dean is the most incoherent candidate i can remember. worse than even clinton.

"seem to believe that nothing can be gained from working with nations that have stood by our side as allies for generations.”

Gawd help me, he's talking about the French and Germans, without adding "on and off, barring the occasional fascist outbreak"

Korea, Taiwan, Japan, China, Cuba, Iran, Russia

Q: What do these nations have in common?

A: They aren't fit for mention in Dean's 'major' foreign policy speech.

Q: What about Afghanistan?

A: It gets two mentions, one to say Dean supported action in Afghanistan, one to say that NATO is helping us there. No mention of what our Afghanistan policy should be.

Let me know when he gets serious.

he is a weasel...

a total weasel, an angry little man whose "straight shooting" is straight bullshit. as david brooks noted in the nyt, dean is the internet candidate personified: short bursts of energy to fill a void. once the void is filled, he moves around to try to fill another one.

at least bush has moral clarity and long range vision.

It's just more nonsense from the usual suspects. Why worry about it?

If Cheney doesn't want it... how about Lieberman for Veep.

"Howard Dean has climbed into his own spider hole of denial if he believes that the capture of Saddam Hussein has not made America safer,” Lieberman said. “Saddam Hussein is a homicidal maniac, brutal dictator, supporter of terrorism, and enemy of the United States, and there should be no doubt that America and the world are safer with him captured.”

WTF?! Dr. Dean should learn how to keep his mouth shut. I foresee him taking the big dive in the next couple of months, because of his mouth...

For those who are wondering, here is Governor Bush's first major foreign policy speech.

Note the presence of actual foreign policy positions.

Also note (1 point for Dean) that Bush promises to spend more money on the Nunn-Lugar bill for securing Soviet WMD, which he has apparently failed to do.

Everyone has a right to be stupid. But Dean is abusing the privilege.

Hate to be the one to tell you this Dean, but the US was hated and resented by many before Bush took office. Twit.

I'm not all that great with the maths, so help me out.

Are there not 60 countries involved in our efforts in Iraq?

How does adding France, Germany and Russia turn something that is supposively unilateral to multilateral?

We can't be in charge of any operation, ever?

I can take some comfort, though. I don't think he has a chance.

The fact Dean supported unilateral action in Bosnia reveals the hypocrisy of his "true partnership" language.

In the hopes that some Dean Dem is reading this, let me put it really simply:

I'll be goddamned before I let the likes of Syria, China, Lybia, Egypt, or France have a say over my security.

Actually, I don't have a problem with unilateralism. In fact, I think we make too much of an effort to try to preserve it.

MattJ#3:

So, he didn't mention Russia... Did he make any mention of the Soviet Union. Earlier, he mentioned the need to work more closely with the former communist empire, esp. on the Iran situation. Has backed off of this position? Anyone know? I haven't heard anything since the MSNBC interview. I was an interesting idea.

OT

But does anyone know anything about this Jews4Clark group???

Dean is not "just another McGovern." He's WORSE than McGovern!

By the way, the first time I ever saw Dean was this past Spring when he was on Meet The Press. I was curious and didn't know a thing about him. Well, the second he uttered the word "unilateral," Tim said "Whoa, this isn't actually a unilateral action" and proceeded to list all the countries. Dean stumbled and stuttered, and every time he said "unilateral," he would backtrack and stutter and say "Well, technically not unilateral but what I've been calling unilateral because it is unilateral ... yadda yadda yadda." (Hint: uni=one; UK alone makes it not uni!) I called my brother and said "Have you seen this idiot? There's no way he'll become president." I think Dean is doing a mediocre job at best now, and he'll be sausage in the Republican meat grinder come next Summer.

Do you think someone in the Republican party is saving up all of Dean's statements for election time?

This is a gold mine of anti-Americanism that only has to be rolled out by Bush or his supporters at the appropriate time. We must never forget.

