August 05, 2003
H(oward) Ross McDean
Fresh off his wins in the money primary and the publicity primary, Howard Dean showed off a new side of himself to Larry King and the Today Show.
Call it H. Ross McDean.
In both venues Dean emphasized this above all, to thine own budget be true. He repeatedly promised a “glide path” to a balanced budget, with “spending limits” to keep liberals at bay, pointing to his record as Vermont governor.
How could he morph so far to the right? Here’s a secret. He didn’t change a thing.
What everyone forgets about Howard Dean is that he's not really left, right, or center -- those are labels we place on people in order to pigeonhole them, and later dismiss them.
Dean is what he is. He is, at heart, a pragmatist, a problem solver. He is a Dean as in Dean Witter Reynolds (yep -- his family are those Deans) and he doesn't mind admitting it.
At the same time, he knows what wins elections, and he knows what liberal Democrats want. You win elections by exciting your base vote first, and what Democrats want is someone who will take the fight to the foe, who won't back down, who will stand up for their principles.
How can Howard Dean be both a liberal and a Perot-like McCainiac?
It's an artifact of just how far to what was once called the "Radical Right" this Administration has gone. A unilateral foreign policy overturning a 60-year tradition, an exploding federal deficit driven by tax cuts, a regressive social policy, and an attitude toward opponents that can most kindly be called autocratic. That's the second Bush era in a nutshell. That's the record. It's just that simple.
How Democrats could bow down to this, even with September 11, is beyond belief to many of them. So the base vote is easy to get.
And here, remarkably, 15 months before the election, Dean has been able to launch a general election campaign based on what were, until a very few years ago, very conservative principles.
It's still an uphill fight, given the money Bush has, the Conservative Media Conspiracy, and sheer incumbency. But the math now is inescapable. You combine the people who voted for Bill Cinton, who were 43% of the electorate in 1992, with the people who voted for Ross Perot, who were 19% of the electorate. Sprinkle in the McCain supporters who were 40% of the 2000 primary vote, and stir. That leaves the Bush family with 38%, same as they got last time.
"If it's liberal to be for balancing the budget, then call me a liberal," he said with a smile. In that one sentence, Howard Dean redeemed a generation of "tax-and-spend" rhetoric which has gotten into most voters' DNA, thanks to the efforts of Republicans. He grabbed the Perot supporters by the scruff of the neck and pulled them in close, just that simple.
The only way to win is by getting millions of people to write small checks. That's how you compete with a President who can get as many $2,000 checks as he wants, he said. The campaign itself is campaign finance reform, McCainiacs, campaign finance reform in action.
These are the right moves. This is how you win.
Karl Rove wants Dean? Fine. Jody Powell and Hamilton Jordan wanted Reagan, too.
Posted by Danablankenhorn at August 5, 2003 09:11 AMAnd don’t forget the significant number of disenchanted voters who are getting turned on to Dean. I’ve been to six meetups so far and at each and every one there is a HUGE number of people who simply don’t vote but are interested in getting back into electoral politics and Dean is the one who has brought them in.
Put it this way: you don’t need that 10% swing if you can get a significant portion of the 50% who don’t vote at all.
Posted by: Chris Andersen at August 5, 2003 12:35 PMDid you see the line about being the center.
Larry King: “Will you run to the center as the election gets closer?”
Howard Dean: “Larry, I am in the center.”
My God I think this guy can really beat Bush next election.
Posted by: Jake of 8bitjoystick.com at August 5, 2003 01:14 PMQuote:
“I think this guy can really beat Bush next election.”
That’s what I’ve been saying for about a month. We have a winner here. It’s getting to be about time for me to make another donation.
Posted by: Dan Wylie-Sears at August 5, 2003 02:54 PMHoward Dean is far from a winner. His budget balancing approach is a disaster, as well as his foreign policy. And on many instnaces, he’s publicly slapped the face of fellow Democrats. I can’t believe you guys are buying into his crap.
Posted by: Adam at August 5, 2003 04:17 PM“And on many (instances), he’s publicly slapped the face of fellow Democrats.”
So, he’s capable of standing up for himself and not always buying into a party line? Why is that such a bad thing?
Posted by: Jason Lauborough at August 5, 2003 04:26 PMThey had a surplus, balanced the budget and provided health care in Dean’s Vermont. How is that a disaster? Not to mention that they kept voting him back in office.
Posted by: Jake of 8bitjoystick.com at August 5, 2003 05:25 PMAlso I don’t consider Joe Lieberman a democrat.
Posted by: Jake of 8bitjoystick.com at August 5, 2003 05:26 PMI am telling you guys, Dean would have a good chance at challenging Bush if it were not for the fact that he sealed his legislative records for the next ten years. I ralize that you will think that I am “trippin” but consider this. Kerry is out to get Dean and you may well say “so what” but Kerry,along with others, is forming a hit squad to get Dean. He publicly denies it but read this buzz…
“You’ll recall that the campaign of Sen. John Kerry denied that it was using staff to do opposition research on Dean, who is shaping up as the media darling and far-left Democratic Party favorite.
But suddenly little bits of dirt are dribbling out of Vermont, and it isn’t Dean who’s letting them out. In fact, his effort to control information about himself is one of the stories.
Just before Dean left office, he signed orders that sealed almost half of his gubernatorial documents from public view until 2013 — ten years after the end of his service as governor. That is at least four years longer than any previous Vermont leader had held back his (or her) political papers.
