Heart and Soul (Part 2) - What Would You Ask the DNC Chair?

Deb, great topic, and as soon as I finish being shell-shocked from Dean's conference followers this weekend I'll answer. Any pragmatism I have was considered a cop-out to their uninformed idealism.

He may or may not be a good strategist or willing to work hard without the media watching, though doubt it, but the immaturity of his base does not speak well for what he is really bringing when his organization is cited. Same with the primaries when people had an inflated view of his reach. As someone here said, deep but not wide. We don't need just a mouthpiece.

I don't know how we would be able to live with him as chair, or his followers making unconstructive noise, especially if he isn't.

He is still getting mileage as anti-war and Kerry still getting falsely accused by them as pro-war, to this very day.

Long held belief to remember next time. Take care of your-emotional-base. They are fickle and are not always thinking strategically.

Marjorie,

What meeting was it? One of the regional caucuses?

I am really torn about this decision - there's a part of me that would like to see him take on the role of Chair and then work to defuse some of the ugliness he helped to create. He'd have to face the cult of personality he created head on to move the party forward.

On the other hand, I think he would be a polarizing person. And the republicans would go to town with his derogatory comments about being from the "democratic part of the democratic party."

I've been trying to think of what question I would like to ask him.

Here is a link to the Air America site. On the lower right hand part of the page is a section called Run-DNC with some additional information about the candidates, including interviews.

http://www.Airamericaradio.com

Seattle P-I Scores A Double-Header:

Peaceful means best way to spread freedom
By HELEN THOMAS
HEARST NEWSPAPERS

WASHINGTON -- I've got news for President Bush.

Since its birth, the United States has always been a beacon light of freedom and has spread the good word about democracy and self-government through ideas and aid -- but not at gunpoint.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/209318_thomas26.html

Black voters in United States disproportionally disenfranchised
JESSE JACKSON AND GREG PALAST
GUEST COLUMNISTS

The inaugural confetti has been swept away and with it, the last quarrel over who really won the presidential election.

But there is still unfinished business that can't be swept away. After taking his oath, the president called for a "concerted effort to promote democracy." The president should begin with the United States.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/209316_palastjackson26.html

Subject: Bachrach (Vanity Fair) Questions Imperial Coronation

Fox News Live Anchorwoman Brigitte Quinn gets a surprise when Judy Bachrach from Vanity Fair dares to question the nature of Bush's elaborate second inauguration.

http://www.milkandcookies.com/links/24912/

This is the best tv since Jon Stewart was on Hardball. I don't watch tv but I sure do have spies!

Read about Uncle Bucky Bush getting even richer:

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0501/S00212.htm

09:02 PM

Resolute, I don't think Dean could or would be able to diffuse it. He doesn't know how without exposing the rickety base he built. They still quote that vote, backbone and all the rest.

Tempting to say that any reality, or cult of personality he built, only he could deprogram. Does he want to? Teach them, as their leader? Some are very bright grown-ups who want to believe, and came into this more willingly than the kids.

Still, it's catering to a smaller base than many imagine to justify turning over our future to him. Desperate before, and desperate again, people turn to him.

I started this, and my neighbor called, talking 30 min. about politics again. Wanting lefty left. I may not survive until our rebirth.

Kerry was persona non-grata at this progressive conference, as it also seems on Air America, according to my neighbor. He probably won by playing the margins. Did we have to? At the end of the day, without the TV media, we had nothing, whatever he did. Now he doesn't have the gratitude of our nutty base, his same legacy, since they're clueless to the realities of how much work or how difficult was the challenge.

I pray for his rebirth as well. My President.

-corr- defuse what he created (not diffuse)

My thoughts on DNC chair are this. I will support whomever is selected to be the DNC chair and I hope he thinks about what's good for the entire party and not stay in their political comfort zone or cater soley to their base of supporters.

Now as for my thoughts on Dean specifically, I really never had any big gripe about him. I didn't choose to support him during the primaries because he wasn't what I was looking for in a candidate, however he is leaps and bounds ahead of The Chimp. Anyway, like Marjorie I think it's his supporters who are his biggest bridge burners. Don't get me wrong, there are some great former Dean supporters, but their is a small faction of rabid, ill-informed Deaniacs (most of whom are online) who are his biggest liability. During the election, these guys proudly held their vote hostage and kicked and screamed throughout the entire process. Lots of campaign and blogger time was wasted trying to appease this group, imo. Okay, water under the bridge now, right? Not quite. Fast forward to today and I'm still seeing posts by Deanics on various blogs declaring that if Dean is not elected chair they are out of the party. Once again, Deaniacs holding the party hostage.

Also, I'm not sure that it's right for MoveOn.org to subliminally support Dean in their emails to their subscribers. I know they haven't come out and endorsed him explicitly but the support is definitely implied. I'm not sure it's appropriate for them to do this. It's not that dissimilar to if the DNC picked the primary winner before the first caucus and then emailed voters and "subtlely" encouraged them to support their candidate of choice.

All that said, I think I like Rosenberg best, although I wish his post election comments about the KE campaign would have been kept to himself. If he learns to keep his opinions about Dem business and campaigns out of the press,I'd like him more. But from what I'm hearing, he's got great potential, so I'm willing to give him a shot. But it looks like Dean will get it and if he does I'm okay with that too. However, I don't think he should be the sole party spokesperson, or the de facto president of the Dem party as some Deaniacs desire. And frankly I don't think he personally will bring that many new folks to the party via his personality like some of them think. He does scare alot of people,including some liberal Dems I know. He may bring in new poeple by strategy but not via his personality. It's funny though, I posted a couple of weeks or so ago I posted that Dean would not officially toss his hat into the ring until he knew he had the position locked up. Well, a day after he officially announced his entrance into the race a poll of half of those who get to vote on the chairmanship was posted onto DK with Dean the hands down winner. Bar a major upset, he's got it. Now if JK had hedged his bets like this, Deaniacs would be calling him cautious, sneaky, crafty. Dean does it and they don't make a peep. Don't get me wrong, I think it was smart for Dean to wait and see what kind of support he had. He still has presidential aspirations for sure. How could he run for prez again if he can't even win party chair? So I do think it was smart on his part, but a double standard does exist. If JK had done this their reaction would have been totally different.

If Dean does get it, I hope he utilizes the talents of the others also running for chair. I'm sure all of them have certain strengths that can be used to make the party stronger and better.

FD

You think Dean still has presidential aspirations and building a grassroots to support them?

"I may not survive until our rebirth."
~~Marjorie G

My friend, as long as you're around, we all have a chance at rebirth. {{{Marjorie G}}}

I just don't tell you often enough how much I appreciate all you do, and all you did, during the campaign. You're a rock. But you move like lightning. ;-)

As for chair... sigh. I don't know. I'd like to see a woman for a change. If we could only clone Nancy Pelosi.

I'm late to this conversation, has there been any discussion other than the obvious, Dean?

Roemer is from my home state, a good Notre Dame grad, but Wellington looks interesting. His wife was a player. That sets well with me.

Good topic, Resolute. Again, this weekend, when the dust clears, I'll check on these links and get up to speed on this issue.