BTW, has anybody noticed on the Drudge report the potential issue with moveon.org accepting contributions from foreigners to support their anti-Bush campaign. If true, it has the potential to sink the credibility of moveon.org. Apparently, their are links to sites in Canada on Dean's site for making contributions.

One last thing...I saw Daniel Pipes on BookTV late last night - brilliant - his two main points: (1) Israel made a bad assumption in the early 90's that the Palestinians had accepted that Israel should exist (NOT) (2) Any and all actions based on that assumption which Israel hoped would demonstrate good faith only showed weakness. His conclusion: until the Palestinians acknowledge that Israel has a right to exist, Israel should make no more concessions. Smart dude.

Alan

#17

I'll have to disagree with you on that. McGovern has been a Saudi lobbyist for years...bought and paid for by Saudi Arabia. I don't think Dean is a low as McGovern...not yet anyway. In the future, who knows?

Your politicians should really understand by now that until the US subordinates its foreign policy to others, brings its economy to the same mediocre level of output and ridiculous level of taxtation as the EU,
stops producing so many Nobel prize winners, starts being a little more polite about its opinions (ie. shut up), it will always be resented.
Perhaps and probably even if the US does all of the above, it will still not be enough.

Dean scares me, there's something not right about him. Or the Deanbots.

“We find ourselves, too often, isolated and resented,"...

There are some 63 or so countries involved in Iraq with us. If that defines "isolated and resented", I welcome it.

I do look forward to a Dean - Bush debate... the only thing that would make that sweeter is if Nader gets in the mix...hhheeehehheheeheheee!!!

In honour of Rhys-Davies, can we call them gnomes or midgets instead of dwarves?

Howard Dean doesn't measure up to the top of the soles on George McGoverns shoes. This is what the "Democratic" Party has come to.

Germany and Russia have been our allies for generations?!?

And they say Bush is a moron.

#19 Alan,

If true, it has the potential to sink the credibility of moveon.org.

You realize you wrote credibility and moveon.org in the same sentence without the phrase "has never had any"?

So, Dean says he'd like the US to depend on the say so of the likes of North Korea, Yemen and Saudi Arabia. Not since Carter do I remeber such attitude, and this got him a single state in the following elections, didn't it?

had the United Nations given us permission

Holy shit! I bet a whole bunch of our troops "sensed a great disturbance in The Force" as he spewed out that line. Anyone call attention to the fact that the UN structure allowed France to announce a veto to our pre-war compromise proposal before Iraq even had a chance to turn it down? Oh, what was I thinking? Of course not.

Sorry, but this doesn't add up. Even Kucinich isn't this inept on the campaign trail. And as screwed up as the Democrat party has been, when did they get so screwed up that it visibly oozed out of every pore from the top of the structure on down? It isn't as if Dean is trying to claw his way up from fifth in the pack, the odds-makers are saying the only question is how much is he going to win the nomination by, barring the unforeseeable.

Like 'em or not, the Dem power structure is chock full of professionals, and billions of dollars and the course and climate of the nation ride on each presidential election. I just can't see them letting such a repulsive figure be the face of the party, unless we're witnessing another Heaven's Gate applesauce party on a national scale. But then these are the people that gave us Dukakis, Mondale and Carter.

Still, I smell a rat. Going to have to keep my eye on some other factors. Like why the heck Gephardt is supposed to be neck-and-neck with Dean in Iowa, yet has been keeping a pretty low profile compared to Lieberman over the last few days. Then there's the absolutely senseless Gore endorsement.

Uggh, the sad part is that I'm probably waaay over-thinking this, and that Dean is that much of an ass, the party is that screwed up, and that millions of Americans will be voting for whatever hairball the nominating process hacks up. The stuff scary dreams are made of.

It's worth remembering that when McGovern, a genuine war hero, ran in 1972 he was able to make these scathing points:

Four years ago Candidate Nixon announced he had a “secret plan” to end the war in Vietnam.But as President he has dragged the war on for four painful years. Around 20,000 more Americans have died -- one third of our total Vietnam combat deaths. Millions more civilians in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos have been killed, maimed, and made homeless, the majority by American bombing. An estimated 10% to 15% of our Vietnam G..I.’s became addicted to heroin while serving there.

