Howard Dean has nothing to offer except for complains about the American meritocracy, and advocating that wealth be shifted from the most productive to the less productive. it's not surprising he couldn't change his message. What's he going to say? "Vote for me, and I'll make your taxes so high, and welfare so wide, it won't even be worth working! It's like a permanent vacation! yays!".

Know your audience. This is Persuasion 101. Can't anybody play this game anymore?

Looking at the very first comment by American Hawk: no. Nobody can.

scarshapedstar: I keep posting in the futile hope that, eventually, maybe some democrats will come around and stop wanting to punish me for being a productive, high-income earning American.

Frankly, a OpEd in the WSJ by Howard Dean ain't convincing anybody of anything. He just should have pasted in one of your Chinese spam comments and called it a day.

Hawk: If you're so productive, how do you have the time to watch my RSS feed so obsessively and jump into every thread? Don't you have some productive work calling out to you?

Poor American Hawk.

I feel your pain. How you must suffer.

Kevin-- The great thing about laptops is that I can work, and the RSS feeder will let me know when a new post is up. Surely you're familar with the concept?

What's more, I imagine you consider yourself a productive person, and you spend a hundred times the amount of time working on this blog than I do...

Anyway, I'm not being productive *at the moment*. It's 11:30 PM on a Friday. But if Democrats had their way, my tax bracket would be in the 75% or so, like in the pre-Reagan area. That's unacceptable.

Kevin, I just have to wonder, just how brain-dead are you today?

I have one other message for Dean: Dude. You were writing in the fucking Wall Street Journal. Do you really think that's the place for a thousand words of pitchfork-waving, tax-cut-hating, populist agit-prop?

Now, I know you try hard to curry favor with your right-wing brethren, but today you're trying a little too hard. "Agit-prop"? Hell, you write the same economic wonkery every third day, and now you bash Dean for articulating the same thing, but with a real audience? If you actually believed in what you write, I can't fathom why you'd agree with frickin' Tom Bevan on this.

Even if you couldn't bring yourself to write about national security, don't you think you could have picked a slightly better approach to win the hearts and minds of the conservative business titans who read the Journal?

He frequently tied in economic issues with the war, in a financial newspaper. Crazy, isn't it. What would you have him do differently, really? Was he simply supposed to write about the war, and not about its costs and effects domestically?

You're pretzeling yourself in an effort to appear Sensible. Cut it out.

I'd settle for 50% of American Hawk's income to send to our brave men and women fighting overseas.

Of course the're probably not as "productive" as he is.

they're

"I keep posting in the futile hope that, eventually, maybe some democrats will come around and stop wanting to punish me for being a productive, high-income earning American."

Well, no, actually, you keep posting because you love to troll. And you love that you can get people riled through the simple expedient of writing really stupid shit over and over and over again.

Sadly, it takes no particular skill to troll. All it takes is the ability to write really stupid shit over and over and over again.

Kevvy you're right as rain again. In the WSJ, Dean should have called for more tax cuts.

Tweez-- By definition, they're not. Ever heard of the Broken Windows fallacy? The military.... mostly breaks windows. I'm more on the 'supply' side of government revenue.

paulB-- Yes, I know how it works at liberal blogs. Anything right of Dennis Kucinich is 'trolling' or 'really stupid shit', and any disgruntled democrats are "concern trolls". Hey, at least my side is winning, and will again in 2006

LOL... And so entirely predictable. Dear heart, I don't accuse those who disagree with me of writing stupid shit. I accuse those who write stupid shit of writing stupid shit. See, for example, your posts on this thread. Q.E.D.

Good night, dear heart. I don't have time to play with a troll tonight, so you'll have to turn to someone else to get your jollies.

Uh-oh.

I thwacked Kevin a little in his Euro-bashing thread -- and *now* he decides to go for the ample fleshy jugular of my hero Dr. Dean.

I'm sorry, Kevin. I'll still love ya just because you're shamelessly polishing up your centrist credentials for the InstaCracker cocktail weenie circuit, honestly I will.

Your cats will *always* remain adorable.

Bob

they might want to reconsider the focus on the economy:

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-poll22sep22,0,2507975,full.story

Lots of swing voters read WSJ.

Irony Man:

Word.

The Pretzelization of Kevin Drum.

I wonder which blog will flog the press releases once it's in galleys ready to publish? :)

Bob

What *I* wanna know is ... (speaking of Dr. Dean):

How he could have written a 1500-word editorial in the WSJ talking *exclusively* about Iraq and the GWoT.

That Kevin or his cocktail-weenie friends would find acceptible, that is ...

Seriously. WTF did you want this dude to say?

We're even *angrier* at Osama than the Republicans? How many words does *that* take?

More fearmongering rhetoric -- only the Dems will be even more draconian than the Republicans in rooting out the IslamoBadguy menace?

I mean, c'mon -- Dean said what needed to be said. He hit the talking points on both the GWoT and Iraq. Tougher and smarter. Strategic redeployment. What else *is* there that you would have liked to have heard -- seriously now.

Bob

Hey Bob
When are you going to launch you blog?
Never you say since it is so much easier to criticize. You are a fucking douche.

Which is precisely my point about Kevin's empty criticism of what Dean wrote in the WSJ.

Bob

Howard Dean, of all people, ain't gonna be Republican Lite. Ain't gonna happen.

Within those parameters -- I'd just love to know what else he could have said (or not have said) in what I thought was a very perspecatious editorial.

He's a Democrat, for crying out loud.

Bob

Yes, I know how it works at liberal blogs. Anything right of Dennis Kucinich is 'trolling' or 'really stupid shit', and any disgruntled democrats are "concern trolls". Hey, at least my side is winning, and will again in 2006

A concern troll isn't a disgruntled Democrat. A concern troll is a Republican pretending to be a disgruntled Democrat for reasons known only to them and their reflection in the window that they talk to, and possibly Lee Siegel.

Big difference.

scarshapedstar:

A concern troll's agenda is a little more deliberate and nefarious than that, from what I've observed.

A concern troll's entire intent is to get us to internalize the GOP talking points and run cowering from the strongest and most articulate elements in our party.

