Howie D's response to Howie K.

[madfloridian]

http://www.blogforamerica.com/

A Message from Howard Dean
The quotes attributed to me by others in Howard Kurtz's gossipy rendition of the divisions in the Dean for America campaign are entirely false, as is the description of my reaction after losing the Iowa caucuses, before the famous speech.

The danger of using unattributed sources as Kurtz and so many others do, is that the veracity of the informants can not be evaluated. In this case Kurtz included a significant amount of material which was not true, and produced a story which was greatly exaggerated.

There have been many inquiries about the relationship between Dean For America and the Change for America website. The answer to the question is that there is no relationship. We intend to form a progressive grassroots organization based on the Dean for America campaign, and we will work with other organizations after we get set up. We will announce the set up on March 18.

In the meantime, my deepest thanks to all of you who worked so hard to change America. We are not giving up, and we have an outline about what we intend to do on the DFA website.

Many thanks,
Howard Dean

[janx]

1. Right on Time--as usual!

This is great! Thanks for posting, MF.

GO HOWARD DEAN!

[Cuban_Liberal]

2. Your timing is impeccable, Dr.!

:thumbsup:

[pollock]

3. Yeah, started reading that column in the Post

Usual garbage from Kurtz; reminded me why I stopped reading his column.

[slinkerwink]

69. kurtz's credibility was shot a long time ago--why do people still

believe him?

[boobooday]

4. Thanks for posting this

Whatever happened with Howie K's ethical problems? I read something about a conflict of interest . . .

Not that it would be anything new.

http://www.wgoeshome.com

[madfloridian]

6. Strange we never heard another word about Kurtz and his ethics.

It is all hushed up now like good little media do.

[janx]

22. His ethical problems just sort of disappeared.

I can't even remember what they were about now, can you?

5. LOL

love it, just love it.

I'm glad Dean didn't waste any time getting this statement out.

[madfloridian]

7. I love the adjective before rendition.

LOL.

[janx]

9. Yep. How else could one describe it?

Kurtz's credibility is now...officially...SHOT.

[madfloridian]

8. And for the first time he clarified the connection between DFA and CFA.

Maybe he got a wee bit irritated with some?

[janx]

10. Not necessarily. They may work together in the future--

who knows? :shrug:

I think Trippi set that up when he did in order to retain some talent should it be needed in the larger effort.

[madfloridian]

11. Yes, but some connected there should not speak out so.

If they are going to try to undermine him, they should think twice.

I am thinking of going ahead and joining up with CFA, but I may wait a bit.

[janx]

14. We don't know where Kurtz got his "quotes." They were

so out-of-context and vague that he could have gotten them from anybody--or nobody! ;-)

There is no harm in waiting though.

[madfloridian]

16. I read it and check it out, but the article slowed me down a bit

from joining.

[janx]

20. Can't wait to find out what Dean's going to announce on

3/18.

That's not too far away. You might be able to wait until then, eh?

[foo_bar]

48. probably e-mail

Dean's policy director, Jeremy Ben-Ami, declared in an e-mail: "The message of the campaign is simply no longer our campaign vs. the special interests. This is not what the governor wants to be saying -- or frankly what he ever really wanted to be saying."

Joe Drymala, the chief speechwriter who received the e-mail, resigned in protest. "I refused to believe it because I didn't want to," he said. "To believe that was to believe that Howard Dean was a fraud."

Since the campaign used the internet more than Al Gore's Blackberries, it isn't surprising that all of the internal hissy fits were documented (and probably forwarded to five hundred of Trippi's closest friends). Every campaign has internal factions, so blaming them for the electoral drubbing is imperfect hindsight. If Dean won Iowa, the same story would've been the tremendous unity of his message despite internal stylistic differences (or more likely, no story at all since the leakers would've clammed up).

[janx]

49. I doubt they were documented if they weren't true.

And it doesn't really matter now where Kurtz came up with his lies. The guy's a hack.

[slinkerwink]

51. exactly----he's a total MEDIA WHORE!

[foo_bar]

63. who said they weren't true?

Dean only denied quotes attributed to Dean. If Kurtz invented these sources out of thin air, it does matter; he could be fired tomorrow morning (don't roll your eyes at me: the catbox liner papers of record still have standards above drudge's). If he didn't, well, it's an interesting story albeit nothing we haven't read before.

