All The Candidates Were Circulating Press Releases At The Debate

The Dean people have been feigning shock and disgust that another campaign would resort to such a low form of politics (apparently, calling candidates "Bush-lite" seemed within decency).

Big surprise - once again the Dean camp has egg on its face. Remember when Dean people attacked other camps for going after Clark, only to discover that Dean was going to put yet another notch on his belt? I do.

They also felt that there was a conspiracy to keep Dean off the air (another way of saying Dean's moments were uneventful, or at least uninteresting). That fed into the conspiracy between the Kerry camp and the owners of CNN to undermine the unstoppable Howard Dean.

Except, whoops, the Dean people were circulating press releases just like the rest of them.

This comes from a Slate magazine that is otherwise completely wrongheaded:

To me, though, the most interesting moment of the evening occurred backstage. The Dean campaign circulates a long release detailing how Gephardt was "instrumental" in Bush's "miserable failure" in Iraq. Smack in the middle of it is a picture of Gephardt standing next to Trent Lott, President Bush, and Denny Hastert, just over a year ago as they announced the congressional war resolution. Yes, it's a clever slap: "You think I stood with Newt Gingrich during our 'darkest hour'? Look in the mirror, buddy."

http://slate.msn.com/id/2089595/

Is Dean really going there? You bet your sweet patootie he is. Despite his normally squeaky clean campaigning, he is more than willing to "slap" Gephardt with a damning photo. Oh, the intrigue! He's not alone, of course.

One anti-Kerry release, two anti-Gephardt releases, five anti-Dean releases, and seven anti-Clark releases—but four of those anti-Clarks were put out by the Lieberman campaign.

So apparently the story is that everybody was dishing dirt, and only Kerry's was pulled out for the debates. Kerry didn't look too happy about its entrance into a moment of unusual harmony between the candidates. But he did the right thing. He acknowledged it, and returned very quickly to the on-going discussion.

Will this cause the Dean people to suddenly re-evaluate things and admit that perhaps they were hasty in their condemnation? I'll be holding my breath. I promise.

<>

I am getting sick and tired of Democrats attacking
other democrats.

Now lets make claer this... one of the Candidates today
invoked the 11th comandment (though shall not attack other
Republicans, and we can thank Ronny ray Gun)

It is time we adopt the 11th commandment for the democrats.

karl Rove is begging and egging us to fight each other.

ENOUGH of playing divide and conquer, and I do not care
who does it.. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

If we are to defeat this very real enemy of the United States
we need to be behind each other.

Take teh pledge now.

And that goes for everybody.

We Dems can be our own worst enemy. At this rate it seems like the Repukes could just sit back and watch the candidates destroy each other. They get the result they want without ever lifting a finger.

We will stand no chance of throwing these "evildoers" out of our White House if we keep this up. Divide and conquer is one of the oldest covert defeat tactics in the world ... are we really gonna fall for that???

Big picture, folks ... ANYBODY BUT BUSH IN 2004!!

This is where I have greater respect for guys like Clark and Sharpton. They save their attacks for Bush.

And that's the way it's supposed to be.

Say, still funded by the Kerry campaign?

I read the article. How did you arrive at the conclusion that "all candidates" was circulating press releases?

... can someone explain to me why it was wrong?

is it just that the moderator only used one campaign's press release, and didn't give equal time to the other campaigns?

or is there something improper about using press releases as the basis for questions?

offhand, i think it's great that Dean got a chance to answer the misinformation in Kerry's press release.