Is Dean the most liberal?

[branch]

It really bothers me the way the national media and the Repub's are trying to spin this guy as the most liberal of them all.

I think it is a sign of strength for Dean. If he wasn't a threat the right wouldn't say that he is the most liberal of the Dem's.

He doesn't seem to be that far left at all to me. ie: guns.

[dajabr]

1. Dupe X 1 million (nt)

[branch]

3. sorry

eom

[dajabr]

5. No problem...

Just venting... :-)

[wuushew]

2. Plus his tax plan sucks

Krugman knows the low down.

[Hep]

4. Where's krugman?

Maybe he can back up your assertion.

[wuushew]

6. The rich should be taxed to death

LO: There seems to be a fault line forming in the Democratic primary, with one side Howard Dean and Dick Gephardt wanting to repeal all the Bush tax cuts, and on the other John Kerry, John Edwards and Joe Lieberman saying we should at least keep the tax cuts for the middle-class.

Is one of those strategies better than another for the economy?

PK: Put it this way. If you do the arithmetic, take the estimates of where we are on budget, we’re actually very deep in the hole.

The best estimates say we got a fundamental shortfall of about 4.5 or 4.6 percent of GDP. The Bush tax cuts are actually about 2.7 percent of GDP.

So the truth is, even if we rolled them all back, we would still have a hole in the budget.

If you wanted to…keep the tax cuts for the middle-class, there’s something to be said for . Our tax system has gotten a lot less progressive over the past 20 years.

But that means that you’re going to have to come up either with some kind of program cuts or some kind of additional revenue elsewhere.

Even with all the Bush tax cuts rolled back, we still have a long-run budget problem, though it’s not nearly as severe as the one we’re right now facing.

So if somebody says, “I just want to repeal some parts of it,” I think it’s fair to ask, “Well OK, what else are you going to do?”



http://www.liberaloasis.com/krugman.htm

[Hep]

7. Thanks, Mr. Krugman,

but you don't really come out and advocate one plan over the other. This doesn't explain your pal wuushew's assertion that Dean's tax plan sucks. And it certainly doesn't address the underlying notion that the tax code needs work and can be changed to benefit middle and working class people. You don't really address the idea of alternative economic midels at all, no mattre how significant those changes might be. Could you expand a little more?

[DrFunkenstein]

9. He Has An Article Somewhere Blasting Dean's Plan

I'm not sure where you can find Krugman's old op-eds, since the NYTimes deletes them. Anyone know?

[w4rma]

8. Dean is a passionate centrist, IMHO. (n/t)

[Tinoire]

10. Centrist. Nothing Liberal about Dean. n/t

[WindRavenX]

11. He really isn't...

..although I would have no problem with him being President, anyone that gets a 4 star review from the NRA really isn't..THAT liberal.
IMHO, Kerry is the most liberal and has the best chance to win, to boot...

[blm]

12. The media pushed Dean as a liberal to fool the Democrats into

supporting him as the liberal antiwar candidate. Dean is neither liberal OR antiwar. In fact, Dean has a record of pushing for deregulation in Vermont, a very proLibertarian and proRepublican stance on deregulation.

[WindRavenX]

13. This is why I have said over and over..

...that the canidate that gets nominated should be the one that has the least problems with the media. The media is a HUGE hurdle for us this upcoming election. We saw it in effect in 2000, and it's going to be worse as we get closer to 2004.
Kerry and Clark, IMHO, seem to have the least friction with the media. Dean is really being bashed lately..

[Capn Sunshine]

14. They always go after the front runner

[WindRavenX]

16. That's true

However, during those few weeks when Clark jumped into the fray, EVERYONE was praising him and writing nothing but lovely things about him. At that time, he was the front runner and all over the media, yet they didn't attack him. I find that interesting, and it may be helpful to us if Clark should actually get the nominee..the media seems more docile towards him.

[mzmolly]

15. On the right issues he is...

;)

[Classical_Liberal]

17. He is stronger on class politics

The politics the DLC ignores. He owes less to business than all the other candidates, so the repukes really fear him.

[blm]

18. Owes less to business? Can you prove that?

It seems to me that the only candidates who never accepted corporate pac money in their careers are Kerry and Kucinich.

Dean was known as being VERY business friendly as governor. He even pushed for deregulation in his state. The CATO Institute rated him highest of all democratic lawmakers.

[McDiggy]

19. Here are the candidates in chart form.....

from politicalcompass.org



So, no, he's really quite middle-of-the-road. It's quite humourous to hear Bush supporters call Dean an extremest, when he's the one that is way off towards the edge.