Who watched Meet the Press?

[blueloo]

Ok, Mehlman is trying to redefine the question about why we went to war. My real concern was Dean's performance. He was tripping over his words, made word choice mistakes, and didn't deliver answers with much confidence. Also, his suit ensemble was poor.

[pstans]

1. Dean will never be the best dressed politician

I think Dean made some very good points. I didn't all of the Dean interview, but I think he did fairly well. Dean did good on the part when he was asked about Moral values.

I didn't see the part with Mehlman, I don't like rats in my house.

[Debi]

2. The 'Dean sucks' posts are getting old

I'm sure all of us would do better. That's why we're sitting in Iowa watching Meet the Press on Sunday morning instead of in the studio getting interviewed. Because we're so much more elegant speakers than Howard Dean. :eyes:

Let's find a new target, shall we?

[rurallib]

3. Saw part of Mehlman and then turned it off

I was surprised the Timmeh kept going after him. So unlike anyone in the press. But I just couldn't stand to be lied to yet again. So I missed Dean.
But having seen Dean before I cannot understand your comment. Dean says what everyone should be saying and he's been saying it for three years on the national scene. He's not slick with a fistful of talking points like any packaged republican regressive. He is a real person who thinks and thinks on his feet and for the most part he does so extremely well. I really don't think we want to trot out a robot with pre-programmed talking points.

[IA_Seth]

4. I watched it..

I usually try to wake up long enough on Sunday mornings to watch Meet the Press or This Week (the George Stephanopolous one) and then if I am feeling like a little punishment I watch that crap one on Fox.

Anywho...I will be the first to admit that I wasn't a Dean fan for 2004. It was probably more a product of his supporters in my area (I wasn't a fan of them either), but either way I just never really identified with the Dean camp.

That being said, I don't really see where he was tripping up much Sunday? I admit that I was flipping back and forth, but from what I watched he actually seemed ok to me. He made good points about Iraq, about Alito, and he seemed to handle his questions alright to me? What did he say or do that came across as lacking confidence?

Oh, and I didn't catch the suit. I am actually pretty mindful of those things most of the time but I was pretty tired I guess. What was wrong with it? If it wasn't the same old dark suit/light shirt/red tie crap that everyone else wears I would be thrilled.

[Pirate Smile]

5. I thought Dean did very well. Perhaps we were watching different

shows.

I also didn't notice anything about the suit but he has never been a clothes horse or cared much about that kind of crap.

[blueloo]

6. Response

If a suit is a suit that's fine. For the record the Meet the Press website has a different picture of Dean on it's header (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032608/).

It may be that I've never been one for Dean's rhetorical tendancies. I would name some but I wouldn't want to be tagged as a Dean-hater, despite having not previously said much of anything about Dean if I can remember. In fact, I never suggested that Dean was bad at being the head of the DNC. All indicators suggest he has exceeded expectations, seen both in money and praise, and is doing a stand up job. It did seem like Russert bullied him into talking about an agenda and not just about how much Republican suck. In the grand plan it may be better to lay low and hold out on a big policy plans for the 2006 elections, which it appears is happening now.

[IA_Seth]

7. Yeah..

That refreshed my memory somewhat.

Russert was trying to the lead the conversation towards specific agenda points and Dean did resist pretty well. I recall at one point Russert saying something to the effect of "so the American people should just trust what you say that the Dems have specifics"...I know that isn't close to verbatim but something like that. It seemed like Dean didn't really want to delve into specific policies, which I don't think is a bad thing. I think you are right when guessing that they are holding out for the 2006 elections.

They did talk about fund-raising and Dean got a kick out of Russert trying to downplay the enormous success that we've had this year. Dean said something to the affect of "yeah, we are behind but its a lot better than we used to be" "we are gaining ground" or something like that. I thought Dean came across as pretty frank and honest.