Regarding Donna Brazille's defense of the DNC's treatment of Florida. . .

[wndycty]

. . .but I think this shows politics makes strange bedfellows. I seem to remember, given her cozy relationship with Karl Rove and other things that have been viewed as "anti-progressive," she has earned the scorn of the "true progressives" and the liberal net roots community. Yet here she is standing with Dean, and many of the fine folks who have previously demonized her are now applauding her. And many who have supported her are now pissed at her.

This should teach all of us a lesson, the very Democrat you lionize or vilify today will be the very Democrat you hate or love tomorrow.

I see a lot of name calling but what is the DLC position (yea or nay on the early primary) what is the true progressive or netroots position (yea or nay on the early primary). I'm not sure if those positions have been stated, but I bet more than a few of the folks who have been name callers in the past find themselves agreeing with those they have called names in the past. LOL

[Jim Sagle]

1. I admit to some delight and surprise at Brazile's stance on this.

Especially since I view Florida's antics as a Clintonite attempt to kill the campaigns of your candidate and mine before they get off the ground.

[msongs]

2. persecution complex? paranoid? nt

[Jim Sagle]

4. Another Hilbot heard from.

:boring:

[Cha]

19. Really..it's so

freakin' obvious.

[Tom Joad]

3. She is absolutely amazing. That she could manage a campaign against the

most moronic Republican nominee in maybe a hundred years and still lose shows an extra-special skill. She is one-in-a-million.

[Buzz Clik]

8. Doesn't say much for her candidate, does it?

[AlGore-08.com]

11. F.Y.I. the 2000 campaign started two months after the impeachment, and Gore was 20 points behind

As a result.

Bush and Rove were the ones who ran a lousy campaign - - they blew a 20 point lead while outspending their opponent by almost two to one. They even had the advantage of a media that worked actively to destroy their opponent's campaign.

The Republicans knew that they were out gamed. The GOP spent several million studying the Gore campaign's GOTV strategy, and used that to beat us in the 2002 midterm elections.

[Tom Joad]

12. After choosing Donna as his campaign manager, he choose Joe Lieberman as his running mate.

[Buzz Clik]

13. But it's all Brazille's fault. Of course.

No doubt, it was Brazille who was the one huffing and puffing and sighting throughout Debate #1, and then spent Debate #2 almost catatonic, and it was Donna who walked over to Bush's podium and stood there while Bush was giving an answer. Goddam Brazille!

I'll grant you that Bush was the most incompetent campaigner ever, and yet he was close enough to Gore that Florida made all the difference. Brazille's fault? Okey dokey!

[AlGore-08.com]

17. No, actually Gore had moved up only 10 points behind by the time he picked Lieberman

And despite what folks read on DU, Gore's choice of Lieberman was very popular in 2000. Lieberman was, at that time, universally loved by the press. It got Gore his only real positive coverage. It made Florida a swing state (it had been solidly Bush country before then). And it helped "distance" Gore from Clinton, which is what most voters wanted. Lieberman was beloved by the institutional left at that time - - Arianna Huffington called him "the last real Democrat". (And F.Y.I. almost every Democrat in the Senate went on the record to condemn Bill Clinton in a similar fashion that Lieberman did - - it's never been discussed in the press, but I believe it was a tactic, possibly approved by the Clinton White House, to give the Dem Senators a way to vote against impeachment without risking backlash from the voters at home... )

Below are some polls from August 2000...

http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/08/07/cnn.poll/

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 7
Opinion of Joe Lieberman
Favorable 37%
Unfavorable 10
Unsure 53

Sampling error: +/-4% pts

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 7
Choice of Lieberman As Running Mate
Excellent 18%
Pretty good 35
Only fair 21
Poor 7
Unsure 19

Sampling error: +/-4% pts
CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 7
V.P. Choices
Lieberman Cheney

Excellent/good 53% 55%
Only fair/poor 28 34

Sampling error: +/-4% pts
CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 7
Effect of V.P. Choice On Your Vote
Lieberman Cheney

