove the case with Clark. If The Media have turned anti-Dean, it is only very recently, and only because his recent performance has embarrassed the punditocracy. Exposed to scrutiny, Dean folded. No one invented Dean's gaffes, he pulled them all off all by himself. All in all, The Media doesn't much care who wins. They don't really have a horse in the race; they will happily ride whichever horse survives, just as they always have. You're not explaining reasons for Dean's slide, you're offering excuses, and lame ones at that.

A little more poll-ution;

Perhaps a most telling snapshot of opinion may be found here



if there's anything there, it looks as though its a three-way, and Dean ain't there.

Nothing really new in this next one, just the Boston Globe's poll more or less mirroring Gallup's results:



The latest LA Times NH Tracking poll (no graphic, sorry), pretty closely matches the others. In barely a week, Edwards has almost doubled his strength; the latest, released tonight, says 13 percent of likely voters favor him, up from 7 last Friday, within striking distance of Clark, at 17 percent, pretty much unchanged, and Dean at 19 percent, down from 28 percent. Kerry is far in front with 32 percent, while the third New Englander, Lieberman, trails at 5 percent. The others languish, mired in the single-digit realm of hopeless futility and show little movement one way or the other. As regards Lieberman, that really surprises me in a way, he being a New Englander and all, but them's the numbers as they turn up tonight. They'll likely tighten up in some respects, and spread further in others over the weekend. Look for surprises.

There was nothing inherently negative about any of Dean's gaffes. Yet the media consistently refused to portray both sides of the story. They presented his statements as wrong though deed down they knew they were right. They never bothered to explain both sides of the story. And that is how the media was anti-Dean. While they treat all Bush's statements and lies with the upmost care and don't even bother to cover most of Kerry's gaffes.

And as I have already shown in my post above, there are a great many reasons why all of the mainstream media would be hurt by a Dean presidency. He has promised to break up the media conglomerations. He has accused the media of failing to do it's job of presenting the complete truth about Iraq and the WMDs. And the people on the DNC that Dean is criticizing made most of the few liberal hosts on the media what they are. Whether the influence of this is concious or subconcious, it's never the less present.

The claim that it was the media that built him up is absurd. His campaign was truly built up by internet grassroots.

An year ago, his campaign had a total staff of 7 and a couple of hundreds supporters nationwide and a couple hundred thousand dollars for funds.

He made a few speeches against the Iraq war when it was the unpopular thing to do. None of these speeches were televised nationally or covered much if at all by the print media. But online, people heard about them. The content of the speech struck a cord with people and momentum began to build on line. Even as the coverage of the democratic nominees was just getting underway, the media repeatedly dismissed Dean as someone without any real chance and focused mostly on Kerry (the front runner). The online momentum grew and grew. But it wasn't until it was revealed that this momentum generated 30 million dollars or so already in small donations from people, that Dean rejected federal matching funds and has hundreds of thousands of registered supporters, that the media finally took a look at him.

By the time the media started covering Dean, he already had the most money and the most registered supporters by a long shot. He was already the front runner. He wasn't made by the media. It wasn't until he already amassing a large movement behind him that the print media so much as ran a detailed profile on him and the tv media mentioned him as a serious candidate.

You're entitled to your opinion, Centroles, and perfectly welcome to forward any argument you find comforting. Some folks have a different opinion, and some folks find the argument you've offered not only laughably preposterous but tediously predictable. That's politics. A few win, most lose, some whine, some pick up the pieces of broken dreams and rebuild them into working, growing visions. Nothing lasts forever. That's politics, too. Good luck.

If all the candidates had started capaigning the same day and started off with a televised debate, Dean never would have been the front runner.