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Governer Dean Becomes Chair of DNC
sg3000 writes "It's official: the Democrats elected Howard Dean as Chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Dean won the position after a particularly contentious run for chairman, as reported in The New Republic. Governor Dean became a national figure during his impressive run for president in 2003, where he started as an outsider and long-shot candidate but became the front runner, only to see support fail to materialize during the Iowa caucuses."
Dean? A Democrat? Yes, he signed civil unions into law, but publicly declaired his discomfort about it and did the signing in private with no press allowed. He was practically the Republican governor of Vermont for ten years!
"Remember, there never were pineapple-almond cookies here."
Struck a cord with the common man? Come on, Howard Dean was a joke, and it shows there is a leadership problem at the top of the Dem party.
I agree with you that Dean wasn't the one striking a chord with the common man, but I don't think that was the reason. As much as I, and many here, hate George W. Bush, the reason he's in office is "striking a chord with the common man."
He comes off as "common man" with his poor speaking abilities. He goes to schools, and reads stories to children. He went out in the crowd of terrified family members after 9/11, shaking hands and pausing to listen to frightened citizens stories. Then shortly after, he stood up and told the country that he was going to make us safer, and make it alright.
"Common men" don't care about secret tribunals, election fraud, attacking the wrong guy, invading soveriegn nations, alienating the world, or any of that stuff that "nerds" (of all types) care about. They want to be told that their leader empathizes with them, and that by golly, he's going to make it right. That's the stuff that makes the "common man" sleep easy at night.
~Rebecca
however, it doesn't really matter, that is not since the GOP corrupted and sold out america
overly affluent americans are traitors
As a Republican, I think this is good. I think he'll lead the party in the wrong direction and will onlly make my party's life easier.
I see him as what is wrong the with the Democratic party. Full of venom, hate, and far to the left. I think he'll move the party even more to the left than they already are (which, in my opinion, is why they lost the elections recently, they are too far from center). I know other Republicans who share this view.
But this post isn't about why I think he is bad, or that I think he is bad (I think Zell Miller would have been a great choice but I know how well THAT suggestion would have gone over ;). What I would like to ask of the Democrats here on /. is... what do you think? Do you think this is a good thing? Is there anything about him that worries you? Are there any specific traits that you think will make him do a better job than Terry McCauluf (probably spelled wrong)? The only thing I see good about him is that he is good at fundraising and organizing the far left (but I really don't know much about the guy).
So what do you Dems think of this decision? Good, bad, indifferent, and why?
PS: He wasn't the Clinton's pick, from what I understand. I bet they are NOT happy about this. But that's another discussion entirely.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
I really detest that cynical attitude. That the only ones whose opinions are fit are these theoretical "joe sixpacks" that go to blue collar jobs, don't read books, drink domestic beer, etc. etc. I think that stereotype, and buying into it, is stupid, and I don't think any American "common" or "uncommon" should buy into an idea that their opinion doesn't really matter because they are not somehow the "prototypical American". There is no prototypical American. There is no universal Joe Sixpack. There's an implicit reverse elitism in that. There is no fucking reason a lab-worker or aerospace engineer, or single mother middle-manager, or ex-drug-addict playwright are any LESS American than our theoretical Joe Sixpack. I think that's what makes us Americans.
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
What I can't believe is how far to the right this country's shifted so quickly. What was the center in 2000 is now the 'extreme left' today. Dean's a proper left-leaning democrat, not a republican-wannabe apologist.
The right's gotten a strong wind recently, and we need to fight back accordingly, not start letting go of core values. And it's well-needed, even with such a poor candidate as Kerry, we still got 48%* of the electorate. Kerry ignored most of the issues at hand and only attacked Bush's strongpoints. I don't think Dean will let our newer candidates make the same mistakes.
Maybe I'm an old romantic, but I don't think homophobia (gay rights), subordination of women (abortion), warmongering (iraq), and the extortion of the lower classes (taxes, social security) are American values.
--
* debates over the remnants of fair voting aside
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"But his views on things like health care, welfare, social security, environmental policy, tax reform and foreign policy range from the standard liberal platform to extremism."
Here is a translation for those people who don't speak extreme wingnuttian...
Dean's Views on:
Google really should develop a language tool for extreme wingnuttian.
It's hard to imagine a better development than this! Excellent! Terry McAuliffe had brought the party to its knees with his Republican-Lite approach to leading the DNC. Screw that. Dean is the man!
Few things are as amusing as watching people get all worked up into a lather denouncing the choice. What, exactly, is wrong with having an intelligent, passionate leader? America has become such a country of clucking chickens that we not only accept the degradations to our liberties performed by the current monkey admin, but now even the dissenters are afraid of having a leader with a voice. Grow some balls, people.
The old idea of being Not-As-Evil-As-Our-Opponents is dead. It's time to pick up the populist trail where we left it years ago.
Oh, and PS weirdo rightist fascists - Dean is not a 'leftie'. He's left-of-center, certainly, but he's barely moderate, let alone "far-left". Readjust that sociopathically-slanted political spectrum you've got before you slide into the abyss of fascism. Just a friendly tip.
The candidate who gets the "lesser evil" votes doesn't have a party at campaign HQ celebrating the fact that he's less evil. He sees every vote, regardless of why it was cast, as an endorsement of his policies. Vote for the D, he sees it as you voting for the welfare state, affirmative action and all the other un-libertarian Democrat policies. Vote for the R, you're voting for the War in Iraq, the War on Drugs, and all the other un-libertarian Republican policies.
If you're a Libertarian, please vote for Libertarian candidates or stay home. Anything else is harmful to the Libertarian movement.
live(free) || die;
Well, only if you follow the "watch what I say, not what I do" rule.
Bush isn't particularly interested in making Health Care more affordable unless by that you mean, "don't allow class action lawsuits across state boundaries".
Likewise, he isn't for (in the sense of watching what he does) helping the poor or making sure our environment is taken care of. He's atrocious on all levels here.
I doubt very much that Bush would be willing to stipulate Tax Reform should be based on a "People should pay according to their means more or less" policy. He's more like, "the richer you are the less you should pay" policy.
As for a foreign policy that doesn't promote lying to the people to foster support for wars of aggression... Seriously, try to say Bush is for that without laughing.
Dean is clearly on the left side of the spectrum, but BushCo is much more clearly on the *FAR* right side. The rightwingers have become so dominant that the system is falling out of balance, and there are basically only two outcomes now. One possible outcome is a swing back to the left, and Dean is of course going to be pushing for that. The stronger the swing to the right, the stronger the counterswing will have to be.
The other possible outcome would be bankruptcy and collapse. The United States has already lasted far longer than the average government, and it's showing plenty of symptoms of the kind of senility that often appears before a government collapses.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
This issue is often a source of heated debates among Libertarians. I admit, its a hard one to struggle with. You're correct, both parties offer major "evils" when viewed in libertarian terms.
Unfortunately, voting in the USA right now has major flaws when more than two parties participate.
Taking the most recent election for example, with the split being so close. In the previous election, the independant vote was decidedly on the "Left" side of center. Those voting Libertarian, Independant, or others, were still voting "against Bush". I phrase it in that way because it really felt to me like the last election was never "for Kerry" but only "for/against" Bush Jr.
In 1992, the independant vote was decidedly on the "Right" side of center. Ross Perot's vote was taken mostly from those that would have otherwise voted for Bush Sr.
How do you know which is which? Well I'm sure there is a socio-political scientist out there that can fund a study and take 10 years to come up with the answer. Truthfully, you just have to know the climate. When you have an election that offers no second choice or rating system, and 2 parties are virtually guarenteed to recieve 50/50 +/- 5% of the vote, voting outside of those two is likely to have unintended side effects.
I'm libertarian because I actually support most (I think at last count 22 of 24 major issues?) of their platforms. I put my money where my mouth is with donations, and I throw my support when I can. But if we have another election similar to 2004, voting Libertarian for President is a fast track to insuring I don't get to vote again.
~Rebecca
And what is wrong with cutting taxes and equal rights for gun owners?
Same people? Maybe.
But if you think Gore did NOT play a major role in creating the Internet, then you've bought into a big lie circulated by right-wing politicians starting with Dick Armey, who originally misquoted Gore.
Gore was discussing his legislative record. Anyone who looks into that record can easily see that Gore was a leader in the 1980s of a faction called the "Atari Democrats," who believed the industrial base of the United States had to shift from heavy industry to technology.
When DARPA pulled back from funding non-military uses of the fledgling TCP/IP network, Gore was instrumental in getting the National Science Foundation both the funding and the jurisdiction to create NSFNet, which became the core of the public Internet.
It is conservative economic dogma that private enterprise will make everything just peachy if we just keep the government from intervening.
But private enterprise had no incentive to create a public Internet; on the contrary, private enterprise had an incentive to create instead a series of private networks (generally running proprietary protocols).
By declaring that the nation needed an "information superhighway" for the new era and throwing government support and funding behind an open network standard, Gore was instrumental in breaking that logjam and -- yes -- creating the Internet.
It is hard these days for simple things like facts and public records to compete with the drumbeat of spin, misinformation and outright lies that has come to characterize "political discourse." Both the mischaracterization of Gore's statement about the Internet and the miscasting of the pragmatic moderate Vermont Governor Howard Dean as a screaming "ultra-liberal on social issues who is out of the mainstream and wrong for America" are examples.
its pretty sad how the parent is considered insightful on slashdot. have all the adults left?
No, because of moderation abuse by the liberal majority here on Slashdot, nearly all of the conservatives and moderates have left.
The politics section has become an echo chamber of malcontent liberalism--the epitome of what's wrong with the Democratic party. With them, there's no room for legitimate disagreement. They're right and George Bush and everyone who voted for him are wrong and evil (or, at the very least, stupid).
-Grym
By definition, there are more common men than uncommon men. People win elections (well, in theory) by getting more votes than the other guys. Therefore, appealing to the common man is more important than appealing to the uncommon man. Don't shoot the messenger, kiddo.
Rob
You seem to be implying that Bush won the election because of rhetoric and image. Certainly that's partially true, as with any politician. However, as long as the Democrats keep thinking that, they will never win an election.
The reason Bush won is because people knew what Bush was about, knew what he stood for, and agreed with some of his ideas.
The Democratic party needs to put forth someone with a message that the people like, and positions the people agree with. It's that simple. The Democrats are having somewhat of an identity problem, and that was reflected last election.
The fiscal liberals (i.e. people who want to involve the federal government more in economic transactions) are a strong component of the Democratic party. However, for better or worse, those ideas just don't get votes. Neither do politicians who support gay marriage.
There are really two options:
(1) Try to be honest about core values, like fiscal liberalism, abortion as a civil right, gay marriage, and more involvement with the U.N. This will initially cost the Democrats many positions, but will provide an opportunity to convince people of their ways.
(2) Continue their policy of Republican-Lite. The Democrats will hold more offices, but never will they gain the dominant position in the nation. They will never be able to convince anyone that liberalism is the way to go, because they can't even stand up and say it (or they'll lose votes).
Now, I'm not a member of the Democratic party, so maybe you shouldn't take my advice. I just want a healthy political landscape because that is better for me too. If the Democrats are constantly pandering and compromising and never really come up with a main issue that really creates a following, that means we have a bunch of Democrats, none of whom actually agree with the Democratic party.
Social scientists are inspired by theories; scientists are humbled by facts.