Ex-Dem. Party Boss Blasts Kerry in Book

[no_to_war_economy]

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory?id=2772633

Former Democratic Party boss and Clinton friend Terry McAuliffe is lambasting John Kerry's unsuccessful presidential campaign, calling his effort to unseat President Bush "one of the biggest acts of political malpractice in the history of American politics."

McAuliffe said Kerry's camp was so afraid of offending swing voters that it didn't defend his record or criticize Bush. He said he was muzzled by Kerry's aides from assailing Bush's military record.

He said the campaign also ordered speeches at the Democratic National Convention to be scrubbed of any mention of Bush's name or his record although McAuliffe privately encouraged firebrand Al Sharpton to go ahead with his attacks on the president in his crowd-pleasing speech.

"I thought the decision of the Kerry campaign to back off any real criticism of Bush was one of the biggest acts of political malpractice in the history of American politics," he said.

[blondeatlast]

1. Edit--The mods took care of the last one.

I'll hold my fire.

[no_to_war_economy]

3. DU glitch, I guess

I posted this earlier but it disappeared from DU, must have been some kind of glitch

[seabeyond]

7. i think

it was more the extra comment that poster put in his post. not the actual article.

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Mass]

12. Remember that McAuliffe was one of those who wanted Kerry to concede

as early as Tuesday night. He is poorly placed to make these attacks.

[seabeyond]

16. poster like this that would call someone like kerry a pussy

has no desire to remember reality. kerry may be a lot of things, a pussy he is not. could kick this persons ass...... being the wuss he is. all kerry has done, standing tough, regardless of the unfair criticism ad attack, to be called a pussy

i hate that word, lol lol

[seabeyond]

14. are we gonna do this all over again

the pussy is the person that has to use women to put men down. i am seeing you are the pussy.

only in my opinion of course. i think it is the wussiest of male that has to use women to the wussiest make a man less. only the wussiest of men

[NoPasaran]

30. Not unless you accompany your post

With a picture of a kitty!

[karynnj]

15. self delete

self delete

[WinkyDink]

2. Terry McAuliffe can KMA.

[wisteria]

4. But a Democrat out whacking Democrats sells books,” Terry McAuliffe quote

http://thinkexist.com/quotes/terry_mcauliffe/


The guy is out to make money and help out Hillary, or at least that is what he thinks he will do.

[Hamlette]

5. when it comes to political malpractice, no better source than Terry n/t

[seabeyond]

6. if anyone was a hindrance on kerry it was mcauliffe and his incompetence

utter bullshit. this man did nothing to help kerry. when he was on tv he went along with bullshit rw talking point, media garbage abb chant and how kerry wasnt effective allowing the media lies to continue with kerry. leaving kerry to do all the work himself. HE failed.

[rox63]

8. McAuliffe bears a big part of the blame for the 2004 loss

He was head of the DNC, and he allowed the party infrasctucture to fall into ruin over his 4 years. Dean has started the long task of rebuilding the party, but it will take a while. McAuliffe never wanted Kerry to win. He was just laying the groundwork for Clinton part 2.

[Norquist Nemesis]

9. Terry's a little late to the party

I'm more suspicious of his timing (or maybe it's ABC's timing). He's taken two years for this?

[karynnj]

11. All these arguments were debunked in a thread locked

and then disapeared.

The facts are:
-McAuliffe lost not just 2004, but 2000 and 2002.

-McAuliffe himself did little or nothing to defend Kerry. The information was there as early as April:
-There were over 100 pages of naval records, all uniformly extremely positive - many signed by the SBVT.
-There was a Nixon tape where they decided to destroy Kerry after finding that he was squeaky clean and a genuine war hero. Their problem was that he was very credible and he was the only anti-war leader they feared.
-At the convention, all but 1 of Kerry's crew were there and they at other times had all been very positive about Kerry
-Brinkley was a noted historian. His book was not campaign fodder. He had spoken to over 100 people involved with Kerry in Vietnam. Those comments were made before it became political. Brinkley came away from his investigations very impressed by Kerry.
- The Navy gave Kerry his medals and John Warner - who at that time was the Secratary of the Navy said he earned them.

So - with all this - McAuliffe as the head of the DNC could not even defend Kerry. Remember the Clinton people defended Clinton on Gennifer Flowers when there was a TAPE of Clinton and her - with Clinton suggesting she lie to reporters. Who is harder to defend a man who by all reasonable accounts was a war hero or one who was denyin a seedy affair that even to a Democratic partisan (me) looked like it occured. My problem then was why was he lying?

[no_to_war_economy]

13. the thread was not locked, it was deleted by the mod

[karynnj]

17. You're correct

My problem with it being deleted is that many of us countered the arguments - which are now surfacing in this and another thread. The thread at the point it was deleted was only negative to McAuliffe.

[seabeyond]

18. because it was clear to most everyone mcauliffe's incompetence and

lack of integrity in running the dnc. he absolutely did not do his job. he encourage the rw talking points put out by the media allowing the non truths to grow. i didn't see his happy ass out there defending kerry during the attack on kerry military service. he encouraged and allowed the incorrect perceptions to grow and continue. he was an utter failure

[Name removed]

21. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[karynnj]

25. self delete

[Strawman]

19. I find it odd

That a DK supporter would source the biggest corporate money whore in the party, Terry McCauliffe. Gee what's Bob Rubin got to say about JK? Whether the critique is accurate or not, he's not an ally.