Marjorie-
Yup. I don't think it's a secret Dean still really wants to be president. And he doesn't have to build a grassroots base, he already has one. Although if he becomes DNC chair he cannot run for prez in '08.

What a great start we are having to 2005....

-The Chimp is inaugurated...again.

-We have the bloodiest day in Iraq. 37 US soldiers dead.

-Johnny Carson dies

And it's only January. Sheesh!

Tapestry artist reveals ancestors of US president as murderous bunch

It is perhaps not the best omen for US foreign
affairs. Local historians in Wexford have discovered that George Bush is a descendant of Strongbow, the power-hungry warlord who led the Norman invasion of Ireland thus heralding 800 years of mutual misery.

With a long line of Scots Irish presidents including Woodrow Wilson, the Irish are normally quick to claim US leaders as their own. But, despite President Bush's large Ulster Scots vote in the American Bible belt, Ireland had let his family escape the genealogical microscope.

"It is one of those bizarre developments," she said. "We traced the Bush genealogy through a Republican source in Chicago and found it was correct. People here are absolutely shocked. I'm not sure what the wider reaction will be, Bush has not been seen as a great friend of the Irish."

Indeed, when Mr Bush visited a County Clare castle last year, radio talk-show hosts asked: "Is this the most hated American ever to set foot on Irish soil?"

The US president's now apparent ancestor, Richard de Clare, Earl of Pembroke - known as Strongbow for his arrow skills - is remembered as a desperate, land-grabbing warlord whose calamitous foreign adventure led to the suffering of generations. Shunned by Henry II, he offered his services as a mercenary in the 12th century invasion of Wexford in exchange for power and land. When he eventually died of a festering
ulcer in his foot, his enemies said it was the revenge of Irish saints whose shrines he had violated.

more...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,13...

Meanwhile, Cheney is over in the Ukraine wearing an orange tie & then will show up at Auschwitz - how ironic ..

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39783-20...

Bush Caught Off-Guard by Case of Jailed Jordanian

President Bush was stumped yesterday when he was asked at his news conference about the plight of a Jordanian man who faces a two-year prison term for slander after giving a lecture last month calling for a boycott of American goods and companies. "I'm unaware of the case," he said.

The circumstances are somewhat murky, but in many ways the case signifies the difficult choices and
trade-offs inherent in Bush's call in his inaugural address for the right to dissent and protest around the world.

Jordan is a close U.S. ally, ruled by a monarch, whose support has been critical in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and the war in Iraq, despite growing resentment among Jordanian citizens over these policies. Ali Hattar, the man charged with slander, is vehemently opposed to Jordan's 1994 establishment of relations with Israel, which he has demanded be reversed. Hattar is not a democracy activist, nor would he be considered an appealing figure by many Americans, but he has been charged under a type of
vague law frequently used to suppress dissent across the Middle East.

Tom Malinowski, Washington advocacy director of Human Rights Watch, said there are few activists in the Middle East who could be considered supportive of U.S. policies. Yet Bush said last week that the United States will press of the cause of "free dissent and the participation of the governed" with "every ruler and every nation."

This is an internet poll & it's big (American On-Line) & quite a cross-section (not studded with liberals) & you're looking at it before it's hacked to look more Republican (as happens):

How would you rate Bush's handling of Iraq?
Poor 73%
Good 11%
Excellent 10%
Fair 6%
 
Has the war in Iraq been worth the human cost?
No 75%
Yes 14%
It's too early to tell 11%

What should we do with troop levels in Iraq?
Decrease 59%
Increase 21%
Maintain 21%

How optimistic are you about the future of Iraq?
Not at all 48%
Barely 24%
Very 15%
Somewhat 13%
Total Votes: 151,393

A reminder to send thank yous and/or money, for those like me who come online later and can't read the whole day's posting:

NAY votes on the SofS:
[send them thanks]

Levin(MI)
Dayton(MN)
Kennedy(MA)
Bayh(IN)
Boxer(CA)
Byrd(WV) - a most inspiring, eloquent and emphatic NO!
Kerry (MA)
Durbin(IL)
Reed(RI)
Jeffords (IND-VT)
Harkin (IA)
Akaka (HI)
Lautenberg (NJ)

FINAL TALLY: 85-13 [AYE-NAY]

Thanks for the tally above, Amy. "Thank you" pipelines are high on my list. I fully support those who stand up and speak truth to power and look forward to strengthening, and widening, those pipelines in the future.

Reposting for anyone who missed this:

We’ve Got Your Back John Kerry!
26 January 2005

John Kerry’s new Kids Come First Act (S.114) deserves our support. We have created an action alert on Congress.org to make it easy for everyone to send a letter to their Senators urging them to Co-Sponsor the Kids Come First Act in the Senate.

http://www.lightupthedarkness.org/blog/default.asp?view=plink&id=277

On one of the cable talk shows Wednesday, there was an interesting observation by Dana Milbank, former Washington Post White House correspondent and now its national political correspondent. Bush had said in his morning press conference that "millions" would vote in the Iraqi election, but Milbank noted that in an interview later in the day, the President said "thousands" would vote. So, Milbank said, "we can only hope that some dozens will vote . . . "

VA hospitals overwhelmed with patients
More than 300,000 veterans report outstanding claims
By Kevin Corke
NBC Correspondent
Updated: 9:27 p.m. ET Jan. 26, 2005

WASHINGTON - Twenty-two-year-old Marine Cpl. Visnu Gonzalez was in Fallujah on April 21 when snipers opened fire. He was struck twice and paralyzed from the waist down.

"[The bullet] got my spine and went through the center of my back," he remembers.

Thirty-eight years ago, Artie Guerrero was fighting a different war — in Vietnam.

"I took an AK-47 all the way through the right shoulder, grenade shrapnel on the left shoulder, and a .45 slug from a grease gun on the left thigh," Guerrero recalls.

Today, both Guerrero and Gonzalez are depending on the same Veterans Affairs healthcare system for treatment. Corporal Gonzalez is one of 5,000 soldiers too injured to return to the front.

With the combination of aging veterans living longer and new veterans coming home, there are more than 300,000 VA claims still waiting to be processed. Some VA patients wait up to a year to see specialists. Artie Guerrero says he's on a waiting list.

"I was told I had high blood pressure and I needed to be monitored and it was an emergency," he says. "They wanted to do a 24-hour check on me. I still have not been contacted for that appointment to get a heart monitor."
[SNIP]

But some members of Congress are concerned current VA funding levels may not keep up with demand in the years to come.

"Funding has increased, but it hasn't increased at the same level the veterans themselves are increasing," says Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La. "And so healthcare is being basically rationed to our veterans."

It's a system under growing pressure, at a time when a new generation of veterans hope the sacrifices they made at war will be remembered — and the promises made to them at home will be kept.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6872403/

Congress Shows Sadness, Division on Iraq
By LIZ SIDOTI The Associated Press
Wednesday, January 26, 2005; 9:38 PM

WASHINGTON - As the U.S. military sustained its deadliest day since the Iraq war began, members of Congress expressed sadness and division over how the United States should proceed.