A concern troll wants us to fear and loathe our activist base -- despite the fact that the GOP goes out of its way to bestow *its* activist base -- no matter how frothingly extreme -- into a position of power and status, even if only symbolically so.

A concern troll's intent is to provoke a Democratic circular firing squad.

Bob

Hell, you write the same economic wonkery every third day, and now you bash Dean for articulating the same thing, but with a real audience?

The man's got a point.

Doctors often think they're the smartest person in the room. Med schools need to reel this crap in. Cocky arrogance can be toxic to clear thinking.

At this point, I no longer fucking care if the Republicans retain Congress. The shit is about to hit the fan on just about all fronts. Why shouldn't these assholes still be in power so they can take the blame for it all?

I know, they won't have to shoulder any blame. The MSM will take care of that. Isn't it wonderful how the Corporate Party has a Corporate Media to cover its ass?

Kevin - glad you gave props to RealClearPolitics.com.

It's one of the best political sites anywhere.

And yes, the proprietor, Tom Bevan, is a smart Republican.

Kevin Drum >"...don't you think you could have picked a slightly better approach to win the hearts and minds of the conservative business titans who read the Journal?..."

No one that reads the OpEd page of the WSJ & believes a word of it is EVER going to vote for a Democratic candidate

Oh, and by the way, American Squawker can go jack himself off somewhere else gutless punk that he is

"You see what power is - holding someone else's fear in your hand and showing it to them!" - Amy Tan

"But if Democrats had their way, my tax bracket would be in the 75% or so, like in the pre-Reagan area"

You mean, back before we were running trillion dollars in extra debt every couple of years?

"Know your audience. This is Persuasion 101. Can't anybody play this game anymore?"

I offer my challenge again Kevin. Do better. Come up with a plan that won't immediately be trumped by a batshit crazy plan from the right.

Have someone write "loot" on your forehead, and just sit in front of the mirror for a while.

You. Are. A. Tool.

don't you think you could have picked a slightly better approach to win the hearts and minds of the conservative business titans who read the Journal?

Look at it the other way around: WSJ readers know what he really wants, and don't need to depend on second-hand paraphrases.

I keep posting in the futile hope that, eventually, maybe some democrats will come around and stop wanting to punish me for being a productive, high-income earning American.

That's not why we want to punish you.

Kevin is right. Dean's piece was very good but ill-suited to the WSJ. Conservatives are typically unmoved by the plight of middle-class Americans and even less of the poor. (Why can't they pull themselves up by their bootstraps? Or conversely--why do liberals want to punish me for being a productive, high-income earning American?)

Conservatives do care about fiscal discipline and national security.

Know your audience.

Oops, Kevin just said "Know your audience."

Um, yeah!

American Hawk makes the usual Republican mistake of generalizing to the sake of absurdity.

Not everyone, by a long way, who makes a lot of money makes it by being productive. I've known plenty of liars, cheats, manipulators, con artists and just plain criminals who have made plenty of money. And that's just in the banking and financial world. I'm sure we've all got examples.

Look at the auto dealership world. Or mortgage/re-financing.

In the same way, all people held (can't use the word arrested, that don't work) by this administration are presumed guilty as not charged as terrorists. And no appeal!

You guys don't use logic or a moral base. Just word play.

So, economically, it's very plain the lower 2/3 of US society have seen nothing of productivity gains throughout industries, just the big squeeze. And we see the guys at the top over-rewarding themselves. And it isn't good for society.

But then again, these guys have exactly the same morals and attitudes of the fat cats in any other American disfunctional, corrupt state. We're just still going down in the elevator to their level.

I have a request. As one of the smartest liberal writers out there, can you please sometime post the four or five things that Bush has done to "make war on families" and that helped to create this economy that you descibe as awful to the poor and middle class? It strikes me that other than a tax cut and the prescription drug thing, he hasn't really done jack domestically vis a vis the economy.

I get that the left doesn't like tax cuts. Fine, I won't get back into that here. But seriously, what else? Is it the lack of action on stuff like minimum wages or having the government sit on wal-mart in some way? Is it not taking some action to prop up unions? Seriously, I am intensely curious what Bush has done to cause the wage stagnation you blame him for.

So why can't Democrats talk about National Security? Why can't the Democrats produce a viable strategy to win the War on Terror?

Maybe because the war on Terror is a batshit crazy Republican delusion and has been since 9/11? This is not to say that America does not face tremendous threats. We do. We absolutely do. And some of those threats involve lunatic Muslims who may get their hands on weapons of mass destruction.

...but the reason the Dems can't come up with a coherent War on Terror strategy is because the current WOT is primarily a incoherent, vicious gimmick to consolidate Republican power. Democrats can try to play the Republican game on terrorism and all they will do is help elect Republicans.

And the war on Terror is not why people are voting for Republicans.A substantial proportion of the population votes Republican not because they think the Republicans are such brilliant leaders who will keep us safe in the WOT, but because they are convinced at the gut-level that Democrats are drug-abusing, draft-dodging libertines who want to raise taxes to 75% and squander the wealth of hard working productive Americans on lazy minority groups.

Kevin: "And while we're at it, I have one other message for Dean: Dude. You were writing in the fucking Wall Street Journal. ... Even if you couldn't bring yourself to write about national security, don't you think you could have picked a slightly better approach to win the hearts and minds of the conservative business titans who read the Journal?"

By openly professing before his host -- without apology -- his party's liberal values and proggresive platform, Gov. Howard Dean demponstrated that he was more than willing to take the battle into his political adversaries' home ground. I would therefore offer that the DNC chairman's audience wasn't the few vacillating consciences amongst the nation's corporate capitalist elite, but the Democratic Party's own core activist base.

If -- as the late Sen. Barry Goldwater once observed -- "extremism in the defense of liberty is certainly no vice," then I would further note that your beloved political middle's apparent diffidence in the face of a militant GOP assault upon our country's time-honored and much valued constitutional principles is hardly a virtue.

Is it Dean's fault or is Dean just the messenger?

Isn't it the Democratic Leadership that tells Dean what to say, what they want to run on? Isn't it Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi that have the November play book that Dean is supposed to spining?

