dean would have been another dukakis. the “people” thought that kerry was too liberal! wesley clark had less charisma than kerry. actually, i think kerry looked pretty damn presidential at the end of the race. edwards was too young, too inexperienced. people are scared of the terrorists, and they would have never gone for edwards.
lieberman? please. i think he’s the reason gore lost it 4 years ago. talk about a snoozer. plus by america’s political standards he’s too ethnic. we would have had the guy who jesus put on earth to rule the free world versus the guy whose people killed jesus. yeah, that one would have been close…
i think bush had a stacked deck. none of this election’s crop of democrats had a chance. kerry had some openings to really sway voters, but they passed him by. really, i’m suprised it was so close in the end. bush and his ilk had the midwest pretty much under their spell.
I’m from rural Georgia and know a lot of church-going mechanics here. You are mistaken about Dean.
His plain-spoken style is exactly what the Democrats need. John Kerry’s primary defect was not that he was a New England liberal, but that he acted like a New England liberal. His droning patrician delivery just played right into the stereotype. Perceptions matter, and Dean comes across as much more of a regular guy, even though he is from a similar background as Kerry. In short, Dean passes the “beer test.”
Moreover, Vietnam would have been a non-issue (and therefore a non-distraction) had Dean been the nominee. He could have focused on the pressing issues of the day without having to debate what happened thirty-five years ago.
My first choice would have been John Edwards, but Howard Dean would have been a close second.
Dean, by the way, is no liberal. He has governed Vermont as a moderate. He only projected a liberal maverick image in the primaries and could have moved back to the center (on the strength of his record) in the general election.
Dean had charisma, personality, a clearly defined platform, and one that had as one of its basic planks a certain level of defiance of the traditional political machine. He CARED, or at least it looked like he cared. Half the twentysomethings I know were talking about volunteering for him. I remember distinctly being totally disheartened when I saw the paper where Dean got a distant third in the primary and realized he was probably gone.
I think Dean would have won this election, if he hadn’t gotten blown up by the media and whatnot.