January 14, 2004 7:53 AM
Dean's Rolling Stone Interview:
Unlike most politicians, who work hard to seem like your best friend, Dean, a physician by training, projects a refreshing quality of seeming not to really care if you like him. In conversation, his whole body is clenched, his manner making it clear that getting his views across is work, that he's doing a job, not trying to reach out or seduce. When you ask him a question, he doesn't so much answer it as snap it in two, relaxing a little only when he's sure that he has broken its back.
Obsessing over re-election:
They didn't pay any attention. I was this governor from Vermont. What did they care? The currency in Washington is "Can you get reelected?" It's not my currency -- I want to change the country. And so if your currency in Washington is "Can I get re-elected?" you measure everything by what you say, and how that relates to whether you can get re-elected or not. I think that's the worst kind of politics there is. You end up standing for nothing -- except getting re-elected. ... This president is not interested in being a good president. He's interested in some complicated psychological situation that he has with his father. He is obsessed with being re-elected, and his obsession with re-election is hurting the country.
Damn Republicans:
George Bush's philosophy is, "If you're rich, you deserve it, and if you're poor, you deserve it." That's not my philosophy. ... These guys are not driven by real-world considerations. They're driven by an ideological view of the country, which they believe, literally, it's their God-given right to inflict on everybody else.
Stem-cell research: (YEAH!)
I don't know what drove the president to his restrictions on stem-cell research. But I can tell you: This president should never get the vote of any family with a diabetic in it, under any circumstances, because of what he's done to dash the hopes of small children of recovering. And not just diabetes but all manner of potentially curable diseases. I think his slavish adherence to anti-scientific thinking is costing people their lives and their hopes all over the country.
And finally...
Most people do not want to traffic in hate. And this election is going to be about whether we cater to the worst in us or cater to the best in us, and I intend to do the latter.
Did I mention that smile? After 2 years of campaigning, we finally got a photo with a real smile!
Check out that smile! (01.14.2004)
Next Entry: Halliburton's [alleged] international bribery scheme (01.14.2004)
Previous Entry: Yet more evidence Saddam wasn't a threat to America (01.13.2004)
stonedown:
NICE!!!
Wed Jan 14 2004 11:20 AM
dhermesc:
I'll take Bush's verbal fumbles over the disco-ball of incoherence that is Howard Dean's brain.
He denies reality when he insists, despite a crystal clear record indicating otherwise, that he wasn't a supporter of NAFTA or that he ever said Saddam was a threat.
But what more interesting is when Dean's explanations are weirder than the original gaffe, as when he recently explained his statement that we shouldn't "prejudge" Osama bin Laden's guilt. Dean clarified that he was sure Osama would get the death penalty, but a presidential candidate should stand for the "rule of law." In other words, he's innocent but whether he is or not, he's going to fry.
On the issue of religion, Dean is as legible as fistful of spaghetti splattered on the wall. For months Dean said he didn't "think religion should be part of American policy" and that the Democrats must move away from "having our elections in the South based on race, guns, God and gays."
Then, when his secularism became a political liability, particularity in South Carolina, he started talking about God. "I am gradually getting more comfortable to talk about religion in ways I did not talk about before." But, he explained, he would only talk about God in the South.
Little did I know that religious fervor can be changed simply by crossing the Mason-Dixon Line.
Wed Jan 14 2004 11:24 AM
Email:
   
|
  
 |
