Posted on 12/01/2010 5:16:49 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
The Tea Party is not the significant force that Tea Partiers think it is, Democratic politician Howard Dean told a class of Vanderbilt students yesterday.
The former governor of Vermont and Democratic national committee chairman called into “Political Campaigns and the Electoral Process” taught by Professor of Political Science John Geer and Adjunct Political Science Professor Roy Neel to discuss the effects of the Tea Party on the 2012 presidential election.
“I think in addition to a bad economy, the Tea Party arose out of a discomfort with the demographic shift going on in this country,” Dean said.
According the Dean, the country is shifting to a group of ethnic and social minorities, and this bothers members of the Tea Party, which he says consists mostly of white people 55 years and older.
“Obama was elected overwhelmingly by voters under 35 years of age,” Dean said. “Obama has not lost any voters to the Tea Party.”
The advantage that President Obama and Democrats have in general, according to Dean, is a younger generation with views more in line with the Democratic Party.
“The problem with Republicans in general is that they offend the younger generation with their attacks on gays and immigrants,” Dean said. “I don’t have much advice for Republican (presidential contenders) other than to abandon their right-wing social agenda.”
Dean also offered his opinions of Sarah Palin and her potential candidacy in 2012.
“Sarah Palin stands for the middle class of the 1950s, when things were much more black and white,” Dean said. “It is interesting that she is a turn off to most women but attractive to older Republican men.”
Despite this, Dean said he cautions most Democrats who write Palin off as a weak contender.
“If she can win a major party’s nomination, she could win the race,” Dean said.
Sophomore Matthew Meinel disagreed with Dean’s outlook on Palin’s potential campaign.
“I don’t think she could win the party’s nomination or the general election, but it will be interesting to see how everything plays out,” Meinel said.
As for how the president should proceed in the light of a Republican majority in the House of Representatives, Dean said that Obama should not compromise with Republican leadership.
“How do you compromise with Mitch McConnell, who has said that his sole goal is to get rid of Obama after one term?” Dean asked.
Junior Matthew Taylor said he agreed with Dean’s advice for the president.
“I don’t think the president should compromise with Republicans who have said their primary goal is to defeat Obama,” Taylor said.
Professor Geer, a co-teacher of the course, said it was useful to hear the candid opinions of someone with no active stake in the race.
“Students got to hear a different take on the Tea Party, and whether they agree with it or not is up to them,” Geer said. “But for them to be exposed to a different viewpoint is what this course is all about.”
Dean and his commie ‘RAT party are all homosexuals. Two can play Howie’s game.
Dean has said this sort of thing so many times that I have to conclude he is the one who is uncomfortable.
IOW, a classic example of projection.
We are black, brown, and white. We are Jew and gentile. We are from different communities, various backgrounds, and all races, colors, and creeds.
We will Take America Back, not from Democrats or Republicans, but from an arrogant political class that puts its interests before those of all Americans.
Help us spread the word!
Let me clarify his remarks: Yada, yada, yada, yada, ....
Howard Dean is an old left-wing jerk.
Howard Dean and so many others need to look at the county-by-county voting results to help them decipher the backlash phenomenon. On one level it is urban vs. suburban and rural, I think more so than it is old vs. young. It implies to me also that it involves home and property ownership vs. government-provided services, and the values that derive from that part of the American dream.
I’m not anti-city, by any means, but very few large urban areas have a majority of historical values-driven voters these days.
Mr. Dean himself and the other leading Democrats (Reid, Pelosi, Biden, the Clintons, etc) are all white people 55 years and older. They don't understand what is going on in America so they resort to decades old liberal cliches.
The only demographic the Tea Party is concerned with is the control-freak Marxist thinkers versus the responsible freedom-lovers.
FREEDOM will win! ;-)
(natural God-given gift)
Maybe the college age crowd took a look at what is being put on their tab?
As if Dean doesn’t know that people have a tendency to become more conservative as they age.
Palin keeps getting all kinds of free press. No other candidate gets as much. I started a “freepressforPalin” keyword.
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