[slinkerwink]

68. those standards for NYT, Washington Post, etc, have been shot to hell

now, and they still allow Robert Novak as a columnist.

[Bombtrack]

12. Anybody else think that DFA was named to have "west wing" rub off on them

more? In the show, the campaign was "Bartlett for America", at least in the first campaign. They showed it in a flashback. Obviously, being the compact, Vermont governor, with a medical doctor wife, and an early liberal interest was emough of a comparison to start off with. But I'd suspect that they had a keen interest in milking that natural desire from the sushi and starbucks liberal set that watches TWW to have a real Bartlett was what made them go with that name

[madfloridian]

13. No, I never thought that at all.

:hi:

[janx]

15. I don't know since

I've never watched it. :shrug:

[Bombtrack]

19. Has any other presidential campaign ever been called ______for America?

anyone know?

[slinkerwink]

24. I think one other candidate Trippi worked for had his organization

called that

[janx]

17. I wonder if Kurtz has read this yet...

18. mistah kurtz

you might want to see this... "the horror the horror"

[janx]

21. The horror!

Something's on fire!

[slinkerwink]

31. The Hollow Men!

[slinkerwink]

23. good for Dean---why are we treating people like Kurtz as if they're

telling the truth when they're nothing more than rumor-mongers?

[janx]

25. People will believe almost anything in the print/broadcast

media.

And journalists have morphed into tabloid hacks.

[slinkerwink]

26. why are we still relying on the pundits and columnists to tell us

utter bullshit?

[janx]

29. We sure as heck shouldn't--that's for sure!

It's all just money driven. The hacks will do anything for more money.

People could really use some education concerning this. Most have no idea.

[slinkerwink]

30. and that's how the american public gets brainwashed

[bushwakker]

27. Fuck you Kurtz and your GOP consultant wife too*

[slinkerwink]

28. woohoo!

:headbang:

[janx]

32. This is nothing new from Kurtz, of course. Look at this

article from December in The Nation about Washington versus Dean:

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040112&s=alterman

Washington Goes to War (with Howard Dean)

Print this article
E-mail this article
Write to the editors

Saddam Hussein may be out of his spider hole, but Washington's real enemy is still at large. His name: "Howard Dean"--and nobody in America poses a bigger threat to the city's sense of its own importance. New Republic writer Michelle Cottle returned from maternity leave to find Washington fit for a "Tarantino-style blood bath," with the Democratic front-runner cast as a "paleoliberal...a heartless conservative...too naïve to beat Bush...too politically cynical to trust...a Stalinist... a neofascist kills babies and drinks their blood."

In its self-appointed role as semiofficial punditocracy politburo, the Washington Post editorial board issued what ABC News's The Note properly termed "a button-popping, eye-bugging anti-Dean editorial" that it undoubtedly hoped would serve as Dean's political death sentence. Expressing editorial shock and awe over Dean's unarguably accurate observation that Saddam Hussein's capture left the United States no safer than before, Post editors termed the candidate's views to be "not just unfounded but ludicrous" and complained of his "departure from the Democratic mainstream."

The Note observed that "history might record that this piece stops The Doctor from being his party's nominee," but the hysteria embedded in its analysis could be found nearly everywhere in the media. Over at the New York Times, David Brooks, who appears to have taken over Russell Baker's comic spot on the op-ed page, contrasted Dean with the Bush Administration. He noted, apparently sincerely, that the latter was suffering "an insincerity crisis" owing to its "honesty and candor," along with its "candor and forthrightness." Meanwhile he smirks at Dean as being "the only guy who goes to the Beverly Hills area for a gravitas implant." Dean's crime: offering up a moderate, Clintonesque foreign-policy speech to the Pacific Council of World Affairs.

While the Post editors and Brooks speak for hard-line neocons, Dean receives no less abuse at the hands of many genuine liberals. My colleague at the Center for American Progress, Matthew Miller, attended the speech and found it lacking, not in substance, which he thought properly Clintonian, but in presentation. "When Dean barked it out, it felt smaller and shabbier, as if he were lecturing us on simple facts we ought to have known." Miller worries at length about what it means that Dean accidentally thanked US soldiers for their "services" rather than "service." Jonathan Chait, so obsessed he now operates an anti-Dean blog at The New Republic, also admits that the position that so exercised the Post pooh-bahs is "narrowly true." Chait's problem with Dean, and I quote, is that the Vermont governor "gives off the vibe that he likes to equivocate about the bad guys rather than recognize them for what they are" (what a bummer that Dean dude is...).

