Why do people make things up about Dean in order to hate him?

[skjpm]

It seems that people WANT to hate Dean and, because he's a pretty ordinary politician, they have to make things up in order to hate him. Dean is, for all his weaknesses, ONE OF US. He's on our side. Why do people need to hate him when all they have to do is simply disagree with him?

[Democrats unite]

1. What has been made up about Dean...

To make People hate Dean?

[Hoppin_Mad]

5. That he "attacted Ted Kennedy" and many DU Anti-Deans AGREED -eom-

[jmaier]

8. Would this be like

the thread accusing Clark of being behind the CFG ad because he once worked for the company whose chairman contributes to CFG. This relationship cited as "PROOF" and echoed by many Dean supporters of Clark's venality?

Just curious...

I don't justify any of it. But this hand-wringing, why do people "hate my guy" threads are almost as tiresome as the inane, smear threads. It's politics. It's emotional. It's hardball. All the wishing it away in the world aren't going to change things. Sadly.

[Democrats unite]

15. Well here is the Article...

Attack the article, not Clark Supporters.



http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2004/01/06/deans_education_enemies_list/

[Scott Lee]

21. That he hasn't always been antiwar as far as the Iraq war goes

[molly]

37. HMMMMM - not so fast!

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2004/01/07/nh_voters_eyeing_two_non_deans/

Dean replied that he had initially supported Biden-Lugar because "I think the president deserves the presumption of right on his side in foreign policy. I wanted to give this president as much leeway as we could." (Imagine what Dean would say if John Kerry or Dick Gephardt had made that statement.) But Dean also noted that he had made a speech on Sept. 21, 2002, setting out his opposition to the war. However, Dean was still expressing support for Biden-Lugar in early October; at about that time, the authors of the resolution decided not to press forward with it.

[Scott Lee]

22. That he dodged the draft.

[Scott Lee]

23. That the state he governed, Vermont, is "unimportant".

[Scott Lee]

24. That he "panders" to Gays.

[Scott Lee]

25. That he "panders" to religion - even that of his wife and kids

[jmaier]

30. not good things, Scott

but at least you don't have

1. stalking horse for Hillary
2. tool of the Clintonistas/DLC
3. tool of the neocons/PNAC
4. baby killer/Butcher of Balkans
5. empty suit
6. Venal, mastermind behind the CFG ad
7. wolf in sheeps clothing
8. tax panderer

and I'm sure that I could come up with another dozen or so. What's really odd is that some of these are mutually exclusive and posted and/or echoed by the same people. Present company frequenty included.

I guess we're all in the same boat.


Wes Clark. He will make an exceptional American President.

[w13rd0]

2. Because the hatred...

...justifies de-humanization, of Dean, and of his supporters. Just look around, we're dismissed as "cultists", Kool-aid drinkers, "leftist activists", blah blah blah. You have to hate to dehumanize.

[in_cog_ni_to]

3. I've never seen anything

made up about Dean. What are you talking about?

[Democrats unite]

4. I don't think we will get a answer here.

eom

[KaraokeKarlton]

9. Actually, most of the criticism of Dean I've seen on here isn't true

I've heard some pretty bizarre claims about Dean and Vermont. Being that I live in Vermont and lived under Dean's superb leadership for over a decade, I can spot crap when I see it...and I've seen an awful lot of it here. :shrug:

[jmaier]

6. Sadly

this is a common phenom among a few misguided but quite ardent supporters for each of the candidates. You could basically substitute in the name of Kerry, Clark, Gephardt, etc. for Dean's and ask the same question. Again, to no avail.

Some people get very emotional because they can't quite separate their support for something from their person. Attack my "candidate", "belief", etc. and it's a personal attack against ME, thus ... angry, defensive postures.

Aint' gonna change. Just has to be endured.




Wes Clark. He will make an extraordinary American President.

[bhunt70]

10. good post

[KaraokeKarlton]

14. No, Dean supporters have definitely been attacked on here

I've been compared to a Nazi, called a cult member, repeatedly asked about drinking koolaid, told that I am too dumb to research what my own governor did in my state. It's been quite nasty. Insulting the supporters of a candidate is not criticizing the candidate. It has gotten personal against Dean supporters, and thankfully it's against the rules to do this now. Prior to that rule it was common practice to demean, belittle and insult Dean supporters on this site by many supporters of other candidates. Those are personal attacks, period.

[oasis]

31. Do you recall your response in the thread "Will you watch Kerry's video?"?

[KaraokeKarlton]

34. Yep, and I was being honest

and what, exactly, does that have to do with this thread?

