Posted on 01/08/2004 7:01:20 PM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
Old episodes of the “The Editors,” a roundtable panel of politicians, journalists, and policy gurus who discuss American and Canadian politics, foreign affairs, and social issues are proving to be a show-and-tell on presidential candidate and former Vermont governor Howard Dean, says NBC news, which has acquired copies of the old shows, aired mostly in Canada. The NBC News Investigative Unit obtained the videotapes of 90 of his appearances from 1996 to 2002. According to the NBC special report, the show helps answer one of the race’s biggest questions: Just who is Howard Dean? Apparently Dean shot from the hip even in those years, as witnessed by his candid comments about caucuses in the presidential nominating process. There are a host of other issues as well: “If you look at the caucuses system, they are dominated by the special interests in both parties,” he said. “[And] the special interests don't represent the centrist tendencies of the American people. They represent the extremes. And then you get a president who is beholden to either one extreme or the other, and where the average person is in the middle.” (four years ago) On sponsor and benefactor Al Gore: “He has a lot of attributes, but … there are some things that I am concerned about. One of them is being quick on your feet. He is not.” (January 1998 show) On George Bush: “George Bush, I believe, is in his soul a moderate.” (show after the 2000 presidential election) Compare with this past November: “I believe that George Bush's philosophy in life is, if you're rich you deserve it and if you're poor you deserve it.” On welfare: Commenting on a remark that 80 percent of children who are born to single mothers end up on welfare: “That is absolute crap. This is absolute unmitigated garbage.” (April 1998) On affirmative action: “I think that this country needs affirmative action in order to succeed as a diverse society,” he said in a 1997 show appearance. But in 1995 he once said that affirmative action should be based on class rather than race. On NAFTA: “I’m a little nervous about NAFTA. I was a big supporter four years ago. I’m worried about the condition of Mexican workers around the maquiladoras. And I had hoped that NAFTA would boost the Mexican standard of living.” (February 1998 show) On tax cuts: “There is such a thing as a bad tax cut. It took Reagan’s tax cuts, which were irresponsible, to create an enormous deficit, which has finally 12 years later come home to roost and force us to reduce spending.” (October 1996 show) “I’m very satisfied with the income tax levels in the United States right now,” he added in a later appearance that year. “I think they are about right.” On the Middle East: [There] “will probably be good and bad” if Hamas takes control over the Palestinian leadership. Yasser Arafat, he said, “is going to leave the scene. ... When that happens, I think Hamas will probably take over. There will probably be good and bad out of that. The bad, of course, is that Hamas is a terrorist organization. However, if they have to run a quasi-state they may actually have to be more responsible and start negotiations. So who knows what will happen.” (January 1998 show) More Dean on Arafat: “The next great tragedy is going to be Arafat’s passing, believe it or not. I’m not a fan of terrorism or Arafat. But the truth is that what’s happening here is [former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu has thrown away the chance of a lifetime to negotiate with people he could negotiate with. Next comes Hamas, comes far more radical government in Jordan ... which may ally itself with Iraq. I think it’s a frightening proposition.” (January, 1999 show) More Dean on the Middle East: “I think cooler heads will eventually prevail in the Middle East — unless, of course Netanayhu makes a return. I actually think Pakistan is a far more dangerous place right now; it is a shell of a country waiting to be taken over, essentially, by radical Islamists and that is going to destabilize all of central Asia.” (November 2000 show) Neighbors to the South: “I also think we have to be very concerned about Venezuela and Colombia,” he said. “Here we have two democracies which are now sliding backwards and being threatened with extinction. … That's in our own hemisphere.”
Doh!
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