It was a bad situation. There had been lots of blood and little prospect of victory. Nixon had promised to do something about it and hadn't. The war had led to riots in the streets. The country was torn apart.

And the economy was suffering. Nixon had made things worse there, too.

Prices have gone up over 15% during the Nixon Administration -- 50% faster than during the previous Democratic Administration. And Nixon’s wage-price controls were too hasty and too late -- they froze wages but let prices and profits run wild. Senator McGovern believes we will never bring runaway prices under control until we get to their source -- the inflationary billions squandered on the endless, pointless Vietnam War and the piled-on surplus nuclear overkill power.

McGovern's campaign literature is here.

McGovern, of course, is remembered as one of history's great losers. His campaign, while badly managed, had issues Dean's people can only imagine.

If all Dean has is "the UN didn't approve," he's a goner.

#29,
Actually, he got five and DC (link). Well, DC's a given.

Having a legitimate degree, when they were truly hard to get , I thought this Doctor had brains. Now I want to hear from his Patients.

#33,

Perhaps we can hear from the mythical then-12-year old whom he uses to show his disapproval for mandatory parental notification of abortion.

#19 Alan

when did moveon have credibility in the first place???

#28 Addison (and all LGFers)

My most humble and abject apologies for my statement (I screamed a silent NOOO when I saw your comment Addison!)

It should be in scare quotes - "credibility".

What I meant of course was "credibility" with their supporters but now that I rethink it, how foolish was I to think that facts could change their cherished opinions.

Alan

#19 Alan: Yep, "Don't fire 'til you see the whites of their eyes." No sense flailing around trying to swat them all while they're taking whacks at each other. See who emerges and tailor a campaign to defeat him. Although actually some prominent conservative orgs have been making tenative anti-Dean moves, which seems a bit odd.

Now ask yourself if you were the Saudis, Syrians, N Koreans, Iranians, Jordyptians, French, Germans, Chinese or Russians, who would you want to see win our election? I would not at all be suprised to know of them trying their best to influence the outcome. Of course if this is exposed, there should be serious hell to pay.

#25 K. LOL! But no, I think they're still going to be dwarves. And I'm ready to do some tossing.

Ahh, I see. I was just joshing, anyway.

Just when I thought I couldn't possibly despise Howard Dean even more.

Not buying it.

zulu--Me neither.

Obviously, the dwarves and Lieberman are hanging on in the expectation that Dean will eliminate himself through some monumental gaffe, one so obvious that that even media Deanistas like Al Qaetie Couric (the perky-burqa) will have to take note.
I give him 6 weeks.

From the #40 linked article

Dean has said he would ask former president Bill Clinton to be his Middle East envoy if elected.

So he can personally march them into the ocean?

What a change 5 years makes:

in June 1998 he defended Clinton's bombing of Iraq by arguing on the Canadian program, "I don't think we could have built an international coalition to invade or have a substantial bombing of Saddam."
During another 1998 appearance on the show, "The Editors," Dean said it was not worth trying to woo French support on foreign policy initiatives. "The French will always do exactly the opposite on what the United States wants regardless of what happens, so we're never going to have a consistent policy," he said.

Link to article

NC (#41)

I believe Dean will say whatever he thinks people want to hear. I don't trust him at all, he just reeks of insincerity.

#44 ROA

Geez, Dean should have his own Multilateral House of Waffles franchise or something.

Anybody hear what Jack Straw said about Saddam today? "He wouldn't know the truth if he tripped over it"

The Deanies qualify to be included as above.

It's not just Dean. All of these guys can barely keep from throwing themselves at the feet of the frogs and kofi. It's getting disgusting.

Model 4:
I hadn't thought about the Hale-Bopp Comet, Marshall Applewhite (didn't he have some kind of goofy one-word name?), and the Heaven's Gate cult in years until your comment.