More likely 16% 14%
Less likely 4 10
No effect 76 72

Sampling error: +/-4% pts

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 7
How Lieberman Choice Reflects on Gore's Ability to Make Decisions
Favorably 57%
Unfavorably 19

Sampling error: +/-4% pts


http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/08/13/cnn.poll/

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 11-12

Does Vice President Al Gore's ties with President Bill Clinton make you feel more favorably toward Gore or less favorably toward Gore, or do they have no effect on your view of him?
More favorable 7%
Less favorable 32
No effect 60


Sampling error: +/-3% pts


CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 11-12

If the Democratic nomination for president were still being decided and if Bill Clinton could run again, would you rather see the Democrats nominate Al Gore or Bill Clinton for president?

Gore Clinton
Democrats 48% 46%
Independents 52 29
Republicans 58 12


Sampling error: +/-6% pts

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 11-12

Please tell me whether you think Al Gore, if elected in November, would do a better job, about the same, or not as good a job as President Clinton in handling the job of president.

Economy Moral Leadership
Better 16% 58%
Worse 17 12
Same 60 27

Sampling error: +/-3% pts


http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/08/11/cnn.poll/index.html

CNN/TIME POLL
August 9-10
Is Gore too close to President Clinton?
Now 1999
Yes 49% 55%
No 45 37

Sampling error: +/-3% pts

CNN/TIME POLL
August 9-10
Do you think Bill Clinton's ethical standards are a good indication or a poor indication of how Al Gore would do as president?
Good Indication
Yes 30%
No 53

Sampling error: +/-3% pts


CNN/TIME POLL
August 9-10
As a presidential candidate, do you think Al Gore is more a candidate in his own right, that is based on his qualifications, or more a creation of Bill Clinton choosing him as vice president?

Creation of Clinton 45%
Based on his own
qualifications 42

Sampling error: +/-3% pts

http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/08/06/cnn.time.poll/index.html

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 4-5
Likely Voters' Who Do You Think Will Win?
Now June
Bush 68% 55%
Gore 25 34

Sampling error: +/-4% pts

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 4-5
Favorable Ratings
Former President Bush 73%
Hillary Clinton 45
Bill Clinton 42

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 4-5
Whose Opinions Do You Respect More?
Former President Bush 61%
Bill Clinton 34

Sampling error: +/-3% pts
CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 4-5
Who Would You Vote For?
Former President Bush 53%
Bill Clinton 42

Sampling error: +/-3% pts


http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/08/21/cnn.poll/

Rating the speeches at the Democratic convention:
Gore Clinton
Excellent/good 52% 44%
Just okay 18 16
Poor/terrible 6 13

Sampling error: +/-3% pts


http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/08/07/cnn.poll/index.html

CNN/USA TODAY/GALLUP POLL
August 7
Lieberman's Criticism of Bill Clinton
More favorable 26%
Less favorable 21
No difference 50

Sampling error: +/-4% pts

[Tom Joad]

22. Gore choose a popular reactionary. nice.

[Jim Sagle]

24. Doesn't say much for you that you swallowed the RNC media Kool-Aid.

[Mutineer]

21. How she was hired as a commentator

and "expert" on Democratic politics, or politics in general is beyond me.

[Tom Joad]

23. i think she represents the view of the Dem leadership quite well.

[Cleita]

5. Being on the same page sometimes with someone you

usually disagree with isn't anything new. I find myself occassionally agreeing with Pat Buchanan (gasp!). It doesn't make me forget that Donna Brazille was all warm and fuzzy over Bush's speech and appearance in Mississippi after hurricane Katrina praising him for the lighting, never mind that no one else had electricity at that time. Of course, time has proved that his speech was nothing but BS because few of his promises have been met, but Donna thought he was wonderful. I need a lot more out of her to accept that she has changed.

[rucky]

6. Why is this even happening in the first place?

the primary process is broken, and neither side is really interested in a long-term solution.

and why are there sides, anyway?

