openeyes

Over the weekend, the Dean campaign asked his supporters to contribute money to match the funds that VP Cheney was likely to raise today at a fundraiser in South Carolina. The goal was to raise $250,000 for Dean by midnight tonight. Dean supporters raised that amount by midnight on Sunday and by 11:00 am EDT on Monday had raised over $320.000!

As a Dean supporter, I'm glad to see that his momentum continues. According to his campaign, based on a poll by the Boston Herald, he's now first in New Hampshire. Go Dean!

ex-idaho

The Republican fear of Dean has reached unprecidented levels. Rush today went over the top attempting to paint Dean as a far out lefty. The GOP is terrified they are going to loose the moderate Republican vote to someone like Dean. Someone that takes a strong fiscally conservative stand on the ballooning deficit and still pour money into the schools.

Now that Bob Graham has also gone on the offensive and is hammering Bush on defense and War on Terror issues the heat surely on Bush and his joke of an administration.

jman0904

For a second there that 320,000 looked a lot like 320.00
I almost laughed myself silly. Then I saw the extra 0, and applauded.

openeyes

They're up to over $460,000 now.

Did anyone catch the story about the challenge on "All Thinks Considered" on NPR? It was good, IMO.

I know Dean's not the candidate for everyone, but I've found it amazing easy to throw him a spare $50 here and there. It looks as though that's true for others also. I think it's one tangible way to protest the Bush administration. I'm not sure what'll happen, but I really think between the internet, the meetups, and Dean's willingness to speak out about some things (for me it's a woman's right to choose and the "throw the fundamentalists preachers out of the White House" line) that something big is really brewing.

So Dean has gotten big enough to raise the ire of Limbaugh? I haven't caught wind of Limbaugh's show for ages. (I'm a proud owner of Al Franken's book "Rush Limbaugh is a Big, Fat Liar".) I guess I should tune into his show occaisionally, as I do with Christian radio, to remind myself how far afield from me some people think.

So are the Republicans changing their tune about Dean being the easiest to beat and are getting anxious? I suppose it depends who is doing the spinning.

ex-idaho

No. In fact they are stepping up on this charge. They are trying desperately to convince the world that Dean is a left wing fanatic and will loose 49 states in the general election. While there are alot on the right and the left that take these claims at face value I believe it is all designed to paint one of the most credible and strongest candidates as illegitimate.

Calzaer

LMAO...

Heehee.. *snort*... all THINKS considered.... does that mean Republicans aren't welcome?

*bursts into fits of uncontrollable giggles*

Bill

This is absolutely the case.

If you want to know just how Gray Davis managed to get re-elected as Governor of California last year, it was because he pulled a similar ploy in reverse. He had no credible primary opponants (sitting governors rarely do get credible opposition in their own party), so he concentrated on running a series of negative attack ads against the moderate Republican, former Mayor of Los Angeles Richard Riorden, because he wanted the choice for the voters to be stark: Davis or the really, really right-winger, Simon. Well, Davis got his wish, ran against Simon and won. If he had run against Riorden, he would almost certainly have lost. This sort of thing is just all part of the game of politics.

The difficulty is that the Republicans are going to have a hard time painting Dean as a classic liberal when he has an A rating from the NRA and he strongly advocates a balanced budget. And the more screwed-up things look over in Iraq, what with no WMD and so forth, the more prescient he seems in his opposition to the Iraq war on the terms that Bush wanted to fight it (Dean would support a UN war, but not a unilateral pre-emptive strike war). Dean thought that the French had the right idea: just overload Iraq with inspectors and let them keep looking up Saddams under panties until he comes clean. If we had done that, we would be financially ahead and a lot less people would be dead today.

All we've got to do is keep Dean from sitting in any tanks trying to look like a tank commander (<=== Dukakis reference....).

== Bill

hezekiah jones

Originally posted by openeyes
... the "throw the fundamentalists preachers out of the White House" line) ...

Dean says this?

dcwolf

I think that's a paraphrased version, but perhaps he did say it exactly like that at some point. This is from his speech in Cali 3/22/03.

openeyes

I knew after writing and running off to work that I was going to regret not checking my post more carefully!

I guess I didn't get the quote about the preachers quite right either, but the general sentiment was close.

It seems it's not only the Republicans that are trying to say Dean is too liberal. The Democratic Leadership Council (self-proclaimed moderates) doesn't seem to like him at all. This link is from the NYTimes and this one published in my own StarTribune (via Associated Press) are both anti-Dean, in large part because he opposed the war (both articles were published in today's papers.) It's still a good thing to have supported the war??? It almost seems as though there was some Republicans sitting at that table.

I think you make many good points, Bill, that show Dean isn't as liberal as they're making him out to be, but perception seems to be the key. The Bushies have figured that out. Unfortunately if you never come through (e.g WMD, contracts with Niger), it is eventually noticed that the emperor is wearing no clothes (let's hope!).

BTW, I see Dean raised over a half a million bucks, twice the original goal. (BLog link.)

Another error, I believe the Franken book is entitled "Rush Limbaugh is a Big, Fat Idiot" The new Franken book uses all the words "liar, lies and lying" in the title I believe.