I agree that in the current climate, Howard Dean needs to remember that
everything he says will be taken out of context and plastered all over
the news networks before anyone in his office even realizes what he said.
But if we're going to attack him, let's check the actual quotes.
And for those who've already seen the actual quotes and/or don't care,
take a look at what the RNC was sending out about Democrats during the
last election:
http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/000546.html
It was very, very hard to find Dean's original quotes amongst
all of the blogging activity and so-called news reports, all of
which quoted exactly the same phrase in exactly the same way --
almost as if it had been distributed intentionally. As it turns out,
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Howard_Dean was the best source. Here's what
he actually said, in (more) context:
"You -- (applause continues) -- you know, the idea that you have to
wait on line for eight hours to cast your ballot in Florida -- there's
something the matter with that. You think people can work all day and then
pick up their kids at child care or wherever, and get home and then have
a -- still manage to sandwich in an eight-hour vote? Well, Republicans,
I guess, can do that, because a lot of them have never made an honest
living in their lives. (Light applause.) But for ordinary working people,
who have to work eight hours a day, they have kids, they got to get home
to those kids, the idea of making them stand for eight hours to cast
their ballot for democracy is wrong. We ought to make voting easier to
do. Mail -- Oregon has got it right. (Applause.)" (Take Back America 2005 Conference in D.C., June 2)
"The Republicans are not very friendly to different kinds of people. I
mean, they're a pretty monolithic party. They pretty much, they all
behave the same, they all look the same. It's pretty much a white
Christian party. Again, the Democrats abduct everybody you can think
of. So, as this gentleman was talking about, it's a coalition, a lot
of it independent. The problem is, we gotta make sure that turns into
a party, which means this: I've gotta spend time in the communities,
and our folks gotta spend time in the communities. I think, we're more
welcoming to different folks, because that's the type of people we
are. But that's not enough...." (Discussion with reporters in San Francisco, June 6)