Some lawmakers, mostly Republicans, said the casualties underscore the need to stay the course of establishing democracy and training an Iraqi security force to enable U.S. troops to pull out. Others, primarily Democrats, contended that the death toll's sharp increase raises questions about President Bush's exit strategy.
[SNIP]

Democrats were divided. Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., said, "If you believe in the mission, you've got to go on." Yet Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., contended: "Today's violence and tragic deaths of our soldiers underscore the need for President Bush to face reality. His policy is failing."

On Thursday, Kennedy will become the first senator to publicly call for U.S. troops to start coming home after the election. "It will not be easy to extricate ourselves from Iraq, but we must begin," he will say, according to his prepared remarks.

Two dozen House Democrats introduced a resolution urging Bush to withdraw troops immediately.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, said Congress must recognize it has "an obligation not to political philosophy but to the lives of those young men and women on the front line."

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/breaking_news/10742290.htm?1c

What-If A-Bomb Postulator Ascends
By Al Kamen
Wednesday, January 26, 2005; Page A19

The diplo crowd had raised its hopes of late that Condoleezza Rice would return to her realist roots once confirmed as secretary of state and then restrain ideological activists at the Pentagon.

The diplos watched approvingly as Rice tapped a number of career officers and former secretary of state James A. Baker III hands to senior-most jobs . . . .

But word last week, according to the San Jose Mercury News, was that Rice had tapped Stanford University professor Stephen D. Krasner, a close pal and mentor from university days, to the key job of director of policy planning.
[SNIP]

. . . though he has long been respected as a premier thinker firmly in the realist camp, his latest views on preventive war seem to be more in sync with the Pentagon's, judging from his article in the most recent issue of Foreign Policy. In that piece, Krasner speculates on what would happen if terrorists set off nuclear explosions here and in New Delhi, Berlin and Los Angeles.

"Full-scale preventive wars would be accepted in principle," he says, "and the major powers would no longer" bother trying to get United Nations approval. "A consortium of major powers would assume executive authority and declare the international legal sovereignty of the occupied territory null and void.

"A state's right to control the exploitation of its natural resources (most notably oil) within its territory will be an added casualty," Krasner writes, adding that there is a "growing tension" between states that cannot manage their internal affairs and "the handful of states that possess the means and wherewithal to set matters right."

Meanwhile, U.N. membership "would be contingent upon a state's ability to effectively control it's own territory," he predicts. Presumably he is exempting America's inability to control immigration across its borders. Well, no confirmation required for this gig.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36392-2005Jan25.html

THE BOXER REBELLION
John Nichols, The Nation
Barbara Boxer's impassioned critique of Condoleezza Rice marks the senator as a hero of the left.
http://www.alternet.org/story/21098/

RICE CONFIRMED
Sen. Edward M. Kennedy
Edward Kennedy explains why he voted against Condoleezza Rice's confirmation as Secretary of State on Wednesday.
http://www.alternet.org/story/21094/

Senate Votes 85-13 For Rice: How Did Your Senator Vote?
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0126-10.htm

Roll Call 2: On the Nomination (Confirmation Condoleezza Rice, of California, to be Secretary of State )

No 13

Akaka (D-HI)
Bayh (D-IN)
Boxer (D-CA)
Byrd (D-WV)
Dayton (D-MN)
Durbin (D-IL)
Harkin (D-IA)
Jeffords (I-VT)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Levin (D-MI)
Reed (D-RI)
* * * * *
Yea 85

Alexander (R-TN)
Allard (R-CO)
Allen (R-VA)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bennett (R-UT)
Biden (D-DE)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Chafee (R-RI)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Clinton (D-NY)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Coleman (R-MN)
Collins (R-ME)
Conrad (D-ND)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Corzine (D-NJ)
Craig (R-ID)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
DeWine (R-OH)
Dodd (D-CT)
Dole (R-NC)
Domenici (R-NM)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Feingold (D-WI)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Frist (R-TN)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Hagel (R-NE)
Hatch (R-UT)
Hutchison (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Inouye (D-HI)
Isakson (R-GA)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kohl (D-WI)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Leahy (D-VT)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Lott (R-MS)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCain (R-AZ)
McConnell (R-KY)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Obama (D-IL)
Pryor (D-AR)
Reid (D-NV)
Roberts (R-KS)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Santorum (R-PA)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Smith (R-OR)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Stevens (R-AK)
Sununu (R-NH)
Talent (R-MO)
Thomas (R-WY)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Voinovich (R-OH)
Warner (R-VA)
Wyden (D-OR)
* * * * *
Not Voting 2
Burns (R-MT)
Gregg (R-NH)
* * * * *
I suspect everyone on this blog already has this link, but just in case.... the alpha list of senators & email addresses:
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

This author says it better than most:

http://207.44.245.159/article7824.htm

Paul Craig Roberts: A Party Without Virtue
by Paul Craig Roberts

01/25/05 "LewRockwell.com" -- After listening to his inaugural speech, anyone who thinks President Bush and his handlers are sane needs to visit a psychiatrist. The hubris-filled megalomaniac in the Oval Office has promised the world war without end.

Bush’s crazy talk has even upset rah-rah Republicans. One Republican called Bush’s speech "God-drenched." It has begun to dawn on the formerly Grand Old Party that a bloodless coup has occurred and that Republicans have lost their party to Jacobins, who cloak themselves under the term "neoconservatives."

What is a Jacobin? Jacobins ushered in the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror. The Jacobins saw themselves as virtuous champions of universalist principles that required them to impose "liberty, equality, fraternity" not merely on France by a reign of terror, but also on the rest of Europe by force of arms.

Unlike America’s Founding Fathers, who exhorted their countrymen to cultivate their own garden, Jacobins were not content with revolutionizing France. They were driven to revolutionize the world

President Bush’s second inaugural speech is Jacobin to the core. It stands outside the American tradition. Declaring American values to be universalist principles, Bush promised to use American power to spread democracy and to end tyranny everywhere on earth. As one of Bush’s neocon puppetmasters, Robert Kagen, approvingly wrote in the Washington Post on January 23, "The goal of American foreign policy is now to spread democracy, for its own sake, for reasons that transcend specific threats. In short, Bush has unmoored his foreign policy from the war on terrorism."

Michael Gerson, the Jacobin White House speechwriter who wrote Bush’s infamous "God-drenched speech," defensively insists that Bush’s wars will only last "a generation." We can take comfort in that. According to the dictionary, a generation is "about 30 years," so it is only our children and grandchildren who will have to be sacrificed for "Bush’s historic mission." Along about 2035 things should be calming down. Whoever remains can begin to attack the $50 trillion national war debt.

Kagen calls America’s moral crusade against the world "the higher realism that Bush now proclaims." Gerson declares that Bush’s "methods are deeply realistic."

What is realistic about declaring weapons of mass destruction to exist where they do not exist?

What is realistic about assigning blame for September 11 where it does not belong?

What is realistic about destroying a secular state and creating a vast breeding ground for terrorists?

What is realistic about making Osama bin Laden an Islamic hero and shaking the foundations of America’s reigning puppets in the Middle East?

What is realistic about declaring a world crusade in the face of evidence that the US cannot successfully occupy Baghdad, a city of only 6 million people, much less Iraq, a country of only 25 million people?

There is nothing realistic about Bush or any of his advisers. The world has not seen such delusion since the Children’s Crusade led by a visionary French peasant, Stephen of Cloyes, marched off to free the Holy Land from the Muslims in the year 1212. The children were captured and sold into slavery.