But really the comparison is completely on target...clueless cultists who will vote for whomever the Democratic Party offers up. It's going to be a long slog to November 2004. Thank God there's LGF and comments to keep my spirits up. Dean is a downer.

Uggh, the sad part is that I'm probably waaay over-thinking this, and that Dean is that much of an ass, the party is that screwed up, and that millions of Americans will be voting for whatever hairball the nominating process hacks up. The stuff scary dreams are made of.

Sure looks that way to me. Psychosis has taken hold of a sizable minority of the US population.

The good news is it's still a minority. Any kind of BDS/"Hate Bush at all costs" voting pattern in '04 is a strict landslide loser.

Great column from opinionjournal.com Some of my fellow Democrats are unpatriotic (choice excerpts, please read the whole thing)

In one of Patrick O'Brian's novels about the British navy during the Napoleonic wars, he dismisses a particularly foolish politician by saying that his political platform was "death to the Whigs." Watching the primary campaigns among this year's pathetic crop of Democratic candidates, I can't help but think that their campaigns would be vastly improved if they would only rise to the level of "Death to the Republicans." ...

And the most vile part of this campaign against Mr. Bush is that the terrorist war is being used as a tool to try to defeat him--which means that if Mr. Bush does not win, we will certainly lose the war. Indeed, the anti-Bush campaign threatens to undermine our war effort, give encouragement to our enemies, and cost American lives during the long year of campaigning that lies ahead of us.

Am I saying that critics of the war aren't patriotic?

Not at all--I'm a critic of some aspects of the war. What I'm saying is that those who try to paint the bleakest, most anti-American, and most anti-Bush picture of the war, whose purpose is not criticism but deception in order to gain temporary political advantage, those people are indeed not patriotic. They have placed their own or their party's political gain ahead of the national struggle to destroy the power base of the terrorists who attacked Americans abroad and on American soil.

I can think of many, many reasons why the Republicans should not control both houses of Congress and the White House. But right now, if the alternative is the Democratic Party as led in Congress and as exemplified by the current candidates for the Democratic nomination, then I can't be the only Democrat who will, with great reluctance, vote not just for George W. Bush, but also for every other candidate of the only party that seems committed to fighting abroad to destroy the enemies that seek to kill us and our friends at home.

And if we elect a government that subverts or weakens or ends our war against terrorism, we can count on this: We will soon face enemies that will make 9/11 look like stubbing our toe, and they will attack us with the confidence and determination that come from knowing that we don't have the will to sustain a war all the way to the end.

The headline, "Dean Assails Bush for Unilateralism" is misleading. The article includes this:

He said, “There is no disgrace in having the most powerful nation on earth negotiate bilaterally with North Korea, while we also pursue a multilateral track.”...
Dean assailed “the hard-liners in the Bush administration” for spurning the possibility of engaging in bilateral negotiations with the regime of Kim Jong Il.

So we see that Bush is both too unilateral and too multilateral. Whatever he does he's sure to be wrong. That seems the guiding principle at work in Dean's campaign.

had the United Nations given us permission

Ooops. I guess I can never appear on Meet The Press again. What I really meant to say was that Bush lied, and that I could have done all of this better than him. 9 months from invasion to capture of one of the most brutal and threatening dictators of our time?!??! I could have done it in 7 months and with 125 maximum US casualties, as would have been outlined in my UN War Permit Application Submission Form, that I wouldn’t have submitted anyway, because I have never supported any of this evil american imperialism.

Unilateral.

Bush is stupid.

I think this says it all.

Close up, Dean's speech just gets worse. This point strikes me as deeply unserious:

Today, billions of people live on the knife's edge of survival, trapped in a struggle against ignorance, poverty, and disease. Their misery is a breeding ground for the hatred peddled by bin Laden and other merchants of death. As President, I will work to narrow the now-widening gap between rich and poor.

