September Dem predictions

[DJcairo]

Graham drops out
Clark decides not to run
Gephardt falls to third behind Dean and Kerry in Iowa

[liberalnurse]

1. Yes, I see that happening.

.

[caledesi]

2. I think you are right-on.

[DJcairo]

3. Thanks go to toughenough.org and check out some of my friends predictions

concering when he thinks the candidates will drop out

It's a fun little guessing game us political dorks can play.

[cyclezealot]

5. Dean.

Sorry. Can't get too excited about this guy. I would probably vote for him without enthusism. Don't trust him. His record as Vt. Governor is not that great. He has said some awful things about the poor.Don't trust him on NAFTA. His medical plan will do nothing to assure me medical coverage, when I hope to retire before 65. And after my employer takes away medical coverage for retirees, as they threaten, because this system is unfixable and our employers can't afford it.
Can't get too excited of a candidate who said 'he was a triangulator before Clinton was.' Have you researched this guy.! I am against Bush's folly in Iraq. But think I would prefer Gephardt over Dean. At least he is not a dishonest 'triangulator.'
Dean is boring. Kucinich or else I will do nothing to help a pland do nothing ticket. Does not matter anyway ,if NAFTA is not trastically changed, this country is going down the tubes,due to no jobs and $500 billion trade deficits. Better the Democrats not get blamed for the future economic chaos, by following the Republican trade programs, which are selling out this country. My choice, Kucinich who is honest and next Gephardt, who has the country's economic well being first and foremost.

[UnapologeticLiberal]

13. He apologized many times for his comment about people on welfare

It was something he snapped when he was angry and he has apologized many times for it. Meanwhile, he has put Vermont far ahead of the nation in guaranteeing health care for poor people and in equalizing school funding so that the schools in poor districts get the same funding as schools in rich districts. Vermont has been praised as one of the few states whose welfare to work programs has actually succeeded at helping to lift people out of poverty.

Here is a quote from an AP article about Vermont's welfare reform laws. I can't give a link because I found the article through Lexus Nexus, a paid subscription service primarily used by school and public libraries. If you have the service, the article is entitled "Research found work mandate shrank welfare roll" and it is from September 26, 2002:

Vermont instituted a modified version of the welfare reform program in 2001 to comply with the 1996 federal welfare reform law. The state had been exempt from some of the federal rules while it conducted its long-term experiment with welfare reform.

The penalty for not finding work is a reduction in cash assistance, a punishment less harsh than that of many states, which eliminate public assistance.

This article is called "Oakland agency gives California a C for welfare policies" and it is from the Tri-Valley Herald (Pleasanton, CA) on July 8, 2002:

A LIBERAL Oakland anti-poverty group has given California a C for its policies affecting welfare recipients. In a state-by-state report card called Failing our Families, the Grassroots Organizing for Welfare Leadership group ranked California seventh in the nation, or "family moderate."

...The states that ranked most "family friendly," according to the group, were Vermont, Maine, Minnesota, New Mexico and New York. The five most "family hostile" states were Wyoming, Indiana, Idaho, Oklahoma and North Carolina.

This is from Robert Kuttner at American Prospect, and you can find the article at http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2002/06/kuttner-r-06-10.html:

The post-1996 experience has provided a kind of natural experiment in what actually works to help the dependent poor escape the welfare life and become productive members of the workforce. States that have done the best, not just at cutting the rolls but at raising earnings of the poor, are those that have used welfare funds flexibly, on work and family supports and education.

These states, including Oregon, Vermont, Minnesota, Washington, Wisconsin, cut across party. Their governors include Republicans, Democrats, and an independent. They have in common a willingness to recognize that one original premise of welfare reform -- that welfare recipients should always "work first" -- was misguided, while the program's willingness to trust states to innovate with education and training was right on target.

In these states, among others, surplus welfare funds have been used to help poor women get many kinds of training -- short term or long term depending on needs. They've also gone to subsidize wages and childcare. States have invested in "career-ladder" programs, so that progress doesn't end in a poverty-level minimum wage job. The forward-looking states have particularly resisted rigid bureaucratic formulas, and worked to tailor work supports to families' needs.

I will find more stuff later...I found one article with a conservative griping that Vermont's welfare program had been rated the most successful by a liberal group because it had some of the most liberal work rules and provided the most benefits...of course, I found that article when I was looking for stuff to emphasize his more moderate credentials and now that I am trying to find stuff on how it was good for the poor I can't find it.

Check out my new Dean blog:
http://deangrassroots.blogspot.com

[Nicholas_J]

18. Apologizing for s stupid political statement

Does not mean you do not still hold the same ideas and ideals that caused the comment to come out in the first place.

This is where actions are a far better indicator that what is said.

[Nicholas_J]

17. In Vermont

The LT Governors position the position of a figurehead. All the guy really does is preside over the senate.

[tedoll78]

4. Hmm..

I can see Graham dropping-out.
I can see Clark deciding not to run.
But if Gep continues the tough talk and the effective TV commercials (with Newt in B&W and him in color), he could make Iowa a tight race.

I think the candidates announcing this month in a cluster (all while under the shadow of the CA recall) will see a dampened announcement bounce in the polls. Dean will bring out The Bat once more for a final week of online telethon-style fundraising (duh), and the last week of the month will be spent speculating on how much money each candidate has raised in the third quarter.

[DJcairo]

6. Well...the only other announcement is Edwards right?

and possibly Clark. However, Kerry is experiences a bounce right now if the CNN poll is to be believed. Edwards could have a bounce but it wont do much good. And, despite the Dean fundraising blitz I think there's a good chance Kerry might still end up with more in the bank. Dean is blowing money like crazy on ads no one will remember in four months.

