Will the Real Howard Dean Please Stand Up?

Howard Dean is not a liberal – or so say the liberals who know him best in his home state of Vermont.

"He governed from the middle," says former state Sen. Jan Backus.

Ironically, some of Vermont's Democratic Party stalwarts say Dean's centrism sent liberals running from their party to the ultra-liberal Progressive Party -- handing some elected offices to Republicans.

But such things as liberalism and conservatism are, just like beauty, in the eye of the beholder. The centrist Democratic Leadership Council has made Dean a target - as a liberal who could hand the presidential election to Republicans if he were to become the party's nominee...

The folks back home in Vermont are looking on with a combination of bewilderment and amusement at how their very own good Dr. Dean has become the focus of the debate. Absolutely no one alleges that Dean is a conservative or a wanna-be Republican. But Dean was often a lightning rod for both the right and the left during his decade-plus gubernatorial tenure in Vermont.

In interviews this week, several liberal Vermont politicians and political observers said Dean often found himself in an adversarial position with the state's liberals, as he demanded that growth in government services fall within the constraints of a balanced budget.

Even as he was unsuccessfully promoting a state version of universal health care in Vermont in the early 1990s, he was a staunch supporter of welfare reform, particularly requiring recipients to work.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A4798-2003Jul30.html

Here it comes...Dean wil now be attacked from both sides, the Republicans ,who will use his earlier silence about his conservatism to label him and extrme leftist, and the DLC who will attack Dean as being unelectable, and avenge themselves for Dean unrelenting attack on the people who helped make his political career with masive financial support.

I expected this to start after labor day, but it seems the major media is beginnning it now, a sort of preface to the full attack.

He's actually a lot more conservative that the lefties think he is, and that's OK. I was one of those who thought he was a tree-hugging welfare-'naut until I did a little digging. His only problem will come when the Republican machine tries to play him as unpatriotic for not supporting the war, and immoral for supporting gay marriage.

To a certain extent this only demonizes him with those who weren't going to vote for him anyway. The trick is in how he handles it, and how many independent or moderate voters he turns off (or hopefully on) during the handling process.

Unless Dean bombs a lot of interviews or sucks in the debates, he's a pretty damn good candidate. Dean's campaign staff is extremely talented and Dean is reasonable on the issues.

I think we all know that Dean is a mainstream democrat. He has some liberal tendencies and some moderate ones. This is not anything really new. The people of his left of center state still re-elected him five times as governor, so he must have been doing something right.

Problem is, who voted for Dean...
The indications are that largely Deans five time election was the result od republicans who were disaafected bt extreme roght win Republicans, rather than disafeected Democrats. Dean rather created disaffected democrats and weakened the Democratic Party in Vermont, jjust has happened to the Democratic Party by nominating Canmdididates like McGovern and McCarrthy.

No WE ALL DO NOT KNOW that Dean is a mainstream, democrat. He may not even be this, he certainly is a rather conservative democrat.

His fiscal policies fall outside of the democratic mainstream, and many of his social policies do as well.

There are MNAY here on DU who tout Dean as being the most progressive liberal candidate ever to run for the DEmocratic nomination. THey are serious. and it IS Deans fault that no one knows who he is, as Dean does not clearly stand up and proudly state what he strands for. He lets people for opinions by lines of ommission.

He has stated himself that hs does not mind people mistaing him foir a libeal if it gets him votes. But who is it who leads them to make those mistakes. Dean himself.

The thing most hated about Bush, is that he won votes through dishonest representation of himself

A democrat who miosrepresents himself as a liberal, but is actually a conservative, is hardly a good alternative.

N_J, what is your point exactly? This is just innuendo and smear. You seem to be saying that

1. Dean says he's a liberal
2. Dean isn't really a liberal
3. This is bad

Let's go through this point by point, together, shall we?

1. The meaning of the words liberal and conservative have begun to lose their shape a bit, don't you agree? What really is a liberal? What is a conservative? We should probably define some terms here. We could call a liberal someone who promotes the good of the many over the good of the wealthy few. Or a conservative someone who sticks to traditional arguments and solutions. Or a liberal as someone who promotes individual freedom over government control. Or, by contrast, a conservative as someone who promotes corporate freedom over government control. "Left" and "Right" imply a single axis of issue and thought, when in reality there are many axes involved, and no one seems to have chosen their positions based purely on a single axiomatic, philosophical definition of what is right action. Many of the candidates advocate positions which taken together both increase and decrease personal freedom, and increase and decrease government oversight of our lives, based on the circumstances. Dean's particular package of positions seems to be pragmatic where it has to be, and progressive where it can be.