Dean can't very well talk about terrorist agendas if Dems aren't planning to address the issue.

And speaking of play-books, did anyone notice this post from Josh Marshall:

Dem Fav Murtha has his own trail of earmark muck?

-- Josh Marshall

Only when you click on link, you find that there really isn't muck at all:

If the Dems take control of the House in November, Rep. John Murtha (D-PA), now lauded by Democratic activists for his tough stand on Iraq, is poised to retake the helm of an appropriations panel charged with spending hundreds of billions of dollars on defense-related projects, which he last chaired in the early 1990s. He may even ascend to be Majority Leader in a Democratically controlled House.

Oh my Gosh, and ex-marine is spending money on defense, but how can that be a bad thing for Dems who appear to be weak on national defense?

And these part: Just three years after joining Congress, Murtha was targeted in the Abscam sting, a three-year FBI sting that began in 1978. The operation, in which agents posed as representatives of an Arab sheik and offered suitcases of cash to lawmakers for favors (ah, the good old days), busted six lawmakers for bribery and corruption.

According to reports at the time, Murtha declined the agents' cash offer, but suggested the "sheik" find a way to invest the money in his home district. It was perhaps a telling response: for all the ink that's been spilled on his pork-loving ways, his "all-in-the-family" approach to fundraising and earmarking, no one has reported an instance where Murtha has enjoyed a direct monetary profit from an arrangement, as Duke Cunningham infamously did.

Yeah, it was telling response all right, Murtha didnt take the bait. Sounds like the reporter couldn't really find any dirt on Murtha so spends a lot of talk about pork loving in Bush over-spend world. Nobody spends like the Bush and his GOP following but lets pretend that's not true.

It looks to me like centrist Dems are getting ready to take Murtha out.

Murtha must not dare to get in the way of Hillary's big lose to the next Republican president we're going to have after Bush leaves office. You know, McCain.

We're just not going to be able to thank Josh and Kevin enough for that in 2008.

OK, since we have all spend a few hours bad mouthing each other can we talk about the Howard Dean editorial now.

I have some questions I would like answered. First, is it the entire editorial? Did the Journal edit it.

Second, is it part of a series of editorials? The first on the economy and a second on national security.

Third, why would Dean write an editorial on the economy? Was he trying to change the subject, to take the initiative away from Karl Rove, or is he simply clueless. It seems to me that GWB has been on the receiving end of a string of "good" news days lately focusing on "homeland" security. Since the national Democrats are scared of saying a word about torture maybe Dean thought the economy would be the way to change the subject. We don't know.

Finally, has anybody done any reporting on any of the above questions? Anybody ask Dean why he said what he said? No. Why not?

You can return to the self-absorbed trollfest this site has become. Fight among yourselves.

Cheryl,

You made some great points. I read the muckraker article as well and thought to myself "what is she talking about?" It boiled down to "if Murtha gains power he might be somebody to watch." Well duh, everybody in power should be watched.

I came away thinking the article was a hatchet job. Which proves that even Josh Marshall's minions can get carried away every now and then.

If Dean had written much about Iraq or terrorism, at least three Democrats would have slammed him within 24 hours.

Kevin would have written a post saying Dean is not the party's war and terrorism spokesman. At the end of the post he would have written.

Know your place. This is Politics 101. Can't anybody play this game anymore?

You expect Dean to make clear, bold statements of policy on war and terrorism. But you overlook that he is the chair of a party that doesn't agree on what to do or what to say about either. He is also the chair of a party that can't even state publicly that they are against torture. Your expectations are unreasonable and your criticism is unfair.

The Republicans know that Dean is a leader with a loyal following. He is one of the few Democratic leaders who can get the attention of the Democratic base. So they have a practice of slamming him every time he speaks or acts. It doesn't matter what he says or does, they find a word, a phrase, or they distort. The key is to slam him every time.

Kevin, like far too many Democrats, has seen and heard this so many times that he has internalized it and is now echoing this practice.

Actually, we need Dems to fight the war on terror *without torturing anyone* -- we need them to fight the war on terrorist activities within the Geneva Conventions. We need them to make the phrase "war on terror" obsolete.

Hawk is ignorant of his history.

The Really Best Taxer of Them All was Eisenhower, with a tax of 90% on everything over a million dollars. Now *there* was a man who knew how to tax -- and all for nation building, yanno. The problem with hawks is they want to bomb, but they do not want to pay to fix the damage they cause.

Cheryl: "Yeah, it was telling response all right, Murtha didnt take the bait."

This story reminds me of the time in the 1980s, when President Ronald Reagan's Justice Department -- under that paragon of civic virtue, Attorney General Ed Meese -- was so certain that Willie Brown, the longtime and colorful Democratic Speaker of the California State Assembly, was dirty that they set up an undercover sting operation in Sacramento not unlike Abscam.

While Brown similarly declined the bait offered by the FBI's undercover "lobbyists", five or six GOP legislators did bite, and were subsequently arrested, indicted and convicted for public corruption.

The Wall Street Journal is where democrats write Op-Eds to confuse, distract, and appease the fears of conservative donors.

With that single crappy editorial he just got 1000's of RNC donors to cancel their checks and collectively mutter something to themselves about the democrats falling on the sword.

"Know your audience. This is Persuasion 101. Can't anybody play this game anymore?"

need to see more of this in 'left wing' blogs: a sense of realism, of strategic nuance and acuity.

Ideology only succeeds through sundry forms of abuse, in this case against one's intelligence and free will [GOP] or one's commonsense rationalism and sense of proportion [Dean et al].

Donald from Hawaii,

You're always lucid and persuasive, but I disagree with you here. Even if, as Ron Byers suggests, Dean's editorial is the first of a series, Dean's opening salvo should have played to conservative anxieties about runaway spending and national security. For god's sake, Dean ran for president as a fiscal conservative! He should have used this capital to attack Bush for his fecklessness in allowing spending to spiral out of control.