Bush and the Republican Party have morphed into a Jacobin Party. They sincerely believe that they have a monopoly on virtue and the obligation to impose US virtue on the rest of the world. This Jacobin program requires the supremacy of executive power and is dependent on an unwarranted belief in the efficacy of force.

There is nothing American or democratic about this program. Bush speaks as Robespierre when he invokes "a fire in the minds of men" that "warms those who feel its power." Bush possesses Robespierre’s "pure conscience" as he destroys Iraqi’s infrastructure and the lives of tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians, levels cities, and practices torture. American casualties (dead and wounded) have reached 10 percent of the US occupation force and are but the "realistic methods" Bush uses to achieve his "deeply idealistic" goals.

At home the casualties are the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. Republicans explode in anger when a liberal judge creates a constitutional right. But they sit in silence when the US Department of Justice (sic) creates the right for Bush to decide who has constitutional protections and who has not.

Like Robespierre, Bush justifies the state of terror that he has brought to Iraq by his noble aspirations. The effect is to destroy idealism with hypocrisy about violence. When the neoconservatives succeed in draining idealism of its power, will they then declare violence alone to be their goal?

Led by Bush, the Republican Party now stands for detainment without trial and war without end. It is a party destructive of all virtue and a great threat to life and liberty on earth.

Dr. Roberts [send him mail] is John M. Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy and Research Fellow at the Independent Institute. He is a former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal, former contributing editor for National Review, and a former assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury. He is the co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.

NonnyO,

Great article - I've sent it off to my Democracy Cell email list.

I agree that when I read the MoveOn email it seemed to me that they were trying to build support for Dean. This in light of the fact that there is apparently a move a foot to try to stop Dean.

So I would ask MoveOne to ask Dean how he plans to bring the party together, after having savaged all but his "democratic wing" of the democratic party.

Another question I would ask is - how does he plan on correcting the level of disrespect and suspicion regarding Senator Kerry, one of the party leaders, that he has fostered and encouraged since the primaries. Will he support the current Dem leadership or will he undermine it because it's the "old" leadership.

Finally, I would ask each candidate, what should be done to fund Dem think tanks, media outlets, training programs? Will the Dem party start taking infrastructure seriously, give funding to groups like DCP and others that are trying to grow grassroots activism and provide a forum for civil discussion of progressive ideas? If not, what do they have in mind?

Posted by: Indy at January 26, 2005 03:18 PM from previous thread....

Thank you, Indy.... Very perceptive and very accurate!!! (IMHO)

I've known this was coming by following the rhetoric about "nation building" from Bush's 2000 debates with Gore and journaled extensively about how if he was elected that year we would (1) invade Iraq so he could finish his daddy's war - there is something sickly Oedepal going on there, too, plus - in my opinion - he is a psychopath [alternate names for the same psychological conditon are sociopath, and anti-social personality disorder; they all mean a person born without a conscience - and they are born that way, not made]; and (2) this country would go into a recession. His practiced rhetoric just gets more religiously patriotic, more repetitive, and more practiced. It's the repetition of the big lies that make people numb to hearing the truth; and worse, the bigger the lie, the more he's believed..... (Hitler did it, too.)

If you've been following the PBS documentaries on Auschwitz last week and this week, you will have intuited and compared the "work camps" that the concentration camps were set up to be until people realized murder on a massive scale was being carried out (talk about "ethnic cleansing!") and the POW camps on Guantanamo and the Abu Ghraib - and then there's that little jet that takes prisoners to other countries where interrogation procedures are known to be more brutal, where ours are officially not.... although the Executive Order Bush signed that approved the torture would prove otherwise if it were widely known about. One of the soldiers seeking asylum in Canada spoke about the fact that the new military recruits were told that they didn't have to follow illegal and immoral orders... which was the finding at Nuremburg.... and it's no longer a justifiable defense for a soldier to say "I was only following orders" while committing atrocities, torture, and murder.... To say that the Geneva Convention is "quaint" and "obsolete" is the height of stupidity...!

Bush will somehow try to get his Social Security crap through the legislature, too. I accidentally (most definitely not on purpose!!!) caught the "news conference" yesterday morning and he said he would be "carrying his message directly to the people" in the next coming weeks, so he's going to use Air Force One to go out and campaign for his fake Social Security crisis (ignoring math, of course) by scaring people half to death about the future of Social Security. We know the ultimate aim of any Social Security reforms are to enrich his buddies on Wall Street, but the morons who only get their news on TV (ugh, mostly on Faux, I'm sure!) will probably believe every lying word he says; people believed Hitler, too.....

I agree with your comparisons of Bush to Hitler (and those who have written about it before the election comparing the two, also - and that was before anything was known about Gonzales!); I've watched and compared it all over the last few years, not wanting to believe what I know is happening, although I know perfectly well it is, and at an accelerated pace since 9/11 (the most fortunate day in the life of GWB - and the more I hear about 9/11, the more I wonder...!) and the immediate passing of the Patriot Act, the combining of religious and patriotic rhethoric in the same sentences, not to mention the Executive Order that funded faith-based charities early on in his first administration when he knew he'd never get it through the legislature so the religious 'leaders' would back him. Whenever he knows even the Republican legislators won't go for his idiotic notions, he gets around all of it by signing yet another Executive Order, often in secret. It's fairly easy for me to deconstruct his speeches; I had practice deconstructing his father's speeches when the honors class I was in when his daddy went to war in Iraq was going on and we studied "media manipulation" as our topic. And, I know perfectly well dissenting voices are not believed even if they are aired on TV because there's just too much propaganda coming from the White House (Hitler would have been envious of current media practices, and very proud of how BushCo has handled combining religious values with moral and ethical values to justify his illegal, immoral, and unethical actions.)

Bush talks about tyranny around the world and people in this country fail to recognize Bush as the imperialist tyrant that heads our own government, or that he proceeds in secrecy when he can't get approval for his idiotic legislation (which never fails to make the BushCo cronies and corporations richer while making the rest of us all poorer financially). Bush talks about human rights violations around the world and the media is mum about the human rights abuses committed by US personnel at Guantanamo daily and at Abu Ghraib and prisoners being taken to other lands for torturing - human rights abuses committed by our government that he himself approved in our name!!! Half of us don't even know it's going on if they missed the brief news shows about it; the rest of us are appalled and ashamed beyond belief because we were absolutely never taught those monstrous "values" while growing up, either from our parents or the communities we came from.