:shrug:

[oasis]

36. You seem to get upset when others get nasty, yet you chose to display

your insensitivity on a postive thread about a candidate you don't support.

Wouldn't it be a good idea to pass on positive threads if you haven't anything positive to contribute?

[Scott Lee]

Dean get the vast majority of the crap at DU because hes the frontrunner

it's really that simple.

In politics, people often "hate" a winner....especially if it's not their candidate.

[FubarFly]

7. Probably lots of reasons.

Some people need excuses to act like jerks. :grr:

Some people think that if they tear down Dean, you will vote for their candidate. :eyes:

Some people are trying to promote discord and strife. :nuke:

And some people are gullible enough to believe everything they read. :silly:

:shrug:

[Cha]

11. Good Ones!

And a very reasonable question, too!

[skjpm]

12. They make up his stand on Iraq, for one thing

I fully understood his position--that he would support a resolution that had the backing of the UN. So did I. I'm not anti-war, and I, like Dean, supported the attack on Afghanistan because there was a reasonable connection between that government and the terrorists, IMHO. I was against Iraq because it was unilateral and illegal. So, my position matches Dean. What are you going to make up about that?

[FubarFly]

16. Most people are reasonable enough to separate

the propaganda and distortions from the truth.

But alas, this will continue until we have a candidate.

Try not to take it personally. Most of it is just white noise.

[w13rd0]

20. I frankly, ON THIS BOARD, talked about how...

...someone needed to do something about Afghanistan, the Talibans treatment of women, and people in general, and their extremism, back when they were blowing up the statues of Buddha.

But yeah, I know what you mean. If a credible threat were proven, and look in the archives, Powell "proved it" to many here, until people started letting their skepticism let them look deeper.

It's fairly hideous all around. And for those quick to say, "well you"... There are some things that seem glaringly apparent to me, and for that I wear my tinfoil. They can call me a conspiracy nut all they want, but Bush WAS LYING ABOUT IRAQ, he IS COVERING UP OVER S11, and he DID CHEAT TO STEAL THE WHITE HOUSE.

[QC]

13. Same reason people make up shit about all the candidates.

It's not all a matter of dear, sweet Dr. Dean getting attacked, you know. And Lord knows some of his supporters can sling it with the best of them. This road runs both ways.

Truth is, 90% of the nastiness here is the work of about eight or ten obsessive, relentlessly nasty posters. If the rest of us would ignore them, or failing that, put them in the twitfilter, the tone of this place would improve enormously.

[BobbyJay]

17. I'm wondering why Dean is attacking Clark through smear ads?

I mean, what's he gonna say?

"I sprained my ankle skiing while General Clark was living it up in Vietnam on our tax dollars. I am the only true Democrat. I also have a farm"





www.clark04.com

[Democrats unite]

18. Please lets not bring up the farm issue again!

LOL

[corporatewhore]

19. I dont like it when dean makes things up like only antiwar cannidate

[Scott Lee]

26. At the time he made that statement, he WAS

How many times must the Dean opponents be reminded of this fact?

[Melinda]

29. ^^^^There's one right there^^^^ Dean never said ^^^that^^^

when OTHERS were declared and in the race. Again, you are twisting out of time and context. And since OTHERS declared, he has changed his statement on the war to declare he that he is the ONLY MAJOR candidate opposing it. Big difference, but you keep on spinnin'.

[BobbyJay]

32. nm

[democratreformed]

27. For the same reason they make up things about Clark in order to hate him

And Kucinich, and Lieberman, and Moselely-Braun, etc. etc.

[arewethereyet]

28. nobody has to make up things about Dr Dean

there is so much he gives away for free.

And its not about hate its about making people realize just how unprepared he is as a candidate for the highest office in the land shoot, the world. He's like Dan Quaile only he's too smart to be making such addleminded blunders.

[skjpm]

33. You may have to vote for him

but because you've worked so hard on your hatred, you're going to vote "holding your nose," rather than give him the wholehearted support he needs to win. You've destroyed your ability to see him as a winner or even a good person, and thus, you have unnecessarily weakened the Democratic party by making it difficult for yourself to support Dean.

[w4rma]

35. Many are folks who are tossing bull!@#$ in hopes that something sticks.

Or in hopes that if the act of tossing the bull!@#$ will give the appearance of something.

Not all, though.

[Moderator]

38. Locking....

Please do not post inflammatory statements.

Thanks,

DU Moderator