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Excellent post by Steven Johnson on Howard

Excellent post by Steven Johnson on Howard Dean’s recent troubles with the voters. Took the words right out of my mouth (except better put).

Reader comments

JDFeb 03, 2004 at 12:20AM

He may be right about the ultimate importance of the mainstream media in deciding elections but he is in big time denial about the trashing that Dean has gotten, especially ever since Hussein was "captured" and Dean said that America is still not any safer because of it.

The media has constructed this myth of electability, when in fact the Bushies have come right out and said that it doesn't matter who runs against them in November, because they're just going to throw the same attack at them no matter what.

truthFeb 03, 2004 at 3:36PM

Blame the media! I swear, the deanies look more and more like a cult.

JDFeb 03, 2004 at 7:06PM

FWIW, I'm no Deanie. But, yeah, I'm blaming the media. Sorry if pointing out their hypocrisy in raising the 2004 version of the Democrats' "character" issue while simultaneously swallowing everything Bush and Co. feed them looks cultish to you.

gogol13Feb 03, 2004 at 7:25PM

i liked this post mordem :D

http://www.plastic.com/article.html;sid=04/02/01/14505897#34

andrew sullivan likes dean!

truthFeb 04, 2004 at 1:01AM

JD, the media affects everything. They ran with deans scream, they ran with bush's 'rib's comments. Still, anyone who isn't blind realizes dean's mistakes. But in today's society everyone wants to place the blame anywhere but themselves. Its easier to play victim. Sad.

JDFeb 04, 2004 at 1:22PM

The media may affect (nearly) everything, but they certainly don't affect everything equally. I'm not saying Dean didn't make mistakes. If you weigh his mistakes versus Bush's mistakes (and lies), and then look at the media coverage of each, it's no contest. The op-ed page of the Washington Post, by the way, hasn't been talking about Bush's ribs comments for the past six months the way they've been talking about Dean's "temperament." What's truly sad is the the American people's seeming indifference to a media that treats them with such open contempt.

real voter - not a complainerFeb 04, 2004 at 1:50PM

Who cares about these democraps. Bush wins.

tomFeb 04, 2004 at 3:17PM

JD Wrote:
I'm not saying Dean didn't make mistakes. If you weigh his mistakes versus Bush's mistakes (and lies), and then look at the media coverage of each, it's no contest.. Of course, you are saying Dean hasn't lied, since his name didn't contain the same parenthesis after 'his mistakes'. And Dean hasn't told one lie during this campaign...

JD also wrote:
The op-ed page of the Washington Post, by the way, hasn't been talking about Bush's ribs comments for the past six months the way they've been talking about Dean's "temperament." . Dean's temperment has been talked about by the Washington Post for the past six months? Please, point us to a "temperment" article from August of '03 (heck, even September, since we've entered February).

JDFeb 04, 2004 at 8:40PM

Tom, I'll go back even farther. Here is a link to an article from July 6 by Evelyn Nieves, titled "Short-Fused Populist, Breathing Fire at Bush." (The WaPo site has been pretty unresponsive tonight, so I'm not sure if you'll actually be able to pull up the article, but the title, in and of itself, seems pretty revealing.)

This thread is closed to new comments. Thanks to everyone who responded.