[Link: www.deanforamerica.com...]
Perhaps Dr. Dean was too busy to notice that our most vicious attackers were educated and well-to-do, not poor and backward. Fifteen Saudis led by a rich Egyptian with a master's degree proved fertile ground for bin Laden's hatred. Their misery stemmed from causes Dean seemingly cannot imagine. Giving them money would not be a solution.

The same foolishness pervades this sentiment:

The next President ... must convince Muslims that America neither threatens nor is threatened by Islam, to which millions of our own citizens adhere.

The Islamists despise us for our secular system of man-made law, our freedom to choose our own religions, our refusal to recognize the universal applicability of Allah's law. How will President Dean "convince" them to give up their jihad? The problem is not and never was our goodwill. The problem is Muslim supremacy. If he's wrong about the problem he has no hope of making things better.

The crowining glory:

I believe we will again hear the true voice of America... It is the voice of Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton bringing long-time foes to the table in pursuit of peace.

Enough said.

#52:

And if we elect a government that subverts or weakens or ends our war against terrorism, we can count on this: We will soon face enemies that will make 9/11 look like stubbing our toe,

And if in a future Dean administration we ever have a "Romeo Dellaire Rwanda Moment" involving US troops under UN command being unable to do their jobs due to bureaucracy, or if ineptitude on the part of their Uruguayan or Nepalese general results in American soldiers being slaughtered, then all bets are off as to the political implications.

I just can't believe it would ever come to that, since I think it is illegal right now to place our guys under foreign command and also since we have the tremendous leverage coming from being the only ones on earth who can actually fight a war. Still, this subjugation to illegal international authority is what the Dems, the Euros and the media are pushing for with every statement they make.

As bad as Dean is, it's the Dean cultists who are really terrifying.

Dean has said he would ask former president Bill Clinton to be his Middle East envoy if elected.

That's it.

He's done.

While we're at it, here's

Bagdhad Jim McDermott

Good for a laugh, anyhow.

[Link: www.jmillius.com...]
"The Passion of Howard Dean"

I think I know who Dean would nominate for Secretary of State.

Baghdad Jim McDermott (D-WA) is convinced that Saddam's capture was timed for political advantage.

Baghdad Jim ( he visited Saddam before the war and fully accepted Hussein's guarantees about not having prohibited weapons) says the US knew all along where Saddam was, but decided to capture him now to boost Bush's polls.

Hmm... usually, by now, two or three Deanbots have dropped in to tell us that Dean didn't really say what he said, that we're too stupid to grasp the subtle genius that is Howard Dean, and that Bush is a retarded chimp/petro-imperialist mastermind.

I wonder if even the Deanbots are having second thoughts. e.g. "Just what is in this Kool-Aid anyway?"

...The long, dispiriting history of Holocaust denial - a thriving lie in the Middle East, and alive elsewhere - would be a far worse plague had not the Nuremberg tribunal painstakingly rubbed the noses of various nations in what they did, or did too little to prevent. An unsparing presentation of Saddam's crimes would also usefully complicate the moral exhibitionism of some of America's critics. ...

...Saddam's capture was the third element in last week's trifecta for George W. Bush, coming after Al Gore strengthened the candidacy of Bush's preferred opponent, and the Dow passed 10,000. ...

'INTERNATIONAL' TRIAL WOULD BE UNJUST

#64 V the K

Hmm... usually, by now, two or three Deanbots have dropped in to tell us that Dean didn't really say what he said, that we're too stupid to grasp the subtle genius that is Howard Dean, and that Bush is a retarded chimp/petro-imperialist mastermind.

Could be they're concerned about being confronted with this.

December 16, 2003 -- YOU won't be seeing any video of Howard Dean's x-rated, epithet-ridden New York fund-raiser because Team Dean made sure to bar the TV cameras. Which suggests they expected trouble.
Maybe it was the same foresight that inspired Dean to seal his records as Vermont governor for 10 years because of worries, as he put it in a moment of candor to Vermont public radio, about "future political considerations. We didn't want anything embarrassing appearing in the papers at a critical time in any future endeavor."