I used to read quite a bit about WWII and the concentration camps. I quit doing so years ago because it made me ill and gave me nightmares to read the descriptions of the horrors. Only after one of my father's brothers died did I find out he'd been decorated in WWII and his group opened Bergen-Belsen (an event that put him into an alcoholic stupor after the war, and something that he would never talk about - ever - after he sobered up). I believe our country is already where Germany was just prior to the outbreak of the WWII, and it makes me weep in frustration that so few people seem to grasp that fact. We have no moral compass because our "leader" doesn't have a conscience, and his religious rhetoric and patriotic pretense rings hollow and hypocritical. He's a myopic, selfish, greedy little man who seeks to enrich himself and his cronies (and their corporations) and gain money and world acclaim if not world power as a "leader" - and he's so morally bankrupt he'll get this nation into trouble with the rest of the world for years to come, if not armed conflict with the rest of the world because of his arrogance and presumption of power and world dominance - which could make 9/11 look like a cake-walk next to armed conflict on our soil. Yes, I've wondered if that's a possibility.... If other countries decide to do a "pre-emptive strike" on the US because BushCo seems to be a threat to their countries (and he may just be exactly that to more than one country; Iran comes to mind first...) - just as BushCo imagined Iraq's threat to the US (even though he planned that invasion before 9/11, and used 9/11 as an excuse for pre-emption against the "threat" of Iraq, and all the lies to justify the invasion after that - the PNAC web site has the blueprint for taking over the world), it wouldn't surprise me in the least to see armed conflict here on our soil instead of "over there" - wherever "over there" happens to be in BushCo's imagination next as the better place to carry out a war. We do not have the moral high ground to say we haven't committed atrocities every bit as bad as Saddam Hussein did to his own people (especially since the US sold him the supplies to commit his atrocities against his own people in the first place!), or that our "leader" isn't every bit as bad as Hussein himself. Different nationality; same mentality. Hitler, Hussein, Bush.... Pick your dictator.... (IMHO, his body language betrays him and he is very much acting and thinking like a dictator right now.)

Over a blow job given to a president by a stupid woman who was seeking to acquire power for herself by having sex with a powerful man we heard endless garbage every day, two or three or four times a day in minute and boring detail for years on end - and those knuckleheaded "journalists" still refer to that virtually every time they mention Clinton's name. Makes me yell at the TV: "It was a sex act, you prudish media morons!!! Get over it!!!" (Or do they still talk about it because they are secretly envious that Clinton got a little head and they didn't?!? In Bush's 'press conference' he invoked Clinton's name several times in reference to his imagined Social Security crisis because mentioned a past reference of Clinton's to Social Security... Will the media still mention the "Clinton sex scandal" (now that shrubbie wants Clinton's support for changing Social Security so the fat cats on Wall Street who support Bush can get richer) and forget there's a worse scandal going on at Guantanamo and in Iraq right now, not to mention neglect getting mathematical facts that Social Security is NOT in crisis and will not be in crisis for at least another fifty years if no one touches it???) Over torture committed by Americans and approved of by the man who is the president (and the man who will be the next AG) - and who got his office by illegal means - twice over - American media has gone silent as a tomb.... Where is the outcry by media over the illegal, immoral, and unethical behavior by BushCo and his administration?!?!? Why no hue and cry over torture and the other illegal, immoral, and unethical things going on in the BushCo administration and how BushCo's "reign of terror" is so similar to world situations in the past that have been so disastrous to so many people?!?!? (Oh.... silly me... I was forgetting for a second that mainstream media jumped on the BushCo's patriotic bandwagon with religious zeal after 9/11 and he repaid them with the communications bill he signed last June 2....)

If everyone who wants to hear only truth spoken by television media turned off their TV sets and boycotted all of their advertisers, what would happen?!? (Ah, the fantasy of it....)

My rant is over.... for the moment.... I've seen all this coming on for four years; it has sickened me... but it's like watching a train wreck in slo-mo while being frozen in shock, and knowing no one is going to stop it, least of all half of this nation's citizens and the majority of our legislators.

Torture Treaty Doesn't Bar 'Cruel, Inhuman' Tactics, Gonzales Says
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0126-06.htm

Guantánamo Bay: Isolation, Breakdowns and Mysterious Injections
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0126-03.htm

Huck Gutman | Speedy Gonzales & The Rule of Law
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0126-36.htm

CREW Files Bar Complaint Against Attorney General Nominee Alberto Gonzales
http://www.commondreams.org/news2005/0125-010.htm
The Hidden Passages in Bush’s Inaugural Address:

Bush’s Inaugural Address contained many explicit references to God, but there were even more hidden allusions to the Bible that may have been lost to many in his audience, as they were to me, before I did some research.
http://www.progressive.org/webex05/wx012105.html

Posted by: resolute at January 27, 2005 07:20 AM

Thanks resolute....!
I liked that particular piece of writing quite well. Some of the op-ed writers are becoming very adept at deconstruction BushCo's words - FINALLY!!! Indy had some great analytical insights on the previous thread (worth a revisit to read what he said).

I'm not sure who I'd support for DNC chair. I'm in the minority, but I actually like Dean - mostly because he at least has the balls to speak his mind and so danged few of our Democratic legislators have had any kind of spine in the last four years. It's made me want to offer the titanium rods supporting my spine to some of them.... :-)

Dayton first embarrassed me as a senator from my own state when he didn't back the OH voters with his lame speech on the floor that day (nor did my rep - he heard about it from me, too), but then Dayton turned around and realistically criticized Rice almost eloquently (he even made the local news with a sound byte - I'm not sure about national news since I'm boycotting them). I'm hoping Dayton keeps up his new-found voice and votes against Gonzales in the full senate vote coming up, if only in contrast to that Bush puppet Coleman from MN.... and that other Dem senators will also vote against Gonzales. The fact that the Repuke majority will approve them (Rice and Gonzales) is not the point. The point is that I am just glad that a few senators are finally voting with some sense of ethical and moral values for a change, and voting for what's right and not what's expedient. One can only compromise so far before breaking, and the Democrats have compromised to the point that most don't have any backbone at all. It will make a big difference with me come the next election....

Sad, Times 2: And it makes me wonder... how many must die for a lie, and how many believe it?

Leroy Hernandez said in a television interview that his daughter called him at work early Wednesday and told him his 22-year-old son had died in the chopper crash. Two Marines were at the house, she told her father, who lives at Canyon Lake.

"By the time I got home, my wife and kids were here," and they were trying to contact his son's wife in California, he said.

And Tony Hernandez's mother, Jan Trout, who is divorced from Leroy Hernandez, called her son's death "every mother's nightmare."

But she said she recognized that when someone goes to war, there is always the chance they won't return.

Leroy Hernandez said he supports the U.S. mission in Iraq, and his son believed in what he was doing.

"The price of democracy is very expensive. These kids are doing what they think is right," he added.

Whoever the new DNC Chair is, I want them to rally the party, insert a spine, and go after after this adminstration like our lives depend on it... cuz they do!!!!

Like Nero, Bush and the GOP fiddle while Iraq burns and both Iraqis and Americans die.
By Regis T. Sabol

Just as Nero fiddled while Rome burned, George Bush and the Republican Party threw a gaudy $40 million inaugural celebration that was arrogant, callous, and obscene.

Gleeful Republicans drank champagne and danced the night away while 70 percent of Baghdad went without water because our overtaxed, poorly equipped and undermanned forces were unable to protect the city’s water supply. As the bands played on in Washington, American troops hunkered down and Iraqis bled and died in an explosion of insurgent car bomb attacks across Iraq that rivaled the fireworks display in the nation's capital.

Powerful corporations and their lobbyists threw around dollars like so much confetti at decadent parties entertaining Republicans who now control all three branches of government and the fate of our nation while 36 million Americans live in poverty, their numbers growing as the families of National Guard and Reserve units trapped in Iraq for more than a year struggle to make ends meet at home and fear for the lives and safety of their loved ones at war.

