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Howard Dean is Falling Down, Falling Down
By Matt Margolis | January 1, 2004
Howard Dean is in trouble, and he knows it.
Recent attacks by his Democratic rivals have caused Howard Dean to whimper like a small child running to his mother about the neighborhood bullies. Dean, who wants to remove Terry McAuliffe from his position as head of the Democratic Party, has now been whimpering at McAuliffe’s feet, asking him to stop the attacks on him by his rivals.
The man who wants to President can’t even take criticism from the same people who he’s attacked throughout his campaign. Desperate Dean seems to realize now that his mouth has been getting him in trouble. His inexperience in foreign policy and lack of genuine leadership abilities have put him in a vulnerable state. Dean’s recent comments about Saddam Hussein’s capture not making our country safer, and his unwillingness to judge Osama bin Laden guilty (even after we have evidence of bin Laden admitting to his role in 9-11) has his trailing rivals taking the bait he has left for them.
FoxNews reported last Tuesday:
[t]he front-runner’s complaint has had the effect of increasing those attacks. Some of Dean’s rivals for the Democratic nomination say the former Vermont governor has been relentlessly negative — calling his rivals “cockroaches,” the Democratic leadership in Congress “prostitutes” and Democrats who support tax cuts and a strong defense “Bush lite.” In return, they say Dean’s latest attacks on the DNC show he is nothing more than a whiner.
And the funniest thing is that Dean’s spokesman Jay Carson claims Howard Dean is running a “positive campaign!” He also accuses Dean’s rivals are the ones who are attacking “out of desperation.” Carson said, “The politics of attack … is exactly the kind of politics that turns off voters and suppresses turnout… It’s bad for the party.”
I guess Howard Dean has forgotten his own television ads that criticized his Democratic rivals as “Washington politicians” who voted to support using force against Iraq and for failing the country on such issues as prescription drug benefits.
Lloyd Grove, of the New York Daily News also reported back in October that Howard Dean hired Ace Smith, Gray Davis’s former muckraker to “to gather dirt on political rivals.”
So that’s good for the party?
Truth be told, Howard Dean is a whiner. He’s fumbled on his attempts to gain yardage on foreign policy. After his comments on Hussein and bin Laden backfired, Dean is really feeling the heat and is now working on damage control. Making the smallest of concessions he can without completely disavowing his previous words, he’s now trying to divert criticism away from himself by going back to doing what he does best - reading the news and locating something to blame on Bush.
Howard Dean has recently accused George W. Bush of placing “ideology over facts” which has resulted in “the most dangerous administration” of his lifetime.
It’s “Classic Howard Dean” again. The same one we’ve been laughing at for months.
How can Howard Dean accuse George W. Bush of placing “ideology over facts” when Dean is the one who
…wants to repeal all of Bush’s tax cuts - the same tax cuts that turned around a failing economy?
…opposes the bipartisan “No Child Left Behind Act”?
…opposes the war in Iraq, despite the fact that Saddam Hussein was in violation of multiple U.N. Resolutions?
…thinks as governor he could have secret meeting with his energy task force, but Dick Cheney, as Vice-President couldn’t?
…who supports minors receiving abortions without parental consent despite the fact that an abortion is a serious procedure that can cause death? (He even lied to justify his position)
…thinks that it’s okay for the 9 Democrats running for President to attack Bush, but it’s not okay for them to attack him?
While Dean cries about being attacked by his Democrat opponents he comes out swinging with his eyes closed, attacking his Republican opponent going after anything that smells like a potential target:
“National security and economic security are the touchstones of the election,” he said in the interview after a rally Monday in Green Bay, Wis. “I think the president has been fairly reckless in just about every area I can think of.”
Okay, let’s look at the facts on our National security and economic security:
- Bush’s tax cuts are repairing the economy.
- Bush saw the creation of the Homeland Security Department.
- Bush’s war on terrorism saw the toppling of two terrorist regimes.
- Libya, in the wake of Saddam Hussein’s capture, has now agreed to cease its own WMD programs, and other countries are warming up to negotiating with the U.S.