Dean could have used the same tack to skewer Bush on national security. Bush's foreign policy is a feckless, wasteful failure. Conservatives like to think of themselves as winners. Bush is a loser. He's lost control of the budget. He's lost Osama bin Laden. He's losing the war in Iraq. Etc.

Instead, Dean's editorial is largely devoted to boilerplate rhetoric about issues conservatives not only don't care about but actively dislike. Who cares about struggling families? They're losers.

Furthermore, the Democrats must articulate a coherent national security policy. However undeserved their reputation, Democrats have little credibility on this score. They must hammer away at the fact that Republicans cannot be trusted on national security. 911 occurred on Bush's watch. Bush plunged the nation into a war of choice that has energized our enemies and galvanized the Muslim world against us. The world is a more dangerous place because of Republican foreign policy. And so on.

Dean had a great opportunity to assure the corporate elite about the Democratic alternative. He blew it.

Some good news:

A day after British business mogul Richard Branson pledged $3 billion to battle global warming, Clinton on Friday announced the launch of a $1 billion investment fund for renewable energy.

Clinton said the new Green Fund would focus on reducing pollution and dependence on fossil fuels and creating jobs.

I don't really like or trust Bill Clinton any more. Clinton spend so much time defending and supporting Bush and this horrible holocaust of a war that both Presidents lied us into.

Still, it would be nice to see that Al Gore's dream of renewable resources did die with Bush v. Gore.

"Know your audience. This is Persuasion 101. Can't anybody play this game anymore?"

Yes. They're called Republicans.

"A concern troll's entire intent is to get us to internalize the GOP talking points and run cowering from the strongest and most articulate elements in our party.
A concern troll wants us to fear and loathe our activist base -- despite the fact that the GOP goes out of its way to bestow *its* activist base -- no matter how frothingly extreme -- into a position of power and status, even if only symbolically so.
Bob"

And then some. Panadagon has a hugely funny post on how the NJ Rethugs were caught trolling blogs in that state; apparently they weren't too bright about it:

http://pandagon.net/2006/09/22/rovian-tactics-busted-at-bluejersey/#comments

NYT story:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/21/nyregion/21blog.html?_r=4&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

The Republicans know that Dean is a leader with a loyal following. He is one of the few Democratic leaders who can get the attention of the Democratic base. So they have a practice of slamming him every time he speaks or acts. It doesn't matter what he says or does, they find a word, a phrase, or they distort. The key is to slam him every time.

Kevin, like far too many Democrats, has seen and heard this so many times that he has internalized it and is now echoing this practice.

James E. Powell. You got that one right. The Republicans are scared shitless of Howard Dean because he is a real Democrat and one of those tame Democrats like Joe Leiberman or Hillary Clinton. They have to keep him down for exactly the same reason the "professional Democrats" have to keep him down. His words can move the rank and file. In that way he is like Harry Truman. Truman was scary to Republicans and their allies too.

If, like the Republican lite Democrats, you like the status quo you have to fear and loath somebody like Dean. His message screams change.

All of that said, I sort of agree that he missed an opportunity at the WSJ.

Study after study shows that no matter how tight the economy gets, most white Americans think they are middle class, rich, or soon to be rich. I am no fan of the DLC, but I've always been a firm believer in one of their central messages: most Americans don't like hearing economic gloom and doom. Now, this does NOT mean you need to offer a corportist message. Rather, it means that, when Dems talk about the economy, they need to talk about opportunity...not disparity. Why? Because that's what people want to hear!

The nation's economic numbers might be terrible. Real wages might be stagnant or falling. But the bottom line is, most Americans don't want to hear about it. They want to hear from a political party who will create the environment for them to make it big. They want to hear from the political party that will help them start a business or invent something. Is this silly and unrealistic? Sure it is. But it wins elections.

There's a reason huge numbers of poor, white Americans vote against their interests every year by going Republican. In part, it's because Republicans play on racial stereotypes and corny Americana themes. But it's also because Republicans tell these people what they want to hear on the economy.

In order to win, Democrats have to stop using Republican frames and talking points, and use their own.

The worst way to fight terrorism was to invade and occupy Iraq. Bush should have never let Osama escape from Tora Bora. Republicans don't think Osama is important Democrats do. Terrorism has increased throught the world since we invaded. Ect. Ect.

I'ts not that hard to turn the debate around, if your willing to stand up and say it with conviction.

What happened to "not" in the sentence "not one of those tame Democrats like Joe Leiberman or Hillary Clinton." Odd. I could have sworn I typed it.

To retread a phrase associated with the smartest political leader of the last half century, “It is the economy, stupid.” Many more Americans (by several orders of magnitude) have their lives shredded and /or ended needlessly early due to economic conditions then due to terrorist actions.

…maybe some democrats will come around and stop wanting to punish me for being a productive, high-income earning American.

Oh AH, are you really such a paranoid buffoon? Or are you so short-sightedly greedy? Both? There was a window of time (approx. 70 years) where the “economic rules” of this society were such that any person who was willing to work hard at a full time job could afford adequate housing, provide for a family, get decent medical care and even see their kids go to college.

The dignity of labor was celebrated and rewarded. Currently, this is so far from the case that it seems to from an alien world.

As a result, our greater community is becoming so out of balance that harm is accruing. Harm that is so pervasive that terroristic threat pales in comparison.

And Kevin Drum, are you drinking an Orange County flavor of the Kool-Aid as well?

Kevin. I am shocked at the dropping of the F-bomb! Is that a first (or Frist)? However, your point is a good one. Howard Dean and the Dems just don't stay on message with the same laser-focus as the opposition. They also don't use the supposed strengths of the opposition (e.g. national security), as a bludgeon to beat them with, a la Rove. This Administration is weak, weak, weak on national security. The Dems need to exploit that and point it out to the American people again and again and again.

And now, with UBL likely dead, Bush will forever wear the albatross of never having brought the spiritual leader of the worst attacks on America to justice.

I'ts not that hard to turn the debate around, if your willing to stand up and say it with conviction.

Posted by: AkaDad on September 23, 2006

I don't think many of our national "leaders" have the conviction.