[CMT]

7. Dean finishes month breaking Clinton's record

for most money raised by a Democrat.

Dean's 21-point lead in NH in Zogby poll will fall (no surprise there) and it will be competitive in the state between Dean and Kerry.

Clark does decide to run.

[tsipple]

8. Agree all but Gephardt...

Gephardt will come in second in Iowa, I believe.

I think I agree about Clark. We'll see -- just a few more days until his new deadline.

[ModerateMiddle]

9. You're dreaming

Gephardt falls to third behind Dean and Kerry in Iowa

You're letting your enthusiasm for Kerry color reality. Gep is strong in Iowa.

[DJcairo]

10. Yes but not if in the months ahead

it becomes clear the Gephardt has no chance nationally. The guy registers close to the bottom in every other state and is clearly a second tier candidate nationally.

[mndemocrat_29]

11. I think that Clark will decide against a run in October

I honestly don't see him running now. If Dean hadn't caught fire, Clark would be the go to man, but Dean did catch fire and so Clark won't enter the race. However, his recent announcement of being a Democrat will put him on the shortlist for VP candidates.

On Graham, I think that this campaign was a real folly. Unless he can make great strides in the money race, he's out in October. My guess he won't be the VP now, since he's hurt his chances by not catching fire. He'll either go back to run for the Senate (he'd win a fourth term) or retire.

Gephardt won't fall behind Kerry in Iowa. He may get second, but Gep won't be third. He's still viewed as one of the three candidates who can win the nomination (Dean and Kerry being the other two). He's in this for the long run. His best hope to win the nomination is to take Iowa (the bigger the margin of victory, the better), then try to take Arizona and New Mexico.

[DJcairo]

12. Gephardt is like Buchanan in '2000

Buchanan could just never forget that he had beaten George W. in NH. Poor Dick Gephardt can never forget that he won Iowa in '88. Yet, it's only September and he is in second. That can't be reassuring.

Look for desperate candidates like Gephardt and Lieberman to tar Dean and Dean to fight Gephardt for Iowa and Kerry to rise above the fray.

[mndemocrat_29]

14. I think that Lieberman has already started tarring

He has no chance anywhere. His only hope right now is SC, and I think that Kerry or Edwards (or Dean if his momentum is high enough) will win this race.

[dean4america]

15. Joe's toat, Dean and Kerry looking good.

i think Edwards is the one most likely to win SC, especially if Gep faulters in IA. The real interesting result in SC will be who finishes second. IF Dean wins IA and NH, and finishes a strong second in SC, that would be huge. The same goes for Kerry, too. If HE finishes second in SC, esp. if he loses in NH, then the whole race is redefined. lieberman is falling fast and won't get any traction (thankfully).

the latest NH poll is actually good for Dean and Kerry. It maintains that Dean's 38 % polling result from Zogby wasn't a fluke, and also shows that Kerry has gotten a decent post-announcement bump. It may not matter much, though, if Dean can win IA, which will all but sew up NH for him, and make him dangerous to get 2nd in SC, or even win it outright (though it would be extremely close). About the only clear thing we can probably say at this point is that, if Dean went three for three, NO ONE could stop him from getting the nomination -- he'd have WAY too much momentum.

[apolloborn]

19. A little desperation, but some chutzpah

It may be a little bit of desperation, but I'm getting a kick out of the whole "miserable failure" thing. Could be that Gep's taking it a bit far, but he even bought www.amiserablefailure.com and talked about it on CNN on Sunday.

Hey, anything that takes Bush down a couple of notches is OK in my book.

This, however, is really funny:
http://www.arn.org/boards/ubb-get_topic-f-16-t-000665.html

[Nicholas_J]

16. Clarks record

Of doing some rather nasty things in the Balkans would eventually bring bad press and cause even more problems for him than any other. Clark was fairly careless in ordering strikes that ended up killing large numbers of civilians.

In a 70 day period alone, he ordered 31,000 bombing raids that killed many civilians, and was about to order the boarding of Russin ships in the area. Clinton had to order him to not do so as to avoid World War III.

To justify the bombing raid, Clark claimed that the train's speed had made it impossible for the pilot to divert the bomb. Then he showed the attack on a video filmed from the head of a rocket-propelled AGM-30 bomb.

What Clark failed to say was that the film was shown at three times its normal speed. It was a gross propaganda trick.

A German daily newspaper, the Frankfurter Rundschau, exposed this U.S./NATO gimmick in its Jan. 6, 2000, edition.

As the newspaper put it: "During the Kosovo war, NATO used two video films to try and demonstrate that a bomb attack on a passenger train was an unavoidable accident. ... But the films were played through at least three times the normal speed."

The FR also said that the U.S. Air Force admitted it found out months after the attack on the train that the videos had "given a false picture of the events leading up to the attack." But, an Air Force spokesperson told the FR, "We saw no reason to publish the films after we noticed the mistake."

On April 13, 1999, NATO warplanes killed at least 75 to 100 ethnic Albanian refugees and injured at least 30 more in a convoy crossing a bridge near Djakovica in Kosovo, the Associated Press reported. At the same time, another U.S.- directed bomber hit an ethnic Albanian village in Kosovo, killing at least 20 inhabitants and injuring many others, according to a French Press Agency reporter at the scene.

Were these purposely targeted? Or were they the inevitable "mistakes" of a war machine geared up for the kill and searching for targets?

http://www.iacenter.org/nowar_record.htm

I mean, In general. I must say I like Clark, but he did go a little overkill in the Balkans.