I suppose the states want to decide. I say if the state wants to fund it, they should be able to pick when.

The natural result of that would be a publicly funded, 50-state primary. It's obviously not going to happen this cycle, but something to shoot for as a result of this flap.

[Buzz Clik]

7. This is a lot of posturing.

Something had to be done. The primaries already are insanely long. Florida was one of the many players that had to be reckoned with -- and all the players were out of control.

Hats off to those who stepped forward to show some leadership.

[Tom Rinaldo]

9. I never demonized her.

Yes Donna is comfortably inside the beltway now along with a bunch of other Democratic pols like James Carville, who actually married a leading Republican strategist for Christ's sake. She is friendly with most of the political class in DC, and that includes Joe Lieberman. Yet after Lieberman lost to Lemont Brazille came out in public calling on Lieberman to respect the vote of CT's Democrats and not run again in the General Election. When Russ Feingold introduced his first motion to censure George W. Bush years ago, Brazille wrote a piece supporting Feingold that praised the netroots for having it right and the establishment having it wrong not to support Feingold on that.

Like most professional pundits and Party Pols, her record is checkered from my vantage point, but I never swallowed the line that she is working against us, because it simply isn't true. Grade her issue by issue. Regarding Gore's 2000 run from what I heard Brazille was not given the leading role in deciding how campaign funds would be spent, which cut into her influence in that campaign. Her biggest single contribution was to boost minority voter turn out. I know people who love Gore now want someone other than Gore to blame his inability to souhdly defeat Bush on, but Gore was by then a very seasoned politician. He had the leading voice in charting the outline of his own campaign, not anyone else.

[wndycty]

10. Tom you have always been very objective. . .

. . .I remember being in the DU trenches with you in 2004 as we fought the good fight for Gen. Clark. Unlike those I'm referring to in the OP you don't deal in absolutes like too many DUers have been doing since 2004. Whenever I criticize candidates and leaders I don't agree with I try to keep it to the issue that I'm disagreeing about because I never know when I will be agreeing with that candidate or leader down the line. We have to figure out a way to get past the name calling.

Not sure who the nominee will be (I have my strong preference)but I don't want to have to take back any names I called that person in the primary.

[Buzz Clik]

14. Perfectly stated:

I know people who love Gore now want someone other than Gore to blame his inability to souhdly defeat Bush on, but Gore was by then a very seasoned politician. He had the leading voice in charting the outline of his own campaign, not anyone else.

[AlGore-08.com]

15. The idea that Bush could have been "soundly defeated" in 2000 is a misreading of history

And it's caused a lot of folks in the Netroots to make a lot of bad decisions. One of the main reasons that Bush was so far ahead of Gore - - and Bradley - - in the beginning of the race was that the media actively worked to make George W. Bush the perfect candidate for everything that was wrong with America in 1999/2000. They were constantly given material (by folks inside and outside the Gore campaign) about how Bush's proposed policies would lead the country to disaster. Bush's budget proposal was out of balance by a trillion dollars. Bush's proposed tax cuts obviously benefited the very wealthy only - - they had the (now famous) gall to tell reporters that they hadn't figured out how their tax cuts would help middle class folks, but they'd let the media know as soon as they did. One Bush adviser made the mistake of publicly saying they wouldn't help the middle class at all - - and shortly (the next day I think) did a 180 to say they would help the middle class, only they hadn't quite figured out how yet. The media did report on any of it. The media was given information about Bush's going AWOL during the Vietnam War, the DWI arrests he and Cheney had received, Bush's making fun of Karla Fay Tucker's plea for Bush to spare her life, Bush's disastrous business history, etc., etc., etc.

While a few individual columnists printed these things, they were never picked up nationally by the MSM. They were never discussed endlessly on news discussion programs. The media ignored anything negative about George W. Bush.

There was even a moment during the early fall of 2000 when the Bush campaign stole mail that the Gore campaign had sent to the press corps traveling with the Bush campaign. The Gore campaign caught them, red handed, and held a press conference with the members of the media who had their mail stolen. The Gore campaign pointed out that this was a crime, and they really, really should report it.