[karynnj]

20. Another clue that McAuliffe still doesn't get it

he says that he was muzzled by Kerry's aides about going after Bush's service. This also shows that his idea of defense - is to attack the other side.

The fact is he should have DEFENDED Kerry's service and record. It was clear that most people did not care about the President's record - they knew him and he was Presdent. In the only poll I saw that asked people who said they were for Bush whether they would be affected if the Rather story were true, the result was there would be no loss of support.

For Kerry, the lies hurt because his record said a lot about his character. Kerry is also intensely honest - saying he lied about his record undercut this.

McAuliffe still can't see that he was useless.

[sampsonblk]

22. Devastating Point...

'He said Bush called President Clinton while he was recovering from his heart attack in September 2004 and said, "The Kerry campaign is the most inept group I have ever seen in politics. Don't let them ruin your reputation."'

For once, Bush was connected to reality.

[ProSense]

24. Devastating for McAwful and Clinton!

Bush calling anyone inept is lunacy! How's his reputation? Is Clinton still taking his calls?

McAwful!

[seabeyond]

26. are you fucking serious. the everything is clinton fault.... and bush is

worried about clinton reputation. the right takes him down for blow job and they are concerned for clinton reputation. and you are expecting ANYONE on this board to buy your bullshit

[sampsonblk]

34. Don't blame the messenger!-nt

nt

[seabeyond]

35. For once, Bush was connected to reality.

i thought that was yours.... sorry

[sampsonblk]

41. You were right about that

Yep. That was me. And I stand by it - if Bush actually ever said that.

[LSK]

27. which Bush?

[karynnj]

28. You know, that's a pretty strange comment

Kerry is not Clinton ( a fact that Teresa likely is extremely happy about) and was never even a close ally of his. How could Kerry losing hurt Bill Clinton's reputation? Also, when did we start believing Bush? Wasn't September 2004 when a tall Senator completely destroyed President Bush in the first debate?

[ProSense]

29. Here's another thing that's strange about that comment

posted by DUer Beachmon:

Seems to me that Mr. McAuliffe should look in the mirror for incompetence and malpractice. When your ENEMY says something, you don't take it as wisdom, idiot!!

[beachmom]

31. Oh yeah, let's get in the business of accepting BUSH as a truth teller

What utter BS. Bush got his ass kicked by Kerry three times in the debate. It's part of the spin to say the other campaign sucked. The fact that McAuliffe uses this quote in his book shows him to be at best clueless, at worst a traitor who would side with the ENEMY instead of your own.

[Cha]

37. And fucking bush should know from

inept! Fucking bush would not have a god damn prayer without the fuckingfascistmedia in fatass fucking pocket.

[Sapphire Blue]

23. From the article: "In his scrappy memoir..." should read "In his crappy memoir..."

I'm so glad that Howard Dean is our chairman now. He has succeeded where McAuliffe failed.

[Cha]

38. Cause Dean isn't bought out

by the so called powerhouse of the clintonistas and he's his own man working for us and our country.

[beachmom]

32. What's the real news in this book? That Hillary fears Kerry more than

any other candidate. Only praise for Obama and Edwards. Hmmmm . . . if you're not a big enough target no need in wasting your breath on them. VERY interesting. It's actually made my day.

[karynnj]

33. Also isn't Mark Halperin the political director of ABC

The one who writes the Note and wrote the book on winning electiona that applauds Matt Drudge?

(His first chapter covers an account where the facts and the fantasy are miles apart - and he thinks the fantasy was genius. Yeah! Let's all lie and make stuff up!

fact: Kerry got a hair cut from a top stylist. It was expensive at $75 - but I know people who have paid that amount and they are not as wealthy as Kerry.

fantasy: includes that he had his hair colored and highlighted and was very very paticular about it being perfect etc etc.

Kerry's office said he just got a hair cut. )

To me this is like the Fox story where Cameron reported on Kerry saying he was a metrosexual and other things - all completely made up.

The problem I have is that this is a person who claims to be a reputable journalist and he PRAISES a team that has people in the media completely make things up. This is not Murrow!

[karendc]

36. McAuliffe

(according to insider friends)

went boar-hunting in France after Nov. 4. He was back by the 8th ( at a party for the campaign staff) where the oil simply poured off of him.

Put me right off my hors d-oeuvres, I can tell you.

[mtnsnake]

39. haha, the truth hurts, doesn't it

McCauliffe is spot on about Kerry's campaign. Kerry had the worst campaign advisers ever.

[karynnj]

40. So the reason he nearly

beat a sitting President in a time of war, who used the terror levels as a political tool and indimidated the press by threathening loss of access. Kerry survived hundreds of millions of dollars of ads lying about him and got tepid support from one wing of the party.

So, if his advisors were worse than Dukaksis, McGovern, Mondale, Humphrey, and Carter's the second time, that means that KERRY himsef most be a fantastic candidate.