Upper left, I've done some looking and have a bit of info. But before I get to it, I'd like to invite you and everyone to visit securingamerica dot com, where many spend a lot of time looking into stuff like this AND holding eachother's hands, wishing for the President our grandparents promised us.

I looked at the Atlantic, cited below, as you suggested, a lengthy article discussing numerous examples of both parties 'playing dirty,' as they called it. I don't like any of this stuff, which is one reason that I've been supporting General Clark since 2003.

I'll try to summarize the 6 matters mentioned in the article as raised by Lehane etc. against Governor Dean. Sorry for the length:

First, '[o]n December 4 the Boston Herald reported that although Dean cited the privacy of others in his refusal to release his gubernatorial papers, he had made public documents identifying individuals suffering from depression and Alzheimer's. This led to later disclosures of constituents who were HIV positive.'

2. AP reported that property taxes had risen sharply in Vermont during Governor Dean's term, tho Dean often blamed Bush's tax cuts for rising taxes.

3. 'The Boston Globe reported that Dean had signed legislation providing tax breaks to Bermuda-based insurance companies. Just a day earlier Dean had delivered a speech criticizing companies that dodge taxes by incorporating in Bermuda.'

4. 'Associated Press reported that although Dean had criticized Bush for giving unnecessary tax breaks to large corporations, he had signed legislation that conceded more than $80 million to such firms.'

5. 'Associated Press reported that although Dean had attacked Bush for weakness on homeland security, during his time as governor he was warned repeatedly about lax security at the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant, which received the worst security rating of all the nation's 103 reactors from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.'

6. 'On January 11 a 1998 Associated Press story the Clark campaign had disseminated about the absence of minorities in Dean's cabinet became national news when Al Sharpton repeated the charge during a debate.'

The first thing I'd like to say is WHATEVER WOULD WE DO WITHOUT AP??? Might we learn some relavent, timely things?

The cited matters are all matters of public record which could have been discovered by the media with a little research on their own, in my opinion. They also appear to me to have been rather trivial, and to be expected in the course of a campaign and a governor's term. I absolutely do not sanction 'smears' such as those of the swift boaters, but this stuff is not that, in my opinion, especially if it is true. And I do not question the validity of these particular matters.

Upper left, I have recently learned of another bunch of stuff related to Governor Dean's problems in Iowa, which in my opinion is much more damaging to American voters, and Democrats in particular. I'll cite it here, and urge everyone to read it.

'Immortalized as the reason for the capsize of Dean’s campaign is his famous scream after losing the primary in Iowa. The role the incident played reveals a great deal about how our media works, a topic to which we will return. Putting that aside for a moment, it is instructive to see how the Democratic Party dealt with him apart from the issue. The moves of the DLC reveal a great deal about how tight the control over the party is and how narrow the range of acceptable debate can be. The minimization of this so-called debate also reveals how the Democrats and their liberal cohorts enabled George W. Bush to win his reelection effort.

Howard Dean’s campaign first took on water after Al Gore endorsed Dean for president on December 9, 2003. Hailed by many in the mainstream press as a huge boost to Dean’s bid, the endorsement came at the same exact moment Democratic insiders were meeting to discuss how to sink his advances. For they knew he was a potential threat to the Clinton Democrats.

Theories of why Gore endorsed Dean spread like fire through the media. As political commentator Adam Nagourney told Gwen Ifill on PBS’s Newshour on the day of the endorsement: “One [theory] is that what is going on here is a proxy war between the Clintons and the Gores over the future of the Democratic Party. I think there is an element of truth to that. I don't think we want to exaggerate that.”

He was right. The war had begun. Verbal bombs dropped -- with one target in sight: the future of the Democratic Party. Dean was out for establishment blood, and Gore gladly went along for the ride. “Howard Dean was assassinated in broad daylight. Unlike Kennedy's ‘grassy knoll,’ Dean's killers are not hiding -- it was the Democratic Party itself, and more specifically the Democratic Leadership Council, that successfully went after and sabotaged his candidacy … The DLC reacted with fury to [Dean] … going all out to torpedo his momentum,” Naeem Mohaiemen correctly opined on Alternet.org following Dean’s presidential death.

“Although Democratic nominees soon piled on the ‘bash Dean’ bandwagon, earlier attacks were carried out by DLC operatives. There was even the smell of scandal when two top Democratic candidates were found sharing information about Dean in an attempt to slow him down.”

“But the great myth of the current [Howard Dean] cycle,” DLC leaders Al From and Bruce Reed wrote in a May 15, 2003 memo, “is the misguided notion that the hopes and dreams of activists represent the heart and soul of the Democratic Party … What activists like Dean call the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party is an aberration: the McGovern-Mondale wing, defined principally by weakness abroad and elitist, interest-group liberalism at home.”

No doubt it was scandalous. But there was more to the drama than Dick Gephardt and John Kerry passing notes under the table and the DLC crying foul. In fact, Democratic insiders with deep ties to the DLC began funding campaign ads against Dean, hoping to bring his campaign to a screeching halt.'

>>>> Read on

http://www.counterbias.com/561.html

I certainly can't vouch for anything stated above, but some of it makes sense to me given my developing views of the candidates and the party. I'm VERY happy that Governor Dean is DNC chair, and I look forward to a prosperous future for We the People.

Upper left, thanks for the opportunity to explain. And I hope that you and others will check General Clark out at securingamerica dot com.

Sorry about the length.

elleng

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200406/green