Dean: Vermont moderates are really liberals

By DAVID MACE Vermont Press Bureau

NASHUA, N.H. — The political center in Vermont is so far to the left that moderates there would be called liberals anywhere else, former Gov. Howard Dean said as he campaigned here Thursday.

The remark — by the presidential hopeful who describes himself as a moderate — quickly revived criticism by some Democratic rivals and Republicans that Dean is a far-left liberal out of the political mainstream.

Dean had finished speaking about environmental policy at the contaminated site of a former tannery in Nashua when he struck up a conversation with Peter Flood of Merrimack, a Sierra Club member who lamented that Dean had not won the group’s endorsement while he was governor of Vermont.

“Oh, in Vermont,” Dean answered. “Yeah, but in Vermont, you know, politics is much farther to the left. A Vermont centrist is an American liberal right now.”

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http://timesargus.nybor.com/Story/70450.html

So the right-wingers who opposed unions would really be the 'centrists' elsewhere, eh?

Rubbish.

I don't really think the headline reflects the article or quite what Dean is saying here. I personally agree that the playing field has moved so far to the Right that it's hard to really peg anyone on that's moderate to far Left properly due to the media and GOP being given a free hand in defining the Left/Center/Right spectrum.

But I've said it before, and I'll say it again--I'm not concerned about labels.

amd it was liberal heaven!

Indeed - I lost a friend in the "kingdom" area because I was not as outspoken left as she was. I admire her greatly still - but I never wanted to be an SDS weatherman!

A great place - and Dean is just speaking truth.

at least one person here gets the kingdom reference, though it must be said that the Northeast Kingdom (Vermont's wildest, most rural area) is also the most conservative part of the state. There are indeed some radical left folks. Bread and Puppet Theatre is in Glover. There are still communes and vestiges of communes here and there, but the Kingdom goes Republican in practically every election.

and that is where the infamous '6 pack' comes from

The Kingdom was a challenge per my one time friend as the growing season is the shortest in the US - last frost is usually late June or early July - and first frost is late August or early Sept.

And I agree as to "conservative" - indeed the towns close to Canada seemed the hardest for a Dem to win - I had a friend teaching above the GAP, and the world of Stowe is a million miles away.

I think he is right in much of what he is saying. It is hard to charcterize a person who gave his states LGBT community every right he was able to as a political moderate in the national sense. It is also hard to characterize someone who insured all his states children, and radically altered the states property taxes in a progressive direction as a moderate in a national sense.

…
Ed Kilgore, policy director of the centrist Democrat Leadership Council, which has cautioned against some of Dean’s positions and rhetoric as too left-leaning, downplayed Dean’s comments.

The ‘L-word’ is exciting to some people, off-putting to others, boring to others,” Kilgore said. “The only problem with being a self-identified liberal is if you look at the numbers. Self-described Democrats are about a third of the electorate, self-described liberals are a third of that.”

“Centrists and liberals share most of the same values and goals … (but) nobody’s going to be elected by appealing solely to the value of liberals,” Kilgore said. “They’re an important part of the party, but they’re not a majority; we just have to remember that.”

Davis dismissed the statement as an off-the-cuff slip.

“I think he probably wants to use a word other than liberal to describe himself in the national debate,” he said. “He would prefer centrist, moderate, mainstream, pragmatic. He wants to portray Bush as out of the mainstream by being so far to the right. If I were Dean, I would use words like those and appeal to the liberals in the crowd by talking about policy rather than referring to labels.”
…

and execute people who might be innocent?

wanting to execute people?

Someone seeing that there are times when the death penalty is probably an option to consider is hardly calling for mass executions. And just what is the difference between executing someone who might be innocent and executing an unborn child because two people were too lazy to use a condom? There are times when both abortion and capital punishment are called for and that has to be recognized, period.

moderates here are liberals ever place else

When living back east, I definately considered myself a liberal but since I've moved here, I considere myself a moderate

interesting

But he's about middle of the pack, behind the likes of Kucinich, Kerry, Mosely-Braun, and Sharpton, in the Democratic 9.

Dean's not a flaming liberal or conservative, he's most likely slightly left of moderate.

n/t

being a native vermonter, we are all, republicans and democrats alike, for the most part, social liberals...fiscally, we are about as tight as it gets...that does not mesh...we have to make it work and somehow we do....those of you who scoff at how small our state is must understand...we know our neighbors...we see the hardship and want to make things better for our neighbors...at the same time we know we need to keep a very close eye on how we stretch our dollars....again, i remind you all, 40 states in our union are either in bankruptcy or very close to it...vermont has a 10,000,000.00 rainy day fund thanks to the good dr.

Most people don't realize that there isn't anything that can be kept secret or hidden politically in Vermont. We know everything our politicians are up to. It keeps them honest.