"Dean says he is a liberal". Well, certainly many news people have been saying that because they've tried to make "liberal" a dirty word, and they desperately need to start putting labels on people right away, or they would have to start thinking. Dean's positions on some things are generally to the left - he seems to be a genuine fighter for equal opportunities and equal legal standing for minorities. He's passionate about those positions, and not in an apologetic way, but in a hopeful way.

2. Dean isn't really a liberal. Well, he certainly has a "conservative" view of budgeting. But isn't it important to ask why? To what end does he want to use goverment resources sparingly? Bush, the radical, has taken a huge pile of money that could have been used for social good, and given it away to war profiteers and the already rich. He's put this country in the red. Dean could have been a fiscal "liberal" in the same way, and put his state government in terrible economic shape. By budgeting conservatively, he was able to fund social programs that did well by people, and isn't that a happy result? With fiscal discipline, he was actually able to improve his constituents lives!

Also, I think that when you read that Dean wasn't really "liberal" in Vermont, you have to take that state's particular makeup into account. Vermont is full of "Republicans", but they are definitely a different breed than you often find elsewhere, such as the deep south. Vermont, on the whole is a very liberal state, especially as concerns personal liberty, and for Dean to be "centrist" in that environment speaks very well about him, I feel.

3. I _like_ Dean's positions and his persona. So do many. When someone calls someone else something that they aren't, who is at fault? I don't blame Kerry because the Boston Globe tried to call him Irish - that was the most stupid and juvenile smear I've seen in a long time. And Dean has been very up front about his record, your implications aside.

"He has stated himself that hs does not mind people mistaing him foir a libeal if it gets him votes." I'm afraid we can't let that one go without some attribution, particularly a quote from Dean himself, and I would like to know if he was smiling at the time (or are you irony impaired)? Any politician is happy for more votes, some even illegally (like a certain pResident I know).

"But who is it who leads them to make those mistakes. Dean himself." I would say that the same kind of charge could be leveled at Kerry, who doesn't seem to mind that EVERYONE in the media, to a person, says he "voted to give Bush the power to wage war in Iraq", though Kerry supporters will herniate themselves denying this is true. If this is a false perception, then Kerry better work harder at clearing it up. Otherwise, he appears to be someone who also might say "I don't mind people saying I voted for the war if it gets me more votes". You see?

Most of us know he isn't ideologically pure. We like him because, unlike other Democrats, he actually has the will and ability to win.

**Conservatives** see Dean as the candidate of Islam, taxes, and queers. We are all on the same team; if Dean stopped running I'd give my support back to Kerry.

by Tsias.

"I think we all know that Dean is a mainstream democrat. He has some liberal tendencies and some moderate ones. This is not anything really new. The people of his left of center state still re-elected him five times as governor, so he must have been doing something right."

He alienated many of his true leftist Democrats in his party. He barely survived re-election because the Progressive Party, ripe with the Dems that Dean angered, siphoned off a lot of votes from him, a la Nader to Gore. So while he WAS a popular governor on the whole, he was quite unpopular with the true liberals, who almost cost him his re-election.

please, let's not start the in-fighting!

Dean is far too moderate for my taste, but the prize is to get Dubya OUT!

We can work for whichever democrat we want, but I believe it better to tread lightly on each other. Perhaps I am too sensitive for my own good (at least that's what everyone who's ever met me has said!), but this is just too serious to alienate each other about.

If I had my druthers, Paul Wellstone would still be alive and a Wellstone/Kucinich ticket would be going to the WH. However, that ain't gonna happen anymore than a Kucinich/anyone ticket will win, either. But, I believe that if people feel strongly enough to work for Kucininch now, more power to them, but can't we please be kinder to one another?

As someone once said, "Can't we all just get along"?

:hi:

Wellstone/Kucinich I tell you that would siphon off the Dean support here.

Dean '04...A little taller every day

that's $10 towards Dean....

this is a good one....mixes in at least three of your usual snipes at Dean and it's a dupe post on top...your hands must've been shaking soo bad from trying to type this in...didn't even read the forum to see if anyone else had posted it....

:evilgrin: