Why Dean's "Outspoken" Comments Are Good For Us

[Divine Ms Q]

I noted this about Howard Dean last year during the presidential race after John Kerry locked up the nomination. He would make some statement that seemed totally outrageous and scandalous at the time. Republicans would ridicule him, and Democrats would try to distance themselves from him. Dean was made to look like a total fool. But then, something interesting would happen: the issue that Dean initially raised in his "outrageous" comment would begin to be debated.

For example, remember the raising of the terra'lert right after the Democrat(ic) Convention? (I can never remember what is the PC term to use for our party...Democrat or Democratic, so please forgive my misstep here :blush:). Dean said on some talking head's show how interesting it was that the terra'lert was only raised when the Democrats were on an up-swing. Well, he was absolutely correct, yet the media and Repugs jumped all over him for this statement. Other Democrats shyed away from the statement, and tried to distance themselves from Dean.

But, then, a funny thing happened. The media began to make the terra'lerts a discussion point. Granted, it was only in the media spin for a week or so, but nonetheless, the idea got out there that the Repugs were manipulating the terra'lert system. Now, it seems as if this manipulation is a generally accepted fact.

Although Howard Dean hismelf takes a huge beating when he makes one of his "controversial but true" statements, but the issue he raises tends to get into discussions.

[KoKo]

1. Great comments. Interesting observation....

Thanks.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

2. You make a supremely good point...

Every "wild allegation" by Dean has proven to be, in fact, the truth.

What's more, somebody has to be the pit bull. Somebody has to be the equivalent of Newt Gingrich and throw molotov cocktails at the Republican Party. The rest of the Democratic Party needs to just chill out and stop criticizing (or calling for Dean to apologize). By being the lightning rod and moving the conversation far to the left, Dean is making a safe space for Progressive Democrats to discuss the issues.

Is the Democratic Party as politically stupid as they appear?

[DearAbby]

4. Maybe he should have used the term "White Fake Christians" with

a photograph of trailer hitch Jesus and the fiasco over Shiavo. Show excerpts from the Justice Sunday, Show Dobson, Robertson and Fawell, supporting the GOP...
The march Right toward a theocracy, that would benefit who? What Dean had said is not off point.

[BillZBubb]

3. Bingo! This is mass communications 101.

Too bad the Democratic "leadership" doesn't understand it. In today's media you absolutely must have a stalking horse with a big hammer. He gets the fly's a buzzin'. Then you have the rest of the party follow up with a more concrete explanation of the problem and solution. They don't have to endorse the original statement in toto, just use it as a springboard to push our ideas.

Our so-called leaders fail to seize this great opportunity and instead start attacking one of their own.

Strategy and Democratic party are total strangers.

[Lexingtonian]

5. eh....

At the time Dean supporters gave the man credit for inventing the wheel and making the sun rise every morning, and for casting various magic spells in a general way. It was pretty freaky.

I think the story begins with polling and where the political debate is. Polling says that Indies are only hanging on to supporting Bush because his policy on 'terrorism' hasn't failed yet in their eyes. Democrats can't do much on that other than wait. All other hardline conservative policies have been decided by Democrats and Indies to have failed- both now oppose them- and moderate Republicans are now the demographic in which the debate about the policies centers, where the wavering about them has begun.

I think there's a division of labor going on. Dean has nothing to lose, he has some cred with moderate Republicans and can be the provocateur- he's good at it- and get the ball rolling on whether moderate Republicans really are comfortable with the Religious Right theocracy and white supremacism. I'm not sure this was planned in detail- I suspect Dean jumped the gun and said stuff that was tossed around during a couple of planning meetings for what to do to get moderate Repubs agitated with. We had a bit of an inpromptu response, some of it helping him and the Party (Pelosi) and some of it from parts of the Party that want everything stuck at the moderate and unchallenging status quo positions of a couple of years ago (Biden, Lieberman, Obama, etc).

Democrats telling moderate Republicans to split from the Religious Right sorts was going to happen at some point in the middle future. Dean got there a little earlier than planned- people were in more of a hurry to talk about it than the Democratic leadership thought (as did I, because the Priscilla Owen nomination and Schiavo affair argumentation was a lot about these issues and no one seemed to respond to it). It's been a bit of a melee as a result.