There was one AP wire story about the theft of the mail. The rest of the media did not find it remotely newsworthy that the Bush campaign had violated the law - - had stolen something belonging to them.

Instead, they spent their time misquoting Gore and using those misquotes to "prove" Gore was "a serial exaggerator". Or they took true statements that Gore made and called them lies. They spent endless hours on TV talk shows wondering why Gore would lie about such trivial, inconsequential things. Did he have some kind of mental problem that was keeping him from achieving his life's ambition of becoming President? Bush, on the other hand, was the ideal leader, the perfect Christian and just an all around great guy who was going to cut everybody's taxes and end all these horrible sex scandals in the White House.

The Gore campaign spent countless hours trying to get their message past the MSM - - going on fluff talk shows and playing up the campaign website (back when campaign websites were basically ignored by voters) and getting other Dems to lobby the media for fair coverage.

Despite all of this, Gore still won both the popular vote and the electoral vote. Even with the voter purge of ten thousand + African American voters, the Butterfly ballot loosing 3,000 + more votes, the ten thousand ballots that never got counted... Gore won more votes in Florida than Bush did. The only reason that Bush became President is because the Supreme Court halted the election and made Bush the President by judicial decree.

None of these systemic problems of the media, packed courts and voter suppression have been fixed since 2000. The media remains the biggest threat, IMNSHO. They have consistently reported the conservative line without question and gone out of their way to make the progressive line sound flawed at best. In the run up to the IWR vote, there were numerous voices in and out of the Democratic party who challenged the idea of the war - - they were ridiculed or ignored in favor of endless cheerleading. During the 2002 midterms, the GOP attacked various Democratic candidates as unpatriotic - - and the MSM stayed silent about this despicable tactic. In 2004, the media played an active part in derailing the Dean primary campaign. They then did little or nothing to fact check Bush/Cheney 2004 and reported on the Swift Boat Vets as if they and their charges were legitimate.

It took Katrina to make them even begin to openly question the Bush administration. But here we are, two years after Katrina, and the poor, black sections of New Orleans are still in ruins. This is barely discussed in the MSM - - even when the Democratic primary candidates issue their "how I would fix NOLA" position papers.

In the 2008 race, it's clear to see the media still aren't being objective. The coverage of John Edwards is probably the best example -- the more he emphasizes his populist platform, the more the media questions his sincerity (the haircut, the big house, etc., etc.). (Before somebody flames me, I'm not dissing Edwards or boosting him.) Compare this to the coverage Huckabee gets - - he is running as a Republican populist, but the MSM don't run stories about the cost of his haircuts or suits or home.

Republican scandals still get little coverage unless they're sex scandals. Potential Democratic scandals still get covered like they've already been proven in a court of law.

And we - - both in the grassroots and in the party machine - - act like this isn't happening. If a Dem gets bad coverage, we blame the Dem, not the system. If that bad coverage ends up loosing an election for that Dem, we blame the Dem and look for a new, "fresh face" who will magically defeat the system we refuse to fix ourselves. And then when that Dem falls victim to the same system, we demonize them and move on to the next "fresh face" we have doomed to failure.

[Jim Sagle]

25. Bravo, AG08. A much-needed reminder of how bad the media coverage was in 2000 and how much

it determined the outcome.

[AtomicKitten]

16. I find the hypocrisy thick here at DU.

I have been slammed for having the audacity to defend Ms. Brazile from the thorough reaming she gets here, only to find some of the worse perpetrators singing her praises now.

Oy vey. I think if people cut the drama in half, this kind of embarrassing turnabout in opinion might be cut to a minimum.

[janx]

20. Unfortunately, political cyber communication is often

very gullible when it comes to media gossip.

[Cha]

18. That's right! I didn't like

Kerry for the primaries in 2004 and when he won..I started to really really Like him and not just because he was our candidate:) And I still like him.