Thursday,
February 19 2004
THE SECRET OF DEAN'S DEMISE REVEALED!: By the man himself,
no less. Yesterday Howard Dean started his farewell-to-the-presidency/it's-a-new-beginning
speech by saying:
"And
I said when I left the governor's office that if the rest of this
country were like Vermont this country would be much better off.
And what
we set out to do was make the rest of the country more like Vermont."
Note to Howie:
Vermont is
97% white with a socialist
Congressman. That's not America, it's Sweden. No thanks.
You're lucky
Democrats stopped you when they did. They saved you the even greater
embarrassment of being thoroughly rejected by the rest of the
country in November.
MAKING
SENSE OF MILITARY NUMBERS: From the
CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll:
Do George
W. Bush’s actions while in the National Guard make you more likely
or less likely to vote for him--or will they not have much effect
on your vote?
More Likely 4%; Less Likely 15%; Not Much Effect 80%
Does John
Kerry’s combat experience in the Vietnam War make you more likely
or less likely to vote for him--or will it not have much effect
on your vote?
More Likely 19%, Less Likely 2%, Not Much Effect 78%
So the Bush
AWOL slander has been a slight drag on the President and John
Kerry's service record in Vietnam a slight positive. That's exactly
what the Democrats wanted.
Overall though,
it looks like large majorities of Americans aren't going to be
swayed one way or the the other by service records. But we already
knew this.
The more
interesting question is this one:
Do John
Kerry’s antiwar activities after he returned from serving in the
Vietnam War make you more likely or less likely to vote for him--or
will they not have much effect on your vote?
More Likely 16%, Less Likely 18%, Not Much Effect 65%
Even though
the response is a statistical wash for Kerry and a decent majority
says it won't have much effect on their vote, the public is much
more opinionated on this question than the ones above.
Also, at
this point the public has been less exposed to Kerry's antiwar
activities than his heroic service in Vietnam. Only 39% of respondents
said they "heard or read a great deal" or a "moderate
amount" about Kerry's antiwar activism in the Vietnam era
while 61% say they have heard or read "not much" or
"nothing at all" about it.
In contrast,
49% said have "heard or read a great deal" or a "moderate
amount" about Kerry's Vietnam service record while 51% have
heard or read "not much" or "nothing at all."
(For perspective, the numbers on Bush's National Guard service
are 56/43.)
Put all this
together and what does it mean? I have no idea, other than it
seems Americans still have very strong feelings and remain deeply
divided over the war in Vietnam. Maybe we are going to have to
fight Vietnam over again after all. - T. Bevan 12:40 pm | Link
| Email
Wednesday,
February 18 2004
THE CHEESEHEAD SURPRISE: Leave
it to the cheeseheads (my wife and in-laws are from Wisconsin
so I use this term with true affection) to shake up the Democratic
race. At least a little bit.
John Kerry
had a chance to close the deal last night and couldn't get it
done. So John Edwards gets to hang around and play in the sandbox
a little bit longer. That leaves open at least the theoretical
possibility Edwards could find a way steal Kerry's pail and shovel
(or to pick them up if Kerry drops them) in the next two weeks
and end up being the nominee. It's still a long shot, but that's
better than no shot at all.
Speaking
of no shot at all, Howard
Dean has officially - if somewhat vaguely - ended his candidacy
for President. There is speculation of an endorsement of Edwards,
but at this point no once can say for sure it's going to happen
or that it will make much difference even if it did happen.
Despite the
dramatic arc and bitterly disappointing end of his candidacy,
I don't think we've seen the end of Howard Dean at the national
level.
If Kerry
goes down in flames this November, the anger and apoplexy that
will inevitably rack Democrats throughout Bush's second term will
play perfectly into his hands. He already has a tremendous head
start in building a grassroots organization and you can bet next
time around that Dean and his folks will learn from their mistakes.
But is it
realistic for Dean to think thoughts of the Presidency again,
especially with Hillary looming as the 800 lb gorilla for the
Dems in '08?
This may
be loony, but I can't help but think that maybe Dean's best possible
path to the Presidency may not be a straight one, but may lie
in taking his organization and running as someone's vice president........like
Albert Gore, Jr. You want a grudge match for the soul of the party?
How 'bout Al vs. Hillary four years from now?
Who knows,
maybe they would hire Shrum as their consultant and Lehane as
their hit man - I mean press secretary - and go for broke in 2008.
ALTER-NATE
REALITY: Time for a chuckle. Here is Eric
Alterman in an interview with Liberal Oasis commenting on
George W. Bush:
…I’m called
a Bush-hater by the Wall Street Journal, but I don’t really have
any feelings about Bush personally.
I never
met him [but] when I watched that movie “Journeys with George,”
I found him quite charming, to tell you truth. I understood the
charm of the guy.
But I
don’t care if I like him or not. I don’t care if I like Clinton
or not. I don’t care if I like Cheney or not.
I care,
as a patriot and as an intellectual, what are the results of the
policies for the country and the world.
And my
view is that they are all uniformly disastrous. I can’t tell you
a single good thing the guy has done for the country.
Aahh, those
perky, self-styled "intellectuals." Isn't the ability
to demonstrate a modicum of objectivity one of the hallmarks of
a true intellectual?
And who
would have guessed that letting Teddy Kennedy write the No Child
Left Behind Act and increasing education spending by 48% would
have sent Alterman's undies into such a bunch?
Wait, it
gets better:
…Fear
has its uses. I am genuinely afraid for my country, for my daughter’s
future of the consequences of a second Bush term. I am genuinely
afraid of it. And it’s energized me…
…I think
there’s a real healthy understanding among all sensible people
right now that there is only one hope for the future of this country
and that is to get rid of this man, no matter who replaces him.
