Interview with Matt Bai and Dean from June. Extremely candid. Notes.

[madfloridian]

Unfortunately, though the audio was available for a while in August, I can not find it now. Several in our area transcribed portions of that very long, almost an hour, interview. It is one reason why I did not think that Bai's NYT article last night was a hit piece. Some parts did annoy me though. This interview was held on June 4th, 2006

Here is the one reference I can find now which was announcing the series of interviews. I guess it is not available now. It was a very good interview, and it's a shame it is not available now.

New “Times Talks: Sunday With the Magazine”

And a few portions of the transcriptions we did:

Bai asked Dean about the changes he was trying to make, saying that many in DC did not like his strategy.

Dean: All politicians are "risk aversive" and "rapid adaptors". That means when someone new comes in they usually try what the winner did, but that means if the winner is the opposite party they begin to look like the opposite party.

Dean says the Republicans were Democratic Lite for 30 years and they never won. He mentions Gingrich, says he does not agree with what he believes. However he says Gingrich was transformational because he was not afraid to take risks. He says we're gonna have a 50 state strategy no matter what the folks in Washington worry about.....because like 1994, this is an election where people really want change......people will vote for a party of change. What they will not vote for is a party of "me too."

Further conversation about what Democrats and Republicans stand for, and their tactics.

Here's the problem with Republicans, they're really good at winning elections. They're disciplined, they're organized, they take a long view and and they stick to the same message whether it's true or not..relentlessly. They don't care what the facts are..(laughter)

The trouble with Democrats is that we are entrepreneurial, independent minded, don't mind publicly airing our differences. We believe in values and the right thing will happen in the end without doing the hard work to make it happen.

Interestingly when you come to governing those qualities are reversed. They're terrible at governing...they don't care what the facts are. (laughter). I'm serious, you know they don't care what the facts are. (applause)

There's not a scientific body in the government that's not completely demoralized. They put people in charge of the CDC because they're right to life. Well, I think you're supposed to know something about public health if you go to the CDC. The FDA, they can't keep a commissioner, why? Because the WH tells them what drugs to approve. They don't care what the facts are. They didn't care what the facts are when they went into Iraq.

The thing about the Democrats is that we are intellectually curious, we are interested in new ideas. The Democrats are the true liberals, not in the bad sense the Republicans have made it out to be, but in the good sense, the English sense of broad-minded. Now having said that we need some new ideas. (laughter)

Well said, clear thoughts.

Markos had a few thoughts about this before the article last night came out. It is going to be drastic change.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/9/28/17232/0507

"This is an ongoing battle between a handful on insiders who think DC and NY knows best, and that the party should focus on a handful of "battleground" districts in a handful of "battleground" states, and pretty much everyone else in the party. This is not a battle Rahm and Schumer and Pelosi are going to win.

In 4-10 years, future chairs of the DSCC and DCCC are going to praise Dean for his efforts on behalf of a national party. We have great bench talent in places like Oklahoma, Mississippi, Nebraska and pretty much every state traditionally abandoned by the party. When those Senate and House seats open up, and our candidates have a leg up because of the DNC's tireless ground organizing, then Dean will be vindicated."

I see both sides of the issue of money. We need it now, we need it for later. I am presenting my side, that we must look at later. Since we have once again been abetting Bush in his goals of overturning the constitution, in the torture vote this week....then I wonder how much change we will get by doing the incumbent "you must support me" thing.

Dean called it in this statement:

All politicians are "risk aversive" and "rapid adaptors". That means when someone new comes in they usually try what the winner did, but that means if the winner is the opposite party they begin to look like the opposite party.

We don't need to look like the other party anymore.

Disclaimer: I am voting and supporting Democrats nationally and locally both financially and other ways.

[madfloridian]

1. He's fears when we get back in power we will have to fight complacency.

A few more notes from the audio:

Dean says he wants to put in a real long term business plan for success, win the 2006 elections so at least we can stop the hemorrhaging that is going on in the country and build a base from there.

He then says that if we succeed, which he has every intention of doing is that it is harder to change an institution which is in power than one which is out of power. But he doesn't think the American people can afford to have a weak Democratic party anymore.

The fear is they would say ok now we are back in power, things are ok. He did not use the word complacent, but he gave that impression. His 2nd greatest fear after not winning is that if we do we fail to get health care, we fail to raise the minimum wage, fail to start to balance the budget...