Dean made it clear that he was locking up his documents to avoid political embarrassments, but was hesitant to explain why at the time. Dean staff believe the story now circulating is the direct result of Kerry’s opposition research attempts. “We certainly weren’t publicizing that the governor had sealed half his papers,” says a Dean volunteer. “But a bunch of political hacks looking for dirt would certainly have found out about it soon enough.”
A lesson to Dean…Never Ever mess with Mcauliffe publicly. Or the old gaurd establishment in the Democratic leadership structure. I guarantee Kerry will be able to sabotage Dean in some way. Dean will become the candidate that was.
What is interesting is that the far-left of the party like Dean, who, if you believe him is a moderate. Some in the party are calling him a conservative?!? Just what the heck is going on here?
Dean has other troubles. He’s not very popular in the South and his anti-war purity is going to destroy any chance of getting the soccer-mom vote.
Posted by: Mike Van Winkle at August 6, 2003 08:02 AMNot sure about those soccer-mom’s, Mike. Totally antecdotal, but I am soccer-dad age, and I can tell you that in my neck of the woods, there are far many more women PO’d at Bush than men.
And, there is a lot of appeal for a pro-choice, anti-crime Doctor to fix things.
Meet-up’s tonight!
Rob
Posted by: Robbie D at August 6, 2003 10:21 AMThere are two kinds of people here. There are those who care about politics all the time, and those who don’t.
Those who don’t have a rising affection for Dr. Dean. They like being in the game. They like what he says — social liberalism and economic conservativism has been at the heart of American political attitudes for a century. And they forgive him his faults.
This is something those who deal with politics full time can’t stand. They forgive him his faults. They know Dean’s not perfect, they know no one is, so when someone tries to play “gotcha” with him they see through the game and defend their man.
In politics we call this Teflon.
Posted by: Dana Blankenhorn at August 6, 2003 10:25 AMPete,
“Dean made it clear that he was locking up his documents to avoid political embarrassments, but was hesitant to explain why at the time. “
Do you think sealing documents is a bad thing?
If you do, I urge you join me in the call for President G. W. Bush to lift his order that extended lock-up for his father’s papers.
Robbie.
Posted by: Robbie D at August 6, 2003 11:52 AMI would be much more willing to support Dean if his campaign wasn’t so anti-Bush. So what, he hates Bush and despises his every move? Besides badmouthing, show us what you’re capable of Howard. I know his budget records are excellent when he was in Vermont, but lets not kid ourselves…how difficult can a state like Vermont be to balance the budgets? If he would only start focusing on the positives and not the negatives, I would give him a shot.
Posted by: Spilt at August 7, 2003 08:52 AM>how difficult can a state like Vermont be to balance the budgets?
Snelling couldn’t do it. Of course, he was a Republican, so one can hardly expect fiscal responsibility.
Posted by: Dan Wylie-Sears at August 7, 2003 10:21 AMQuote:
“He’s not very popular in the South and his anti-war purity …”
He’s not very well known in the South, and what anti-war purity? He supported the first Iraq war. He supported the intervention in the former Yugoslavia. He supported the war in Afghanistan. I think the only wars he has opposed are Viet Nam and Iraq II.
Posted by: Dan Wylie-Sears at August 7, 2003 10:26 AMAnd this centerist thing… that’s good, huh?
Did Bush destroy our country in a couple a short years by being a centerist?
So what makes you think a centerist can fix his mess?
Centerist, at this point in history, means to me that they don’t have the balls to do the job that needs done. OR, they are much more likely to turn out to be Bush-lite once in office.
We don’t need no sticking fence sitters.
http://la.indymedia.org/uploads/themenace.jpg
Posted by: FluxRostrum at August 9, 2003 05:57 PMQuote:
“Did Bush destroy our country in a couple a short years by being a centerist?”
Nope. First of all, the country still exists. But more to the point, he did his horrible devastation by being a far-right extremist and a supply-side fanatic. He campaigned as a centrist, but he did not behave as one in office.
Posted by: Dan Wylie-Sears at August 11, 2003 11:04 PMDana Blankenhorn made the following statements in his August 5, 2003 diatribe:
“Dean is what he is. He is, at heart, a pragmatist, a problem solver. He is a Dean as in Dean Witter Reynolds (yep — his family are those Deans) and he doesn’t mind admitting it.”
Dean Witter was founded by an individual named Dean Witter. I believe the Reynolds portion of the name came after a merger with InterCapital Reynolds & Co.
Howard Dean’s father was an executive at Dean Witter Reynolds. The fact that his last name is the same as Dean Witter’s first name does not make him one of “those deans.”
Posted by: Gerald Cohail at September 10, 2003 09:09 PMThe “Reynolds” came from Major D. Reynolds, the older brother of RJ Reynolds, who had a “conversion experience that led him to leave the tobacco business.” Dean Witter acquired Reynolds & Co. in 1978 during his grandson, Thomas F. Staley’s time.
The Thomas F. Staley Foundation, North Carolina Wesleyan College
Howard Dean is the annointed candidate of the Lasker Health Lobby which has controlled the Democratic Party since the 1940s, for crying out loud! No doubt that is why they (and their media accomplices, who pretend they don’t exist) are marketing him as an “outsider” - because they always go for the biggest lie they can concoct!