I would be very happy to vote for Bob Dole or George Herbert Walker
Bush.
He is
the most dangerous man ever to occupy the American presidency
in the past 100 years.
This is delusional
in the extreme. "Sensible" people have "only one
hope"? Liberals bemoan the fact that Bush has used fear to
divide the country since 9/11, yet here they are now trying to
motivate voters with talk of the Apocalypse. Alterman & Co.
are just a tiny hop, skip and a jump from proclaiming George W.
Bush the Antichrist. You can just feel it.
Fortunately
for Alterman (and his daughter) there are serious people running
the government, people devoted to keeping the country safe. John
Kerry may be less offensive to Alterman's sensibilities and less
"dangerous" - whatever that means - but there is no
question in my mind that with Kerry as President America will
also be less aggressive in her own defense and therefore ultimately
less safe. But, hey, at least the French will like us again.
A STATISTIC
YOU WON'T HEAR: Over the last few months, Democrats haven't
missed a chance to point out that corporate profits are way up.
It's their way of insinuating that big businesses are in bed with
the Bush administration and together they are robbing the country
blind and sticking it to little guys like me and you.
Well here's
something you probably won't hear reported in the media and you
certainly won't hear from Democrats (there you go being redundant
again! - ed.): the
U.S. Treasury reports that corporate tax revenues were up 30%
in the first quarter of FY 2004.
Gee, you
mean when corporations make more money they actually pay more
taxes to the government too? That's a good thing for an economy
trying to work its way out of a recession, right? - T. Bevan
11:59 am | Link
| Email
Tuesday,
February 17 2004
DING-DONG, DEAN IS DEAD: Barring a miracle, Howard Dean is
going to lose
his 17th straight primary/caucus today. The National
Chairman of his campaign is gone, and people will be leaving
his Burlington headquarters tomorrow in droves.
Amid the
wreckage of the biggest, most dramatic flameout in U.S. political
history, Dean is left with nothing but questions. At the top of
most people's list, of course, is "How on Earth did you spend
$41
million and still fail so miserably?"
John Kerry
couldn't care less why Dean failed. All he wants to know is just
how much sucking up he'll have to do to get his grubby little
mitts on Dean's email list. The answer is "more than
he's ever done before."
But there
is no question that Dean has left a stamp on this race. Last night
I heard Joe
Klein describe Dean as the "speed horse" in the
field, which sounds just about right - especially on the war issue.
Dean forced
the other candidates (the legitimate ones, anyway) to go way further
to the left on the issue than they otherwise would have gone by
themselves, and to alter their images and modify their behaviors
in tangible, lasting ways.
In particular,
I"m talking about the vote to fund the troops. Without Howard
Dean, there is simply no way John Kerry or John Edwards would
have voted against funding the troops in Iraq. None.
It's a vote
that may end up being a very pivotal one in November.
Switching
gears, it's also D-Day in Kentucky today, where Alice Forgy Kerr
and Ben Chandler look to capture Ernie Fletcher's old seat in
the 6th District. Smart money is on Chandler.
SurveyUSA
released a poll last night showing Chandler widening his lead
to 8 points over Kerr, and he's led in every poll taken in the
race.
I've already
shot down a preemptive effort to spin the results of this
race, but you can be sure that some will try suggest that if,
in fact, Chandler does go on to win today this will signify a
rejection of President Bush and "his candidate" by Kentucky
voters and a sign of his impending doom in November. Don't
believe the hype.
THE GUARD
STORY, PART 4,678: On Friday
morning I wrote about the trap that had been set for President
Bush on the release of his military records. By Friday evening,
the White House had taken the bait and dumped something like 400
pages of records from Bush's time in the Guard.
So did this
end the matter? Of course not. On Saturday morning almost every
headline across the country read "Bush Releases Files, But
Questions Remain."
On Sunday,
Charlie
Rangel firmly refused to take his foot off the slander pedal
on Meet the Press:
MR. RUSSERT:
So the president has not satisfied you on this issue yet?
REP. RANGEL:
It's the American people. And the records have not indicated as
to whether or not after all of the hundreds of thousands of dollars
that it took to train this man, then why was his pilot's ability
to fly suspended? Why was he able to get involved in the campaign?
These are really issues especially when he says on your program
that he's the war president and that he is willing to have a whole
lot of Americans, over 530 lives lost, 2,000 people maimed, for
a war that we didn't have to fight according to some of the experts.
And now we're challenging whether or not he's properly served
this country. I think these are legitimate issues.
Does that
sound like someone who is interested in debating facts? Does it
surprise you to learn that, despite John Kerry's feeble "protestations",
the
DNC says it will not stop attacking the President's service
record?
The White
House could produce a certified video tape of George Bush standing
on the Alabama National Guard base in 1972 and it wouldn't stop
the Dems from continuing to use this issue to attack the president.
Lest you
still have any doubts about what's going on here, let me clue
you in. Here's how liberal
blogger DKos referred to the matter on Saturday night:
This story
might be in its final legs, though that part about "Bush's home
base in Texas declining to provide details of his activities between
May 1972 to April 1973" might help keep it going a while longer.
But
the damage is done. AWOL has taken a hit to his credibility. And
we've got plenty more material for the press to work with. (emphasis
added)
Politics
can be a dirty business when it has to be. When you're desperate
to beat a strong war President and the best candidate your party
can produce is a liberal "internationalist" so clearly
inferior to his opponent on matters of national security, then
it's time to head straight for the mud pit.
Liberals
have already been there for weeks and - thanks in part to the
White House - they've succeeded in getting the President a bit
dirty. - T. Bevan 8:00 am | Link
| Email