The Republicans are scared shitless of Howard Dean because he is a real Democrat and *not* one of those tame Democrats like Joe Leiberman or Hillary Clinton

Ron,

I hate to break this news to you but you might want to go back to the 2004 primaries and look at Howards Deans results and ask yourself, "Why on earth would anyone fear a well funded candidate who can do NO BETTER than 3rd in DEMOCRATIC primaries?

Dean is a dream for Conservatives. He's like Michael Moore and George Clooney, Sean Penn, Tim robbins, etc. He's friggin target practice. You've even got lefty Kevin taking shots at him when he's not ducking Chuch Schumer and Rob Emanuel.

It's quite true he owns the lefty freak show.

It's just as true the lefty freak show can't help elect Presidents.

You don't see the head of the RNC in the news often because he's too busy doing his job. Dean creates news putting both feet in his mouth. The man is a loser.

"The man is a loser."

You see? Conservatives are binary thinkers.

Kevin: the Bush administration has failed on every single facet of good management, and have exported the terror we felt on 9-11 to a Ground Hog's Day like effect throughout the Middle East. The local elections will not be won on the pseudo-arguments and self-serving security issues brought up by the administration. They are absolutely desperate, not to win the election, but to avoid international tribunals and probable impeachment. There obsession with gutting the Geneva Convention--right now--is because this is their last chance to avoid prosecution. I believe they should be prosecuted anyway, because they knowingly violated existing law. This is the most corrupt and dangerous government since Pierce and Buchanan, and we all know what followed those.

Watch polling places carefully. Vote straight Democrat. I don't give a damn whether the GOP candidtae is playing like he isn't a Rovian.

We need to get some investigations going, and get our real security needs taken care of--taking care of the Palestinian question for example. Watching Clinton on Olbermann last night was like a vacation back to competence. I wish he could have served four or five terms.

There's a reason huge numbers of poor, white Americans vote against their interests every year by going Republican. In part, it's because Republicans play on racial stereotypes and corny Americana themes. But it's also because Republicans tell these people what they want to hear on the economy.

That's not it at all. They just can't stand elitist liberals telling them they're stupid and racist.

Owenz you may be able to help me wth something I just can't figure out. I will admit up front I am conservative so that might be part of my problem. I just don't have the intellectual capacity. but I do what I can and I know if I want to understand something I merely need to ask a liberal. They know everything.

Here's my 'quantry'. We all know religious types, redneck and other racists breed like rabbits. We also know that liberals and other secularists, knowing the strain we are putting on Mother Earth, breed little, if at all. We all of course know we live in a Democracy.

So why do liberals insult this large body of voting dupes? There's more of them now and we know from census data there will be many, many more tomorrow. Why piss off the majority? Are you assuming they're too stupid to figure it out? Or are you too stupid to figure it out?

Inquiring minds want to know!

I don't think many of our national "leaders" have the conviction.

I couldn't agree more Ron.

Americans support the Dems on most issues. The problem isn't the issues, its that they don't know how to speak properly.

The man who planned Pearl Harbor was similarly never "brought to justice"

IIRC he was killed when US pilots shot down the transport plain he was traveling in.

This election is a repudiation of the damage done by Republicans. It is that simple. If one equivocates and votes to empower weakness and weak minds, then our leadership will continue to be wanting. The cringing toadies who troll here are the enemies of freedom. Free speech to them is a weakness; something to be exploited like fear.

There are real economic problems in America. The largest and most real is that damned enormous budget deficit. This administration speaks for a narrow group of interests. You have to repudiate the American Hawk level of discourse. What has Bush done to make the country safe? He has trebled our enemies throughout the world. And humans who hate are resourceful enemies--look at Karl Rove. We must repudiate fear, and validate freedom and courage.

"In part, it's because Republicans play on racial stereotypes and corny Americana themes. But it's also because Republicans tell these people what they want to hear on the economy."

Is that why Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and Ray Nagin blame the slow Fed response to Katrina because of the numerous black victims? Oh wait, they're all Democrats.

But isn't it the Dems that are telling us how bad the economy is despite historic low unemployment, ever-increasing GDP #'s, low inflation, rising productivity, rising home ownership and increasing federal tax receipts?

It says something that Jim Webb, essentially a Republican who switched sides because of his opposition to the invasion of Iraq, is one of the few Democratic candidates speaking concretely and authoritatively on foreign policy.

Wake up, Democratic leadership!

btw, I heard a prominent liberal on the radio the other day (can't recall who exactly it was) proceed to tell America that we as a society have an obligation to make it economically viable for girls to decide to have out of wedlock children.

Meaning, we should provide subsidized child care and employers should offer flex scheduling.

Using this logic, what if I chose to spend more time with my family and wanted to work only part time. Shouldn't society subsidize my mortgage?

And you wonder why you're losing elections? Just keep your mouths shut, you might win one.

We must repudiate fear, and validate freedom and courage

Yes. Precisely. We weren't pissing down our legs when we faced the Soviets, who actually had the means to do in huge numbers of Americans. Now if we don't tremble and shake and lose control of bodily functions and rush to the Great White Father in Washington, begging him to take our civil liberties to protect our freedom; we aren't patriotic.

What a crock.

"We weren't pissing down our legs when we faced the Soviets..." - global

When Reagan called the Soviets the "evil empire", the left was definitely pissing down their legs. You don't remember that?

Oh yeah, that's that revision of history so critical to the lefts positions.

Always able to encapsulate in words what the rest of us are thinking, Daniel Shorr once again puts it perfectly when he says:

And so when the law speaks of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment of captives, it may have more meaning for a senator who served than for a White House official who never had to worry about possibly being tortured.

I was on a SAC installation at that time. The SAC guys were laughing at Reagan.

Gosh mhr, what a workmanline job of recycling GOP distortions and misdirections. Your Medal of Freedom awaits. Heck of a job!

mhr's rant is a preview of what the GOP attack machine has in store for the next seven weeks.

How will the Democrats respond? "It's the economy, stupid?"

Global Citizen: And so when the law speaks of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment of captives, it may have more meaning for a senator who served than for a White House official who never had to worry about possibly being tortured.

I'm sure it does. That makes it more meaningful that the senator has signed on to the president's bill, after receiving some concessions.