So there were no TV cameras last Monday night when pro-Dean comics took the stage on West 18th St. in Chelsea at a $250-a-head Dean fund-raiser (reduced from $500) and competed to see how often they could use the F-word in the same sentence.

Comic Judy Gold dissed President Bush as "this piece of living, breathing s---" and Janeane Garofalo ridiculed the Medicare prescription-drug bill that Bush had just signed as the "you can go f--- yourself, Grandma" bill.

Just a few days before, rival John Kerry had used the F-word to attack Bush in Rolling Stone magazine in an apparent bid to sound hip, but Dean's event was "enough to make John Kerry blush," as rival Dick Gephardt's spokesman Erik Smith tartly put it.

And the Dean event got a lot worse. Comedian David Cross used the N-word for blacks in a disjointed "joke" apparently based on the premise that it's fine for a pro-Dean comic to use racial epithets as long as the goal is to claim Republicans are racists. ...

If there had been TV cameras, it could have been really bad news for Dean. As it was, he got off pretty lightly. The Post reported the story and the Times ran a teensy-weensy account buried on page B-6 of the Metro section. ...

HOWARD'S HATEFEST

Howard Dean is a whirling dervish of ideas, a veritable cornucopia of ideologies. Spin'em around where he stops knowbody knows. He advocates UN approval of US actions, he advocated unilateral action on Bosnia.

I recall when GWB was running for president, the dems attacked him for lack of foriegn policy experience. Big story that Bush could not name several obscure heads of state (did anyone see Hardball where Matthews asked that same question to other candidates and they declined/could not answer? Anyone see any stories in the media about that?). At least Bush had served in the White House (under his father), and was a 2 term governor of the 3rd largest state that had real international issues.

Dean is the governor of ONE CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT. Good dairy products, pretty scenery and that's about it. Could be a province of Canada (maybe it is).

Scary, stupid, angry man. A liberal dream candidate.

With the sad pathetic braying coming from the clueless, as well from the wince inducing delusional. Who celebrate the deaths of U.S. service personel and call for more. Is there only one 'strategy' left in their deranged quest for the White House? As they luxuriate in their partisan political cesspool, perhaps they ARE hoping, praying, wishing for another large scale terror attack on U.S. soil (?).

[Link: www.nationalreview.com...]

Non sequitur

Vermont borders Canada, and the midnight run of the Canadian Global model develops another tropical cyclone in the Caribbean next Sunday.

The last time the Canadian predicted a tropical cyclone to form in the Caribbean two weeks ago, one actually did. As we all know, a 110 km/hr Tropical Storm Odette hit La Republica Dominicana, and a really big snow storm hit New York and Boston.

144 Hour Canadian Surface Pressures

J.D. Re: Howard's Hatefest

As usual, the Deanbot intellect is exceeded only by their wit and class.

Written by a good friend:

How can supporters of Israel support Howard Dean?:

Dear Deaniacs,

I am puzzled by the wave of apologias from Jewish-American supporters of Howard Dean. Supposedly his remarks regarding Israel were taken out of context. Here's some of what I have read recently on the subject:

Gov. Dean said, "Israel has always been a longtime ally with a special relationship with the United States, but if we are going to bargain by being in the middle of the negotiations then we are going to have to take an evenhanded role." This is the context for the term "evenhanded". Can anyone argue that a negotiator should not be evenhanded? Land for peace. Dismantling some of the settlements. These are Dean positions shared by the majority of Israelis and moderate Jews in the United States.

OH really? Here's a question for you: Did you EVER consider WHY Gov. Dean raised this subject in the first place? Why would he even advocate a more "even-handed" posture if he didn't think there was something wrong with the way the Bush Administration has dealt with this issue?