Yet, Howard Dean keeps on swinging:
Dean also accused the administration of stubbornly ignoring warnings about mad cow disease and blindly promoting an abstinence-only sex education program that “is not a good solution at all for teens who have decided to have sex.”
Dean seems ever so desperate to blame anything on George W. Bush. He says Bush didn’t heed warnings on mad cow disease – however, Howard Dean, who calls himself a doctor, has not mentioned mad cow disease ever during his campaign before the outbreak. A simple Google search will show that the only news stories containg the terms “Howard Dean” and “mad cow” will show. A search of Howard Dean’s website using Google using the same terms yields similar results. Clearly mad cow only became an issue for Dean when it became a news story. Dean says Bush is to blame for “failing to enact broader cattle testing requirements.” Funny, I can’t find anything that shows Dean caring about that either until last week.
Of course, what Howard Dean doesn’t seem to realize is that the restrictions on the bad cattle feed which causes mad cow were enacted in April of 1997 – fairly early in Bill Clinton’s second term. “broader cattle testing requirements” would have been an issue for the Clinton administration.
Sorry Dean, you lose again.
Howard Dean’s criticism of abstinence-only education also has no merit. Back in a December a survey of U.S. teenagers was conducted and showed that two-thirds of teens who have had sex wish they waited longer – an upward trend from the same survery conducted in 2000. Howard Dean, who likes to consider himself a doctor, ought to be ashamed of his morally bankrupt idealogy.
Howard Dean’s self-exposed weaknesses are making his Democrat rivals more outspoken about their party’s frontrunner and his hypocrisy:
“I’ve got some news for Howard Dean,” presidential candidate Joe Lieberman, who ran as the Democratic vice-presidential nominee in 2000, said Monday. “The primary campaign is a warm-up to what George Bush and Karl Rove have waiting for the Democratic nominee. If Howard Dean can’t stand the heat in the Democratic kitchen, he’s going to melt in a minute once the Republicans start going after him.”
“Howard Dean has spent the last year criticizing me and other candidates at every opportunity. Now, as he makes a series of embarrassing gaffes that underscore the fact he is not well-equipped to challenge George Bush, he suddenly wants to change the rules of the game,” Gephardt said.
It’s pretty sad that Howard Dean’s worst enemy is himself. Howard Dean needs to learn that in order to play with the big boys, you have to be a big boy yourself.
Topics: Liberal Idiots |
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January 1st, 2004 at 9:47 pm
I’d say all these recent posts about Dean all add up to: “Howard Dean is a pussy”
I whole-heartedly agree.
January 1st, 2004 at 11:33 pm
Of course Dean accuses Dubya of being an idealogue - Dean has no ideology. Like Clinton, he waffles so much, trying to backtrack from his previous extremist positions, that he has no firm ideology of his own. Next to him, anyone looks like an ideologue. I’d rather have a president who is firmly committed to something, rather than a president committed to nothing.
January 2nd, 2004 at 5:33 am
I think the major issue for Dean is “do people like me more than they like Bush?” If there’s any way for him to make people like him and/or hate Bush, he seems to jump on the bandwagon. It doesn’t occur to him until later that someone might actually question his position.
January 2nd, 2004 at 9:00 am
Your well detailed post explains all we need to know about why Karl Rove is Howierd the Duck’s biggest cheerleader right now.
January 2nd, 2004 at 11:30 am
Howard Dean is Falling Down, Falling Down
Howard Dean is in trouble, and he knows it. Recent attacks by his Democratic rivals have caused Howard Dean to whimper like a small child running to his mother about the neighborhood bullies. Dean, who wants to remove Terry McAuliffe…
January 2nd, 2004 at 3:38 pm
To all this I say:
“Keep talking Howard. Keep talking.”
Even the most apathetic person will eventually catch on that Dean is a socialist with a big mouth (don’t they all have big mouths?). He should consult with Walter Mondale soon about what to do after you get your ass pounded 49 states to 1.
Maybe the Bahamas?
January 4th, 2004 at 7:17 pm
What Walter would tell Howard is that, after you get beat 49 to 1, you wait 20 years, then go back to your home state and run for Senate so you can make it a clean 50-0. Walter Mondale…the only major party candidate in history to lose a general election in all 50 states.