Or are you one of the people who respects McCain a lot as long as he opposes the president, and disregards his opinion when he agrees with the president? He's a pretty good man either way.

Dean is a very odd fellow and it is hard to see how he has been a moderately successful politician. He has nothing to say about national security and, unfortunately, the democrat party also has little to say.

Colbert King has a spectacular column in the Washington Post today about political hacks and national security. Read the whole thing for full appreciation, but below are the money quotes on politicians (Dean, Kerry, Reid and others definitely fall within this description with his incessant talking about how Bush has not gotten Bin Laden and other partisan talking points -- less so Hillary, but even she is going in that direction.)

"Self-regarding members of Congress, intent on keeping their jobs, have forgotten all about enemies who are so convinced of America's evil and their own righteousness that they can justify making everything in this country -- its national treasures and its people -- targets for destruction.

Listen closely to the huffing and puffing on Capitol Hill. It's all about criticizing each other on the war. They work themselves into a lather arguing about which party can best represent Americans in the hallowed halls of Washington. Watch as they strut and brag about how their party is, because of a surfeit of patriotic zeal, best able to hold terrorist-harboring countries accountable.

Each party treats the other like a malignancy on the body politic when the real cancer is the terrorists whose malignant objective is to kill and maim, to show us how vulnerable we are, to instill fear and to bring this country to its knees.

So, while members of Congress slip, slide, peep and hide in their quest for cheap political advantage, somewhere, somehow, a group not unlike those who got to us five years ago is plotting against crowded suburban shopping malls, downtown cultural centers, subway stations, football stadiums and sources of drinking water.

* * *

Congress and the White House ought to be focusing on defeating that enemy -- not each other. The puerile political nonsense on display on both sides of the Capitol dome must end.

Al-Qaeda, as has been written in this space, bleeds, too. The terrorist ilk that attacked on Sept. 11 must be broken -- not chased, harassed or condemned from a U.N. podium, but broken. That means: Take them down here, there or anywhere they're found.

Bring them before the bar of justice if possible, but by all means, and for as long as it takes, hunt them down. To do any less is to invite more strikes, more body bags, more shattered American lives."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/22/AR2006092201439.html

Tom-one so you are saying that the plane was shot own after a phone call made by or to an American citizen was intercepted?

I smell more GOP misdirection.

A day after British business mogul Richard Branson pledged $3 billion to battle global warming, Clinton on Friday announced the launch of a $1 billion investment fund for renewable energy.

that's nice, even though lots more than that is already being invested. It's very public, and will raise awareness of how much is being done, as well as how much more needs to be done.

Can't anybody play this game anymore?

When Casey Stengel said that his Mets were winning only about 25% of their games. The Democrats are over 45%, and close to a winning record. It just seems bad because it is so hard to get the last few percent needed for majority.

Meanwhile....

Compare and contrast:

1) Communist methods

"In 1971, while in Lefortovo prison in Moscow (the central KGB interrogation jail), I went on a hunger strike demanding a defense lawyer of my choice (the KGB wanted its trusted lawyer to be assigned instead). The moment was most inconvenient for my captors because my case was due in court, and they had no time to spare. So, to break me down, they started force-feeding me in a very unusual manner -- through my nostrils. About a dozen guards led me from my cell to the medical unit. There they straitjacketed me, tied me to a bed, and sat on my legs so that I would not jerk. The others held my shoulders and my head while a doctor was pushing the feeding tube into my nostril.

The feeding pipe was thick, thicker than my nostril, and would not go in. Blood came gushing out of my nose and tears down my cheeks, but they kept pushing until the cartilages cracked. I guess I would have screamed if I could, but I could not with the pipe in my throat. I could breathe neither in nor out at first; I wheezed like a drowning man -- my lungs felt ready to burst. The doctor also seemed ready to burst into tears, but she kept shoving the pipe farther and farther down. Only when it reached my stomach could I resume breathing, carefully. Then she poured some slop through a funnel into the pipe that would choke me if it came back up. They held me down for another half-hour so that the liquid was absorbed by my stomach and could not be vomited back, and then began to pull the pipe out bit by bit. . . . Grrrr. There had just been time for everything to start healing during the night when they came back in the morning and did it all over again, for 10 days"
......

2) Republican methods

"The new procedures were instituted in early January. They include strapping detainees to a chair, forcing a tube down their throats, feeding them large quantities of liquid nutrients and water, and leaving them in the chair for as long as two hours to keep them from purging the food, according to detainee accounts and military officials. Detainees told their attorneys that the tactics, first reported last month in the New York Times, caused them to urinate and defecate on themselves and that the insertion and removal of the feeding tube was painful.

Mohammad Bawazir, a Yemeni detainee who was the subject of Friday's filing in U.S. District Court in Washington, told his lawyers he began his hunger strike in August and was determined to die in Cuba but stopped resisting the force-feeding last year when he decided it was futile. Bawazir's attorneys said he had been allowing the feedings -- through a tube that was left in at all times -- but the tactics changed dramatically on Jan. 11, when the military strapped Bawazir to a chair and forced a much larger tube into his nose and down his throat, causing him "unbearable pain."

Richard G. Murphy Jr., a Washington lawyer representing Bawazir, said yesterday that military officials "argue it's a life-saving mechanism, but they were already engaged in saving his life, without resistance."

Mission accomplished..?

The Democratic party response to the torture debate? Silence.

WAKE UP AND LEAD!

We must repudiate fear, and validate freedom and courage

True enough.

We need the courage to defeat the threat. Pointing out that there is a threat, and detailing its nature, its geographic extent, and its ability to kill with simple and commonplace weaponry is a part of defeating the threat. It's foolish to say that there is no threat, or that the threat is negligible.

John Kerry said that the effort should be more like police work and less like war. On the whole, I think most Americans believe the effort should be more like war and not merely like police work. People disagree on whether the Iraq war helps or hurts the effort against Islamist terrorists. Lots of people reasonably do not share my concern about the Islamists in Indonesia. But anybody who writes about how Americans are more scared now than during the Cold War, or that fear-mongers are pissing down their pants, just hasn't apprehended the threat that requires our courage.

