2004 Elections: Democratic Party Contenders

Why is it impossible to say "they thought he was smarter" without someone having a fit? Nixon was horrible, as it turned out. He was also smart. Let us walk and chew gum at the same time, please!

Nixon was very intelligent- he was also psychotic

Tartarin, please accept my apologies as it's obvious I am the "someone" to whom you refer. I didn't think I was "having a fit" and I don't appreciate your final condescending sentence above, but I can certainly respect your frustration/irritation and I therefore do sincerely apologize. Let's leave it at that, ok? Thank you. :wink:

Sorry, SweetComplication. Didn't mean to throw a snowball right at your face But I have a real problem with black and white thinking that appears from time to time in these discussions. It had an element of political correctness. As you know, I'm sure, people are so much more complicated...

Nixon, as it happens, was quite brilliant in his relationships with foreign leaders much of the time. Vide China. Kennedy was a terrific leader, particularly a terrific leader of men (and shameless user of women), an intellectual, and the fortunate son of a rich and unscrupulous dad who was ambitious for his sons and made them ambitious too, not always in the most laudable ways. I think there are very few presidents in whom one cannot find a single saving grace (Bush may well be one of them). And of course if we want to be intelligent about picking our leaders, we need to understand no one is perfect and very few are incarnations of the devil!! We need to decide what is important in a leader -- charisma? intelligence? power? ability to charm? political savvy (LBJ)? military service (Ike)? jogging five miles at a fair slip? etc. etc.

Hey, there, Tartarin:

"...As you know, I'm sure, people are so much more complicated... "


Hence, my handle ... not just sweet but also complicated :wink: .

And - Nixon also talked about religion, and God. One of the weirdest things I remember reading about is how Kissinger described getting down on his knees to pray with Nixon (at Nixon's insistence).

But another thing about our various presidents is the importance of the people they select to work with them. That's something we should look at, too. In the end, because people are complicated, and because no politician works in a vacuum, the Haldemans and Erlichmans and Mitchells and Rumsfelds and Ashcrofts all combine to form composite pictures.

I didn't go back to read all the posts, but I saw a poll that shows Dean as the front runner at 44%. Look'n good! c.i.

I am very interested in identifying and exploring the key people behind each candidate.

Thank you, Maples; google away and then:

You report, we decide:

hmmmmmmm, now where have I heard that before?

Mamaj -- You raise an interesting point about the presidents' teams. I almost wrote "team" because at least part of the team remains the same through a series of administrations. Not only are their repeats from Reagan in Bush, there are repeats of Clinton in Bush.

Apparently Dean is raising quite an amazing amount of money from small individual contributions. That's a healthy sign. Obviously in real terms small amounts of individual money will never compete with an endless supply of corporate money, but the activism indicated by these contributions will indeed make for serious competition, particularly as the media are obliged to take note of it.

Does anyone here believe that any of these contenders could actually beat George Bush?

Who knows, George! If it's a done deal that Bush wins, then it's a corrupt deal most likely. I think that if there's another election like 2000 -- where there were serious doubts about the validity of the presidency -- there'll be hell to pay. So at least hope for an open and legitimate process.

I don't think anyone thought the first Bush could be beaten either...

Well I don't think that a Bush win is a "done deal", merely the most likely outcome, by far, given the current political situation. I also agree that a Bush Sr. loss appeared most unlikely at this stage of that presidency. Things could indeed change. However no fatal Bush vulnerability is yet evident and no particularly attractive Democrat candidate has yet emerged. Further, there will be no Ross Perot in the next election to siphon off Republican votes. The election doesn't look good for the Dems.

I notice the Democrat candidates have left off their previously escalating attacks on each other and united in opposition to Bush. However, lurking in the background is a serious fight between the active and powerful single issue interest groups that animate much of the Democrat party and the more conservative moderates who steered them to their victories with Clinton. The approaching primaries could easily set off hardscrabble fights in both areas. Bush and the Supreme Court have added to the Democrat's difficulties in their recent actions on Medicare and Affirmative Action. What follows will be very interesting.

Bob Herbert's latest column is about a situation which may well contain the rationale for Bush's defeat:



"...As Mr. Bush moves from fund-raiser to fund-raiser, building the mother of all campaign stockpiles, states from coast to coast are reaching depths of budget desperation unseen since the Great Depression. The disconnect here is becoming surreal. On Thursday the National Governors Association let it be known that the fiscal crisis that has crippled one state after another is worsening, not getting better.

"Taxes have been raised. Services have been cut. And the rainy day funds accumulated in the 1990's have been consumed. If help does not materialize soon ?- in the form of assistance from the federal government or a sharp turnaround in the economy ?- some states will fall into a fiscal abyss....

"...Some Americans are missing meals and going without their medicine, while others are enjoying a surge in already breathtaking levels of wealth. So what are we doing? We're cutting aid to the former while showering government largess on the latter.

"There's a reason those campaign millions keep coming and coming and coming.

"A Times article last week noted that the wealthiest 400 taxpayers accounted for more than 1 percent of all the income in the United States in 2000, "more than double their share just eight years earlier."

"The influence of the wealthy has always been great, but it hasn't always been so cruel. Especially in the past six or seven decades there were many powerful political and civic leaders who looked out for the interests of the less fortunate and pressed their claims for treatment that was reasonably fair.

"That's changed. The Bush juggernaut, at least for the time being, is rolling over everything that dares to get in its way. And fairness is not something it is concerned about."

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/30/opinion/30HERB.html

At this writing (see blogforamerica.com) the Dean campaign is raising close to $1,000/minute on the web.

And this will be of interest to many Dem supporters:

http://www.liberaloasis.com/

I admire your upbeatness (is that a word?) about the prospect of beating the Dimson, Tartarin. I wish I shared it, but the combination of the machine the repubs have constructed that occupies three branches and will probably raise 5 times the money any dem can, along with the stubborn, willful blindness of the populace toward the evident seaminess of this man and his crew, I just don't feel very spunky about the fight.

George, you seem to be under the impression that George Bush is a popular president and that opinion polls would be a credible basis for such an impression.