Gov. Dean claims he is merely acting in the manner of President Clinton when he brokered the 2000 Camp David conference between Barak and Arafat. This statement is misleading and confuses some overriding facts:

First, after the Palestinians rejected the Clinton/Barak offer for a final settlement where both Arabs and Israelis would govern themselves and mutually accept their respective rights to live in peace and security, President Clinton placed the failure of this summit squarely on the shoulders of Arafat. Thus, even Clinton's "even-handedness" ENDED with Arafat's rejection.

Second, while the Palestinians claimed that the offer "didn't include contiguous territory, just cantons of population bifurcated by military checkpoints", they didn't make a reasonable counteroffer and keep negotiating -- even though they were offered NINETY FIVE PERCENT of what they wanted. Arafat stormed out and started the PREMEDITATED "intifada", and has since falsely blamed Israel for the fallout. Israel was then faced with a wave of unprovoked, unrelenting, deadly suicide bombings and shootings against innocent men, women and children. What choice did it have but to take harsh measures like checkpoints, border closings and targeted assassinations to defend its people, just 60 years after 6 million Jews were murdered in a similar manner?

In other words, "land for peace", as you advocate, was given in part -- Israel withdrew from 40 percent of the land and 90 percent of Palestinians were allowed to govern themselves -- and offered almost in toto. And the result, for Israel, was an unremitting war of terror and murder. Just what is there for the United States to be more "even-handed" about that?

Third - Long BEFORE Arafat's rejection of Clinton's offer, the Palestinians at Oslo pledged to end anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic incitement and propaganda and to provide themselves with arms sufficient only to equip a 10,000 man police force. So what did they do after pledging "land for peace"? Since the very inception of Oslo in 1993 the Palestinian Authority has been teaching hatred to children in their official schools and inciting hatred against Jews and Israelis in their mosques and on their official TV and radio stations, including the romanticizing of "martyrdom"; stockpiling weapons and forming militias supposedly banned under Oslo; talking, as did the the late, famed "moderate" Faisal Husseini, about how Oslo was simply a "Trojan Horse", consistent with the "Phased Plan to Liberate Palestine"; i.e., take a piece now, then "liberate" the rest through war and terror -- explicitly equating Oslo with a Trojan Horse -- in Arabic, away from the hearing of gullible Israelis, Westerners, and American Jews. And so Israel had no choice but to vigorously defend itself. Why should the United States be more "even- handed" about that?

Fourth -- all of the recent "peace" plans put forth by various parties since Arafat's rejection of Camp David -- the Mitchell plan, the Tenet plan, the "road map" and the recent Geneva plan, et at. -- share one basic component. And that is a Palestinian commitment to ending terror. And just what have they done in furtherance of that one basic commitment? ZERO. Why should the United States be more "even handed" about that?

The fact is, the United States has not been even-handed since Arafat and his thugs started the intifada. Nor should it be. The end result of the Palestinian "uprising" has been hundreds of murdered Jews, thousands injured and maimed, a nation traumatized and demoralized. Why should the United States be "even-handed" -- at least until the Palestinians commit to dismantling the terrorist groups, demilitarizing its population and eliminating its anti-Semitic incitement.

Sometimes YOU SHOULD take sides. Statements like the one made by Gov. Dean only embolden the Palestinians to continue their terror and obstructionism. What incentive do the Palestinians have to make any concessions [e.g., stop terror and incitement] when an American leader already has determined that there is a moral equivalence between the two sides? Why put more of the negotiating onus on Israel, as Gov. Dean implies, when the Palestinians have NEVER committed themselves to stopping terror and incitement, as they have promised and failed to do repeatedly? For that matter, why put more of the negotiating onus on Israel when so many Palestinian leaders proclaim to their own people that they REALLY don't accept Israel -- as indicated by their maps, textbooks, and websites which depict a Middle East without Israel -- and consider concessions to be mere stepping stones to "the liberation of Palestine"; i.e., the destruction of Israel?

The truth is that the Arab-Israeli conflict will end the very second the Arabs finally, HONESTLY, UNEQUIVOCALLY, accept the legitimacy of a Jewish state in Israel, on ONE PERCENT of all the land in the Middle East --which, despite the unrelenting propoganda which so many Americans and other Westerners [even many Jews, regrettably] swallow, hasn't happened yet.