I'm saying that FDR was allowed to do whatever it took (including the internment of AMERICAN citizens) to win the war.

What you seem to be saying is that ill-considered, racist and flat out ineffective methods must be used to "keep Americans safe".

Your Medal of Freedom awaits.

How do you know..?

I know because people in the America I learned about are innocent until a due process based legal proceedure proves that they are quilty.

Its so sad that you don't believe in that same America.

Troll fest! Troll fest!

I wish you guy(s) actually stood for something besides ignorance.

I say again, time to repudiate republicanism once and for all. Or have the constitution feasted upon by these cringing toadies. Penny a post.

but the tactics changed dramatically on Jan. 11, when the military strapped Bawazir to a chair and forced a much larger tube into his nose and down his throat, causing him "unbearable pain."

Posted by: A Hermit

Don't want to burst your bubble here but I had a tube forced through my nose and down my throat in the emergency room. It was unpleasant, a little painful initially, and drew a little blood but was far from unbearable. So I think we have much ado about nothing here. Since the tube is physically small enough to just barely get through your nostril it would easily go down your throat unless you were uncooperative.

A common medical procedure being used to save someone's life when they are trying to end it is not torture as much as you lefties would like to make it out to be. Everytime one these bozos whines you lefties stand to attention and take like it likes it's the gosepel because America is always wrong and terrorists never lie. I love it!

I'm an extremist? Ha! That's rich. I'm actually pretty moderate.

Speaking of Lieberman, I called his DC office to demand that the Senator denounce the torture bill (despite his undistinguished record on this issue). His staffwoman's response? "Um, what do you mean, exactly? There's nothing called 'the torture bill'."

You're goddamned right I voted for Lamont.

I thought this was a peculiarly clueless post, Kevin - quite unusual for you. Some observations:

1. The Wall Street Journal is not just read by the the top 1% of Americans, and by "conservative business titans." It is read throughout the business world, by people enagaged in commerce and finance at many different levels.

2. My guess is that the vast majority of Wall Street Journal readers consider themselves "middle class Americans."

3. Many of these middle class business-oriented Americans are indeed worried about rising healthcare costs, stagnant wages and falling retirement coverage, both because they themselves are feeling those pinches, and because in their roles as managers they run up against these challenges every day.

4. Lots of people in the business world do in fact think that the people at the very tops of their corporations are paid too much, are coddled by their boards, and use their inordinate political influence to enact fiscal and regulatory policies that are bad for business and bad for America.

5. Even some of those at the top are open to a message that a shrinking middle class is bad for capitalism and bad for America. Some of them are actually smart, and since their businesses are often based on selling things to a prosperous middle class, an enlightened long-view concern for their self-interest makes them worry about this problem.

6. One thing we can say that Wall Street Journal readers probably do have in common is that they are much more concerned about economics than the average American. Thus it makes abundant sense to lead with economic policy in addressing Wall Street Journal readers.

7. If you think the issues of threatened middle class prosperity, foreign competition and distorted political priorities focussed on the extremely wealthy are only the concerns of "pitchfork-waving populists", you don't understand 90% of the American business world.

8. In any political forum, your goal is never to convert your entire audience, but to convert enough of the people you need to win. There are abundant prospects for the Democratic economic pitch among Wall Street Journal readers, and Dean deserves credit for going after them aggressively and with confidence.

9. Conceding vast chunks of the American landscape to the Republicans as "opposition turf" is precisely the the sort of simpering counsel of defeat that Dean has been struggling against, and is beginning to reverse. The Dean message is a powerful and sensible middle class appeal capable of attracting a majority of Americans, and thus he should take every opportunity he can to get into every living room, meeting hall and op-ed page he can - even those of the alleged "opposition".

10. People in business tend to admire other people who compete, fight and win, and who are "straight-shooters." Having one message, sticking to it, and fighting for it even in places where the battle is uphill is a better and more attractive approach than the standard tactics of feckless, timid, waffling weaseldom and pandering that have characterized many Democratic elected officials and pundits in our recent history.

you and Keith would be against the torture of Khalid Sheik Mohammed ("innocent until proven guilty") even if you knew the result was Washington, DC and a couple major American cities being nuked?

Thomas1/Charlie,

The only way you can justify torture is by imagining scenarios which are 100% imaginary.

The idea of actually leading by example and thus living our values is entirely beyond your feeble mind.

You're a goddamned liar to boot.

Thomas1, you sound pretty hysterical and extreme. No wonder considering the hysteria and extremism that has been spouted from your leadership like Dick "No Evidence" Cheney. Why do you and your leadership keep trying to spook people and justify illegal torture crimes with some phantom nuclear threat that doesn't exist? Stop believing in phantoms and fears that are nonexistant. It's your party's confusion and hysteria that has led to the debacle in Iraq. A focused Democratic leadership would have probably put an end to Bin Laden and AQ years ago and done it without destroying the values that made this country great.

The Republican party's record of confusion, ignored warnings, missed opportunities, false wars, trumped evidence, billions of tax payer dollars "reappriated" into the pockets of republican cronies, and illegal torture of innocent people including children clearly shows republicans to be the weak party on terror. You can't be strong and terror and destructive of American values at the same time. You can't claim to be tough on security if you're constantly afraid of phantoms.

"My guess is that the vast majority of Wall Street Journal readers consider themselves 'middle class Americans.'"

Right. Since in America, the rich often consider themselves "middle class".

Oh Thomas, no, no, and no.

Your paranoid imaginings are so off the wall.

You see, I have faith. Faith that this great country has the wherewithal to successfully fight the existent terror threats without throwing the baby out with the bath water.

By that I mean that it is clear that Osama knew that he and his murderous ilk could do nothing on their own to gravely hurt the USA. For that to happen he knew he would have to enlist the cooperation of citizens such as yourself . If he could get our society to over-react, to give in to the darker impulses spawned by fear, he knew he could gain the upper hand.

Thomas, you are want to invoke the names of leaders such as JFK, leaders who could fill the center of a foreign city with tens of thousands of its citizens cheering for an America that gave them hope, an America that was living up it its historic promise.