(more at link)

[slinkerwink]

33. lol, are we really to believe anything from this media whore?

[janx]

34. The guy is a tabloid hack, like so many.

It is extremely ironic that he hosts a television show called "Reliable Sources"--especially after this!

B-)

[slinkerwink]

35. you know what? I don't see anyone from that Howie Kurtz thread on here

I wonder why? :shrug:

[janx]

37. Darned if I know, Slink. Though there are actually two Kurtz

threads, both of which were started by people who don't seem to like Dean too much.

Maybe it's easier and more enjoyable to live with rumor than it is to live with fact! What do you think?

[slinkerwink]

39. hey! it's the episode where the ostrich sticks its head in the sand again!

[janx]

41. Many ostriches.

Loads of them.

[slinkerwink]

42. mmm....I wonder what an ostrich burger tastes like?

[janx]

43. I've never tried ostrich myself, but I have met people who have.

Apparently it's not a very exciting flavor--a little boring, actually.

[janx]

45. I'm trying to find an ostrich photo...

[RetroLounge]

52. Maybe because they are alone intheir shame

for defending MWO's Media Whore of the year only because he said something to fuel the fires of their Dean Hatred.

Pathetic Defenders of Media Whores Unite!

:eyes:

RL

[slinkerwink]

53. heh....they still haven't shown up here

[Scott Lee]

36. Anybody notice any glaring absences on this thread?

I do. Not a single one of Botox's regular defenders are here.

Gee whillikers. I wonder why.

[janx]

38. Slink just mentioned that!

;-)

[slinkerwink]

40. maybe because they don't want to consider that Dean was telling the truth

and that Kurtz was WRONG?

[Scott Lee]

44. Says alot about their moral courage, does it not?

pass the chips please...

[slinkerwink]

46. oh, and about their candidate who also doesn't have moral courage....

[janx]

47. There were loads of them on the rumor threads...

One of those has well over 80 posts, I think... :shrug:

[slinkerwink]

50. oh, really? and there's hardly anyone here but us

[slinkerwink]

54. kick

[janx]

55. Yet another thread appears about this, but the conversation

doesn't take place HERE...

[slinkerwink]

56. geez.........what wussies they are!

[Oreegone]

57. We are with you

We are awaiting word from Doctor Dean to the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party, we are all out here and we are ready to go....Godspeed

[KoKo]

58. Good for you Howard Dean! "Kurtz, Whore Media" tried to strike with lies

and innuendo and you got him back. You aren't dead yet! And, what's more Kurtz's faulty Post-Mortem shows that you are still a force on the left and they had to send little "Mistah Kurtz" out to do their "dirty deeds."

Kurtz's WaPoo article was beyond the depths even I thought he would stoop to! And, I have two e-mails from "Kurtz Whore" back in the old days when I was stupid enough to believe him....year 2000 before the "Selection." So, I know his writing and "Media Whores" got him correct when they put him in their "Hall of Shame."

He was "put up" to write this trash article. Who knows how much he and his Repug/Swartzenneger Campaing Operative wife, Sherri Annis made off Howie's "Big Story" but I'll bet the RW paid handsomely. :nuke:

[slinkerwink]

60. never TRUST a RW columnist!

those who fell for the bait should be ashamed of themselves...

[madfloridian]

62. I did a search on that ethics probe or conflict and Kurtz.....not there.

I can not find much at all. A couple of brief references, no more.
I think I saved an article on my computer.....will search.

Dean is out of the race....so my question is WHY do this now? Isn't he dead enough?

[slinkerwink]

66. because Dean's launching a new organization march 18th

and that still threatens some people.

[DFLforever]

59. I hope Dean's response has been sent to the WP

I may email this entire thread to Kurtz.

[slinkerwink]

61. please do so!

[DFLforever]

64. I e-mailed it to Kurtz - the entire thread

I doubt he'll read it...though he may be a little curious.:evilgrin:

[slinkerwink]

65. thanks!

[slinkerwink]

67. kick

[jburton]

70. Howard Kurtz's main source:

Jason Blair.

:crazy:

[slinkerwink]

71. ahh, reporters who do nothing but insert their own uninformed opinions

into hack pieces.

[slinkerwink]

72. kick