Until that does happen, the Palestinians don't deserve an "even-handed" intermediary. Why American Jewish supporters of Howard Dean can't grasp that is beyond me.

Looks like someone doesn't like having his cheese moved.

Dean cornered himself and this latest bit of tripe is his only way out. Some way out, selling our nation's security off to the criminals, despots and dictators that make up the vast majority of the United Nations. He is cooked, and the Clintondoting media will now begin to carve him into small pieces.

Hillary will run, this whole thing is working her way. She is to the left of Joe Stalin but the absolute insanity of Dean, Kucinich, Brauns etc make her look "centrist". It's the same ploy that husband Bubba used to seize and corrupt the Democratic Party. Yes, you middle-of-the-road Senator Clinton will sweep in just before the Convention to steal the nomination.

Leftist to English dictionary:

Unilateral: In alliance with your friends.

Multilateral: In subserviance to your enemies.

"Angry Joe" Lieberman is coming out with guns blazing.

Good for him. :)

Dean said he “would not have hesitated” to launch an attack on Iraq “had the United Nations given us permission and asked us to be part of a multilateral force.”

With this statement, Dean is apparently trying to appear a little more willing to go to war with other nations. However, in the Chris Matthews' interview, Dean said:

"So what we’re going to do is focus on terrorism and not on nation states, unless the nation states merge with the terrorist organization, as they did in Afghanistan. And I supported the action we took in Afghanistan to fight terror." [Emphasis added]

He was saying this to be critical of the Bush's attack on Iraq. It's bad enough that Dean considers the U.N. necessary in matters of America's self-defense, but I've seen no indication that Dean would have been willing to attack Iraq in the first place.

Also in the speech was an indication of what he thinks causes terrorism:

"Finally, the struggle against terrorism, and the struggle for a better world, demand that we take even more steps...
"Today, billions of people live on the knife's edge of survival, trapped in a struggle against ignorance, poverty, and disease. Their misery is a breeding ground for the hatred peddled by bin Laden and other merchants of death.

"As President, I will work to narrow the now-widening gap between rich and poor. Right now, the United States officially contributes a smaller percentage of its wealth to helping other nations develop than any other industrialized country."

The Command Post has an op-ed by Ed Moltzen that critiques this notion: Howard Dean, Terrorism and Root Cause Politics

And we blogged on this subject last week: Root causes.

@45 zulubaby

Dean isn't insincere, he's over run with insanity.

@66 JD

There has to be a video record somewhere. Someone must have snuck in one of those small camcorders.
Wouldn't that be some juicy stuff. Now if someone would just advertise a nice lump sum of money to encourage someone to come forward with it. :)

When are these twits going to understand? We will listen to the UN, and we will cooperate with the UN when possible, but WE ARE NOT SUBJECTS OF THE UN! As a soverign state, we need no "permission" from that organization, for anything.

#77 quark2

@66 JD

There has to be a video record somewhere. Someone must have snuck in one of those small camcorders.
Wouldn't that be some juicy stuff.

It wouldn't surprise me if we end up seeing this (at least some of it) somewhere.

We must wait and see. :-)

V the K (#64)

LOL. I was disappointed too.

quark2 (#77)

The man gives me the creeps, that's all I know. He strikes me as someone who has a very quick temper, the type that will go off at you for no apparent reason.

#73 Stop Hillary
Seeing your nickname always has me LMAO. It's more like a desperate plea than a nick. It reminds me of the title of this film.
I don't think the Clintons are going to let Dean beat Bush. If Dean stays close to W in the polls, look for some dirt to fly (plausibly denied by the Clintonistas). Or, maybe Hillary's shooting for the Veep nomination. If the Dems lose, she can claim it was because she wasn't at the top of the ticket. If somehow the Dems win, once she's in as Vice Pres, well, anything can happen, can't it?