Business Week article on how Dean was done in......

[SonofMass]

http://www.businessweek.com:/print/bwdaily/dnflash/feb2004/nf20040225_4752_db009.htm?db

[molly]

1. Howard Dean did himself in

this is an opinion piece - not an editorial.

[LoZoccolo]

6. People were saying that about Kerry when the Drudge story broke.

What is the difference between an opinion piece and an editorial?

[agitpropagent9]

14. LOL

ed·i·to·ri·al ( P ) Pronunciation Key (d-tôr-l, -tr-)
n.
An article in a publication expressing the opinion of its editors or publishers.

[Larkspur]

2. Neither the Dem nor the Repuke Party bosses wanted Dean to succeed

If he did, then their power would have been diminished.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

3. Hmm

And, more important, he hadn't taken back the Democratic Party. It remained safe in the soft, manicured hands of the Teddy Kennedys, Bill Clintons, Terry McAuliffes, John Sweeneys, and, yes, John Kerrys of the political world.

[Armstead]

4. Good article

The author is honest about Dean's own failings, but on the money in his assessment of the big picture.


"No upstart from the woods of New England was going to seize the self-fulfilling, self-aggrandizing, self-lubricating power machine of special interests, corporate lobbyists, New Democrats, fat-cat law firms, think-tank theoreticians, union pooh-bahs, foreign policy blowhards, and coddled Washington pols. So the Democratic Party savaged one of its own."

[KittyWampus]

7. Fat-Cat Law Firms Seem To Be Pushing Edwards Pretty Hard

they kept him afloat as next to no grassroots movement gave a crap about a personal injury lawyer.

Dean himself was pretty cozy with Corporate Lobbyists whilst governor.

Oh, and didn't the Union Pooh-bahs endorse Dean?

[CWebster]

8. Seems Unions back candidates strategically

for future political favors as opposed to whether their choices actually reflect the candidates positions on labor issues. They have become pathetic.

[Duder]

10. Sad but true...

Here is the list that contributed to the OBL ad:

Labor unions: The International Longshoremen's Association, Laborers International Union, International Association of Machinists, the International Association of Ironworkers, and the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers.

Big business: Slim-Fast Foods, S. Daniel Abraham of Florida; Yankees Entertainment & Sports Network LLC,Leo Hindery

Individuals: California attorney Ken Ziffren and former Democratic Sen. Bob Torricelli (NJ)*

*note: The scumbag Torricelli is fundraising for Kerry.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

13. that's called surviving

Frankly, AFSCME and SEIU stabbed the rest of the unions in the back by going with Dean - one time Chief Pimp Governor for Nafta. They should have gone with Gephardt if it was about "candidates positions on labor issues". Of course, it's not, it about power - which is why they are going with Kerry.

Thank God the unions aren't going with candidates that have a perfect "position on labor issues" like some Green party guy.

[Kolesar]

11. The trial attorneys bring money to the Democratic Party because ...

...because they have no where else to go. Their enemy is the corporations who ARE the republican party. Lawsuits are a blunt, inexact, and poor way of getting justice, but I am glad we still have lawsuits. Lawsuits also pressure corporations to behave, otherwise it would be the 19th century all over again.

[StClone]

5. Dean

Scared the establishment and as has been mentioned here that once he stated a goal to re-control Corp. media that media turned him into an uncontrolled near mad-man.

Yet they licked the boots of a Cretin for so long (Bush) and still prop him up as a leader of conviction. I would take Dean 100 to zero over Bush and yet the fool is in the WH and Dean is back in Vermont...go figure.

[Tinoire]

9. Interesting quotes and names in this article.

<snip>

As Mission Accomplished in Baghdad gave way to Mission Impossible and Mission Unnecessary and finally Mission Totally Fabricated, Dean soared. In the background, the Democratic powerbrokers shivered and quivered, and huddled together -- much like the Republicans in 1992, when the Buchanan Brigade momentarily threatened the GOP status quo. The man had to be stopped.

If party stalwarts like Dick Gephardt and John Kerry couldn't do it, then by God they'd send for reinforcements. And so in rode General Wesley Clark on a makeshift horse that looked suspiciously like Bill and Hillary Clinton with a sheet thrown over them.

<snip>

For a while, Dean was able to shake off the flubs, but he was peaking too soon. Left alone, he likely would have cracked from the sheer weight of his unconventional and badly managed campaign. That was too chancy, though. No upstart from the woods of New England was going to seize the self-fulfilling, self-aggrandizing, self-lubricating power machine of special interests, corporate lobbyists, New Democrats, fat-cat law firms, think-tank theoreticians, union pooh-bahs, foreign policy blowhards, and coddled Washington pols. So the Democratic Party savaged one of its own.

As The Washington Post reported on Feb. 11, a group called Americans for Jobs & Healthcare spent $500,000 on ads attacking Dean in the run-up to the primaries. The Post said the group was headed by David Jones, a longtime adviser to Gephardt. It said the group's spokesman was Robert Gibbs, who had previously been working for the Kerry campaign. And where did the money come from? According to the Post, disgraced former Senator Robert Torricelli of New Jersey, a Kerry supporter, gave $50,000.

REASON TO SCREAM. Other money, according to the Post, came from Alan Patricof, a Clark fund-raiser, and Bernard Schwartz, chairman of Loral Corp. Schwartz is a longtime moneybag for the Democratic Establishment who had close ties to the Clinton Administration. One ad the group ran questioned Dean's foreign policy expertise and used an image of Osama bin Laden.

<snip>

http://www.businessweek.com/print/bwdaily/dnflash/feb2004/nf20040225_4752_db009.htm?db

The author, who is not that complimentary to Dean which is why I like this article- it's more of an observation of what happened than an attack or a defense, is dead on about this part:

More dangerously, he talked about taking back the Democratic Party.

[madfloridian]

12. Interesting description of Dean.

SNIP...."Dean blew into the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination as The New Yorker dream candidate -- socially liberal, fiscally prudent, disarmingly candid, and personally charming in a smarty-pants, prep-school-boy sort of way. By all accounts, he had been a good governor of Vermont. He was a country doctor, not a Washington lawyer/politician. He respected women enough not to drag his physician wife out on the road with him. He wore cheap suits and never had his tie exactly straight.

NICKELED AND DIMED. In another year, Dean would have been a respectable candidate with a sensible, eat-your-spinach message. And then along came Iraq. He spoke forcefully against the American invasion -- and stuck to his guns. More dangerously, he talked about taking back the Democratic Party......"

Well-said.