Republican movers and shakers like Bill Frist, Dennis Hastert, Tom DeLay, as well as chairs and members of powerful committees that will determine the legislative agenda for this Congress bellied up to the troughs of the pharmaceutical and health care industries, and HMO’s while 45 million Americans, including many families of our National Guard and Reserves, lack basic health care coverage.

Even though American men and women are fighting and dying in the streets and along the highways in Iraq and in the mountains of Afghanistan at a cost of 1,360 dead and more than 10,000 maimed and wounded in Iraq alone, Bush did not even mention Iraq or Afghanistan in an inaugural address that was, to use Shakespeare's words, “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

While Bush repeated words like freedom and liberty in almost every sentence, millions of Americans have found, “Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.” The entire ostentatious spectacle was like one of the floats that rolled down Pennsylvania Avenue -- flimsy and hollow, “a Barnum & Bailey world, just as phony as it can be.”

Ted Turner Calls Fox 'Propaganda Voice' for Bush

LAS VEGAS (Jan. 26) - CNN founder Ted Turner has called the Fox television network a "propaganda voice" of the Bush administration and compared Fox News Channel's popularity to Adolf Hitler's rise in Germany before World War II.

Turner, in a speech Tuesday to the National Association of Television Programming Executives, also targeted "gigantic companies whose agenda goes beyond broadcasting" for timidity in challenging the Bush White House.

"There's one network, Fox, that's a propaganda voice for them," the cable news pioneer said. "It's certainly legal. But it does pose problems for our democracy when the news is 'dumbed-down."'

Fox News in New York issued a statement saying, "Ted is understandably bitter having lost his ratings, his network and now his mind - we wish him well."

Turner, 66, stepped down as vice chairman of AOL Time Warner in May 2003.

During a question-and-answer session moderated by former CNN anchorman Bernard Shaw, Turner called it "not necessarily a bad thing" that Fox ratings top CNN and other cable news networks.

"Adolf Hitler was more popular in Germany in the early '30s than ... people that were running against him," Turner said in remarks videotaped by conference administrators. "So just because you're bigger doesn't mean you're right."

Convention spokeswoman Michelle Mikoljak said the association had no comment about Turner's comments.

Turner heads an Atlanta-based philanthropic and business empire.

Posted by: Marc Trager at January 27, 2005 08:53 AM

"bush fiddels while Iraq burns" ... I like that, good point.

"Ted is understandably bitter having lost his ratings, his network and now his mind - we wish him well."

Yeah, that's what I'd expect from a Repug mouthpiece like Chicken Pox News... having an opinion other than theirs means you've lost your mind.

I especially like the 'we wish him well" part... dripping with compassion. Just like Shrub-a-dub-dumb.

Go down to the URL. There are pictures and comments from inauguration day. The most striking was the empty bleachers along the parade route, which obviously was not reported in the news. This comes from Canary Coalition.

Excerpt:
On Thursday, January 20, fourteen days after the historic street protest and objection to the Ohio Electors in the Joint Session of Congress, the Presidential inauguration and counter-inauguration took place in the nation's Capitol. If you were not there and your only source of news was the mainstream news media, you don't know what really happened on that day.

In this report I've tried to accurately portray what I witnessed in the streets of Washington DC. I make no pretension of objectivity in my perspective of the last election and the character of our President and the Republican leadership in Congress. They are dangerous and the democratic tradition of our country is being challenged.

Since the report includes photograghs and short video clips that would take up too much of your time to download in an email, I've created a webpage and linked to it for those who want to read the report. Please pass it on and post it wherever you feel it would be appropriate.

http://www.friedman-sun.com/inaug/jan20.htm

I can see advantages and disadvantages to Dean, Rosenberg, and Frost being DNC chair.

(Frost used to represent me in congress till DeLay pulled his dirty tricks.)

But as Amy I think said the other day, whoever is elected chair I will support and work my tail off for.

Bush infidels while the middle east burns, I'll bet some would say!

Animated Cartoon Banned Because it Shows Lesbians in the Background at a Vermont Maple Sugar Farm

http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/2005/01/22/wgbh_delays_show_featuring_lesbians/

When cartoons start showing lesbian or gay couples making out, then maybe I'll have an issue... until then, maybe the pillars of morality should go after some of their own, like the drug abusing, marriage carousel Rush Limbaugh, or the sexual harrassment guru Bill O'Reilly, or that smut king Jimmy Swaggart. need I go on?

To speak "their" language (which is also mine), the Good Book commands us to see not only the splinter in our adversary's eye, but also the beam in our own.

Look it up, hyprocites.

Amidst the horrors of war and lies and other skullduggery, a few wry giggles:

POLITICAL OSCARS 2005
Arianna Huffington, AlterNet
In a world where politics and entertainment are almost inseparable,
why not offer some awards to the politicos, too?
http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/21092/

Then back to reality....

Dream On America: The U.S. Model:
For years, much of the world did aspire to the American way of life. But today countries are finding more appealing systems in their own backyards.
http://207.44.245.159/article7827.htm

The right wingnuts get nuttier by the minute some days. As the article said, the adults are in the background and Buster spends his time with the kids.... And the issue is...??? WHAT, precisely?!?!? Just as I asked about the idiotic Tiggy Winky and the recent Spongebob Squarepants "issue"... What, precisely, is the "issue"??? Describe in detail what the dirty particulars are before finding problems where none exist... no profanity, no lewd and lacivious acts, no drug use, no lies, no bullying, no violence.... so the issue is WHAT?!?!? Making much ado about something imagined - just like shrubbie is so good at doing??? Creating an imaginary "issue" for people to talk about as a diversion away from the illegal, immoral, and unethical activities going on in the White House??? Creating an "issue" for people to talk about so they don't talk about the horrors going on with torturing prisoners in Gitmo and Abu Ghraib, or - realizing that the "democracy our troops are fighting for" is NOT our democracy, but the democracy that Iraqis didn't ask us to put in place, and now will resent because a puppet democracy will be set up in place to bow to the wishes of BushCo.....

All those people - Americans and Iraqis and British and others... killed for the sake of who controls the oil beneath the sands of Iraq.... What a f***ing waste of perfectly good lives!!!

If I understand this correctly, this guy is a Repub from Texas. I expect the typical right-wing-echo-chamber response-shoot the messenger.

HON. RON PAUL OF TEXAS
BEFORE THE US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
January 26, 2005

What If (It was all a Big Mistake)?

America’s policy of foreign intervention, while still debated in the early 20th century, is today accepted as conventional wisdom by both political parties. But what if the overall policy is a colossal mistake, a major error in judgment? Not just bad judgment regarding when and where to impose ourselves, but the entire premise that we have a moral right to meddle in the affairs of others? Think of the untold harm done by years of fighting-- hundreds of thousands of American casualties, hundreds of thousands of foreign civilian casualties, and unbelievable human and economic costs. What if it was all needlessly borne by the American people? If we do conclude that grave foreign policy errors have been made, a very serious question must be asked: What would it take to change our policy to one more compatible with a true republic’s goal of peace, commerce, and friendship with all nations? Is it not possible that Washington’s admonition to avoid entangling alliances is sound advice even today?

http://www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec2005/cr012605.htm

Whoever the new DNC Chair is, I want them to rally the party, insert a spine, and go after after this adminstration like our lives depend on it... cuz they do!!!!