That, my friend, is our best defense and not the image of a sniveling and bullying coward that you so quickly are willing to provide.

Dumb post.

Dean writes an Op-Ed on the WSJ and doesn't lay out a War on Terror strategy? Could it be that Democrats don't want Dean to be a point man on the issue Kevin? Could it be they want folks like Murtha and Clark to be the messengers? Sheesh.

Does anybody blogging know how to play this game?

most of the asshats pushing for torture on this board, as in washington, have not been in the military. this is an extension of the supposed tough-mindedness and seriousness of the chickenhawk rightwing, which is too cowardly to actually serve (despite several having been old enough), and yet nevertheless having a military fetish and thinking themselves security experts despite their ignorance.

trashhauler may be an exception, but he's old and white, so his view on torture may be simple bigotry.

the public statments of actual military and CIA service-people contradicts most of the pro-torture rhetoric.

A focused Democratic leadership would have probably put an end to Bin Laden and AQ years ago and done it without destroying the values that made this country great.

Posted by: Chrissy

Clinton had the chance and passed. Would have, could have and should have are just loser excuses for a bunch of cut/run Democrats.

press1forenglish: Bushie had the chance and passed (more likely passed out). Would have, could have, should have and "No one could have predicted" are just loser republican excuses for a bunch of confused cut/torture republicans.

French intel leak sez bin laden died in Pakistan a month ago of typhoid.

Thanks Thomas, you have just cut to the chase when you typed:

…the torture of one suspected terrorist….

I believe it was some long haired liberal who years ago opined, “as you treat the least of these, you treat me.”

What was his name?

most of the asshats pushing for torture on this board, as in washington, have not been in the military. this is an extension of the supposed tough-mindedness and seriousness of the chickenhawk rightwing, which is too cowardly to actually serve (despite several having been old enough), and yet nevertheless having a military fetish and thinking themselves security experts despite their ignorance.

Posted by: Nads

What branch of the service were you in shit-for brains? I love it when you fools throw the bogus chickenhawk name around. It tells me you have no arguement. We have an all volunteer military which meets its enlistment goal. So there are an adequate number of people and no need for everyone that voted republican to go down and enlist. You just come off as another stupid lefty with nothing to offer except name calling and bitching. That is why the Republicans will maintain majorities in both houses this election cycle. I love it!

Press1, Clinton had the chance and he tried as all the while he was being criticized by the Republicans for being too focused on Bin Laden. He regrets that the attempt was not successful, but he tried. Bush didn’t even try until after 9/11.

Stop being a lying putz.

Dan Kervick,

I would like to be convinced that your thoughtful argument is correct and that Kevin's reaction was way off the mark.

"Threatened middle class prosperity, foreign competition and distorted political priorities" have been problems throughout the Bush years, and indeed many Wall Street types defected to Kerry in 2004. Certainly it makes sense to reiterate the toll on the economy exacted by Republic policy, and you make an interesting point about the WSJ's readership. However, I'm pretty confident the Journal's demographic is upper middle class and up. Many Journal readers, of course, actually work on Wall Street and lost friends and colleagues on 911. They have reason to worry about national security. Dean gave them nothing.

Er, "Republican" policy.

ah ... but I don't think that I know better than the multiple CIA and military men who wrote against our revision of the geneva conventions, and who insist torture doesn't work.

I mean, I certainly understand WHY you're a cowardly chickenhawk ... so many of the people you're so busy fellating, from bush to rumsfeld, are either deserters or cowardly chickenhawks, and similarly ignorant of military matters despite thinking themselves expert.

and sure it's an all-volunteer army ... and I clearly don't support illegal wars for profit predicated on lies. However, you do, and given that the only way the armed forces are meeting enlistment quotas is by lowering their IQ and age standards, I just think that you would be duty-bound to volunteer yourself for the noble cause ... except that you're a fat, cowardly chickenhawk.

... fortunately, the standards are so low that they'll likely STILL take your fat, ignorant ass regardless of IQ or BMI.

Dan Kervick on September 23, 2006 at 12:33 PM

That was very good.

Armando:

Zingo. Exactly.

I thought Thomas E. Powell and Dan Kervick nailed it (to use that horrible troll expression). Dean's editorial is a pretty much word-for-word restatement of his campaign speeches. Not because Dean's rigid-minded -- but because he has a simple, direct, clear message that appeals precisely to "middle class Americans." Kervick is so correct; the WSJ reaches a wide audience of business-oriented people, the vast majority of whom are hardly "titans," and who no doubt snicker at their bosses behind their backs. Of course (as Reality Man noted) Dean's going to hook the Iraq war into its economic impact to this audience. That is precisely the way to pitch both Iraq and the GWoT here.

A problem (which is only a sideshow) is, as TE Powell says, that Howard Dean will be attacked for literally *anything* he says, for *any* reason he can be attacked. He's not a pussyfooter or a triangulator; that's why he's so terrifying to TPTB in both parties. But two short, bullet-point paragraphs on Iraq and the GWoT are really the only things he can say as chairman of a party that happens to be divided on the issue. Consider an alternative -- the Biden/Clark plan for Iraqi partition. It's perhaps the most specific out there. Should Dean have talked that up? And locked the Party into supporting it? Why? Is that really the purpose of the chairman of the Party -- or is it best left to national security point men like Murtha and Biden, as Armando suggests?

A huge problem is that the only *correct* frame on the GWoT is hugely counterintuitive. The correct frame is everything that comes off Global Citizen's fingers: We as a nation need to stop cowering in fear over a threat that has a lower odds of happening to us individually than getting hit by a bus crossing the street. How do we pitch that without looking indifferent to a threat that, no matter how objectively small -- is nonetheless real? And which doesn't address the burning desire that we *all* feel to see Osama and his minions face implacable justice?

Kerry tried to Rove this frame. He ran to the right of Bush on terrorist-hatred, which cloaked a law-enforcement approach to the issue. This frame failed -- in large part because it's self-contradictory. The frame only works with a proper understanding of the Islamic world; you can't simultaneously demoniz