Posted by: Marc Trager at January 27, 2005 09:21 AM

Marc,

Luv ya, but hate that "insert a spine" garbage - since it was and still is being used primarily against Kerry.

I think the Dems were stupid enough to think that congeniality and compromise with the party in power would yield the best results as it has for the past 200 years. Unfortunately that wasn't the case. I don't think they were prepared to be lied to quite so blatantly, i.e. the war authorization vote comes to mind. And in fairness - who knew?

Can we talk about the Dems taking on new tactics to fight the Repubs without talking about "inserting" spines (because of course we all know that it's easier to "have a spine" when you are jeering from the sidelines and have nothing at stake, or any responsibility for your consitutents)?

Again, my main question to Dean would be...how do you propose to heal the wounds between the left wing of the party and all the other party elements that were reviled in the primary?

I've heard that Fowler is a popular choice. Anyone have an opinion? How about the folks from Texas? Was he a good representative?

Benson on Bush the Aviator..

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/opinions/benson/

By the way, great discussion on Air America's morning program "Unfiltered." They payed tribute to those Senators who voted not to confirm Condy and Rachel Maddow actually singled Kerry and Boxer out for a special thanks - for taking that brave first step of voting against her in committee, allowing others the cover they needed to vote no in the Senate vote. They played Bette Midler's rendition of "Wind Beneath My Wings" to honor them as "our heros." I'm so glad that very progressive program pointed out Kerry's role in this - as they are usually super critical.

Anywho, they had Ralph Neas from People For the American Way on to talk about the Gonzales confirmation process - but more importantly, to talk about the attempt by Frist and Bush to get rid of the last bastion of power the Dems have in stopping Bush's judicial nominations - the filibuster.

So please visit the PFAW web site and sign the petition that will be sent to the 18 Republican Senators they think can be persuaded to vote with Dem Senators in unholding the sacred right to hold filibusters on the floor of the Senate. If Frist succeeds - the sole remaining check in our savaged system of checks and balances - will be destroyed.

http://www.pfaw.org/pfaw/general/

Very good read............

Wednesday, January 26th, 2005
Seymour Hersh: "We've Been Taken Over by a Cult"

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to Seymour Hersh, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, author of the book, Chain Of Command: The Road From 9-11 to Abu Ghraib. He spoke recently at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/26/1450204

And back OT...........

Left for Dead
Democrats still insist on righting themselves to compete with the GOP

http://villagevoice.com/news/0504,mondo1,60422,6.html

Maureen Dowd and paying the media..

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/27/opinion/27dowd.html?oref=login&n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists%2fMaureen%20Dowd

Resolute I am with you about Dean being too polarized. Everyone here talks about solidifying the Progressive wing of our party. That gets us about 42-45% of the vote that doesn't win too many elections Martin Frost is the ex Congressman that the Texas party supports. He's actually a very good communicator and the right eprsonality and the right section of the country for the party. Simon Rsoenberg runs a Dem. Action Commitee that is getting rave reviews and seems to have the right balance and communications skills, tempermant and strategy that I am attracted to. Having worked with Mayor Webb I got to learn his methods of running a statewide campaign and personally my top choice b/c I strongly feel we must win Colorado, New Mexico. Nevada and Arizona next time where he will be the strongest. I am prejudice here though b/c I spent a great deal of time in Denver in Oct. and was blown away with their campaign operation.

Anyone hear Bush press conference yesterday (which I ususally refuse to listen to). His callousness toward the 31 lost marines and oh its all in a day's work attitude infuriated me. For the life of me I don't see how voters saw him as warm or mrally centered. I didn't hear one oz of empathy from him. I guess when lost American souls are not part of his campaign startegy they are irrelevant. As my wife said yesterday they are not part of the unborn world for him to empathisize with.

I don't believe Fowler is from Texas, Resolute I think you are thinking of Martin Frost. Frost is a cousin of a close friend of mine and Frost was re-elected 15 times and would have won but for Redistricting. he's from a conservative part of Texas Ft. Worth and connected well with his constituents until they suddenly disappeared. Fowler seems to shoot from the hip as they say. He appears young and inexpierenced to me but maybe we need that kind of image rather than the old guard. Its a close call but Rosenberg/Webb/Frost are my front runners.

Posted by: Ira at January 27, 2005 11:56 AM

Ira,

Thanks for clarifying that for me - and thanks for your observations, they are very helpful.

Yes, from your descriptions Webb and Frost sound like great choices. I think Rosenberg looks good, too, but it concerns me that Joe Trippi has endorsed him. Does that mean Trippi would be providing him with strategy tips? If so, that's not good.

I think it was a very provocative move for Dean to hire Jim Jordan, who was fired from the Kerry campaign and who was the one who was spreading rumors about Kerry and the intern during the primaries. I take the move as rather a slap in the face to Kerry - but perhaps not intended as such.

DNC Chair..... DNC Chair....hmmmm

I can't get over the thought that in short order one of these candidates is going to be the one authoring the letters asking us for our money.
I've read everything I can get my hands on about all the candidates and i'm not sure that any one of them completely fills the bill.

I know I am not for Dean. The more that time has gone on, the more i am repelled by him. Its' a feeling, not a fact, that he would be very bad for the chair. Why do I come back to the feeling over and over, that the Democratic party does not control any branch of government right now, and old Howie would in a sense have the last laugh? He would be a winner somewhere, while John Kerry is still a loser. Is seeing it like that crazy?

Roemer? Rosenberg? Fowler? i can discover a postive in each of them, would that I could mingle the three together and come up with an ideal DNC chair. I ask myself, if it were me, trying to gather a following, raise money, and formulate a message, what kind of person would I have to be.

You all take about spines. I take that to mean you think we cannot be tenative, hesitant or meek. My chair is a person who has a mountain of facts avaialbe to them and can speak those facts with utter clarity. What my chair needs is a presence that is hard to ignore. My chair is not easily ridiculed.

Who are the repbulicans most worried about in the position? Who would be the most damaging to them with their skill? Those are my questions. Right now, not one candidate speaks to me enough to make me be sure i will be able to listen to them for the next few years.

Democrats have been accused of being all over the map, of not having a clear message, of being weak. The DNC chair is going to have the overwhelming task of dispelling those imprints on the party. So, my question is this? Would I be able to take the new chair into my community and have him come away with new, energized, willing partners in the quest for democracy, (with a small 'd') so much so that they register and vote Democrat (with a large D)

We cannot afford to be the "anybody but" party ever again. We cannot have people who are for our candidates out of desperation. So, DNC chair to be, can you please make our party widely respected? That's all i need.

resolute... luv ya too, but when I see and hear the absolutely hollow words coming from the majority (not all) of the dems, especially this past week or so, I'm afraid I am left with a rather spineless impression.

Biden, Lieberman, Obama, etc... where is the outrage and the fight and the OPPOSITION to what is going on all around us?

I never leveled it at JK and never will.

Yeah, perhaps "spine" is the wrong word, but I'd like our side to stop playing "Red Rover" already.

NancyJane

I think maybe Ron Paul is one of those libertarian leaning conservatives who is fiscally conservative but isolationist & concerned about erosion of civil liberties.

Bush is capable of offending them left & right.
Congressman Ron Paul in particular was skeptical about the provisions for national identity cards and intra-national checkpoints in the near future, under the auspices of Homeland Security.

We may have some strange bedfellows in our struggle.

I went to Senator Robert Byrd's website and read his awesome speech against confirmation of Condi Rice as Secy of State. He was comprehensive and historically sequenced in the way he laid it out and his framework was the US Constitution, which he feels the neocons have tried to write an Obituary for, with their inferences that it served its purpose in the past but is now not relevant.

I printed it out & was so engrossed in reading it that I was able to screen out an entire party with cake, dignitaries, speeches and loud room noise!

I like Dean - he's funny, he's a healthcare advocate.

Politics? He rallies urban liberals but his experience includes governing a state with one zip code. He didn't win too many primaries..

We'll see.

It sounds like you believe that Trippi is radioactive. I saw the sudden falling out b/w Dean and Trippi and don't know who to attribute it to, Trippi's immaturity or Dean's losing it. Somehow I suspect the latter. Trippi and Dean both need a role in this party. Trippi for his internet genius and Dean for his passion and creativity and ability to connect with Progressives. I am part of that Kerry old guard that believe that steady and sure leadership like Rosenberg/Frost/Webb are what's best. I think these folks understand the volatile issues better like SS, Taxes and Medicare from their years and years of involvment with the DNC and Congressional leadership. I was kind of cool on Frost because he lost his election rather resoundingly but my memories of Frost and his close relationship with Ron Brown and Dick Gebhart give me good feelings towards him; Webb's connections to our nations mayors and the critical sw voters are sure pluses for him. Regarding Rosenberg's endorsement from Trippi I just don't see that as a big whoop unless you sense Trippi pulling Rosenberg's strings which I agree would be disaster.
To me it boils down to old guard vs fresh faces with more idealism but less hands on experience. Again Dean and Trippi need to have a vital role in this party just not as leaders. Personally I can't wait for the vote b/c currently their is a void in our voice at a critical time of policy debates.
Anyone know if John Kerry or Edwards have made any public comments on their preference? I will give a tremendous amount of weight to their preferences if they publicly have one.

Tutterfly your comments were right on the mark. Bush is not running again so our Chair needs to have clear, consistant, thought provoking voice of the vision of our party. Where he wants the Democratic Party to lead our nation in the next 4 years. His vision of Dems since we don't have a Dems President or candidate to speak as one voice for the party. Personally I am sick of the constant fundraising letters signed by McAuliffe I get daily. We had the dough and still didn't win, we need more.

"all take about spines. I take that to mean you think we cannot be tenative, hesitant or meek. My chair is a person who has a mountain of facts avaialbe to them and can speak those facts with utter clarity. What my chair needs is a presence that is hard to ignore. My chair is not easily ridiculed.

Who are the repbulicans most worried about in the position? Who would be the most damaging to them with their skill? Those are my questions. Right now, not one candidate speaks to me enough to make me be sure i will be able to listen to them for the next few years.

Democrats have been accused of being all over the map, of not having a clear message, of being weak. The DNC chair is going to have the overwhelming task of dispelling those imprints on the party. So, my question is this? Would I be able to take the new chair into my community and have him come away with new, energized, willing partners in the quest for democracy, (with a small 'd') so much so that they register and vote Democrat (with a large D)

We cannot afford to be the "anybody but" party ever again. We cannot have people who are for our candidates out of desperation. So, DNC chair to be, can you please make our party widely respected? That's all i need.

I think your comment that the Chair needs to Speak with CLARITY on behalf of the party sums it all up. Ridicule? I'm not sure where that comes from. Are we looking for a flame thrower or someone articulate with a vision that speaks with Clarity. I choose the latter.

Has anyone here posted about Kerry's speech?
WASHINGTON (AP) - Sen. John Kerry hasn't gone away quietly. In his first major speech since conceding the presidential election, the Massachusetts Democrat took aim at President Bush's health care proposals on Thursday, saying they were irresponsible and won't meet the needs of children and low-income families who don't have health coverage.

I'm know I'm coming at this personal, regards Dean's shots at Kerry, and seemingly continuing ones if what resolute said about Jordan is true (who made pretty bad decisions).

I just don't trust Dean to dispel any untruth about Kerry, or embrace what we as Dems have, if it means holding his flock. He will continue to make 3rd party cheap shots stick as something courageous.

He is not a uniter, and another emotional pull, same as the other side, in his not wanting clarity in favor of power.

Give me Rosenberg, and a couple more.

That Alternet article talking about disappointment in Kerry not being anti-war, probably fuming Stewart and others, it also said we could have lost badly, mentioning only in passing. To many, that was a tough thing to gamble with when we might have won, despite the press. They say we lost the continuing argument. I'm sure not going after this crowd is hurting Kerry more, and wonder what he can do now, regardless of his 2008 dreams, which many will resent his trying. A conundrum.

Dear Fellow Americans:

I have complete disgust for the Democratic Senators who voted for Condi Rice. It terribly undermines any semblence of party unity, and most importantly, any sense of ethics -- to confirm this known LIAR and propagandist, a leading participant in misleading America not once, but throughout to this very day about Iraq and every other foreign issue, who cared nothing for 911 victims families, who has lost all sense of guilt, and who has never said anything that wasn't deceiving, a deflection, or just plain vacuous.

If Democratic Senators can't stop being spineless and entangled, at least the DNC chair must be the firm voice of PEOPLE who voted for these Democrats -- the Chair's first priority is restore any last shred of credibility that the Democratic party reflects its own constituency, instead of their preoccupation with brown-nosing and ogling the Republicans, a reputation that they continue to earn.

Another first priority, is to put all the Democrats on the same page and vote as a block against the REDCOATS... and to continously scream at the media about the blatant, sick-sick-sick hypocrisy of the Republican platform in aiding and abetting the destruction of the United States of America, and not be indistinguishable from it!

This is the only course of action to save any respect for the Democratic Party, and perhaps this country.

Let me remind you of some of the traitors involved in the Condi ordeal.. and see if it makes sense to you:

Baucus (D-MT)
Biden (D-DE)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Clinton (D-NY)
Conrad (D-ND)
Corzine (D-NJ)
Dodd (D-CT)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Feingold (D-WI)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Leahy (D-VT)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Obama (D-IL)
Pryor (D-AR)
Reid (D-NV)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Wyden (D-OR)

Needless to say, Obama has already proven himself to me, let alone Biden, Lieberman, Feinstein and Hillary. What a shameful disgrace.

The above have shown terrible, reprehensible judgement and I will remember this, and remember never to vote for them in any office of responsibility. Needless to say, Repugs in are in the same boat.

And just because they are all on the top deck of the Titanic, winking amongst themselves, doesn't mean that the boat won't sink.

If you have time, embarrass your Senator if applicable.

Posted by: Edo at January 28, 2005 06:27 AM

I'm afraid I don't share your militancy and I don't think screaming and insulting is the way to effect change.

And I certainly don't think having someone as Chair who has repeatedly insulted members of his own party is a good choice, either.

Just my opinion.