Hi Nerd,

If you did not accuse Kerry of push-polls and there is no proof they
were committed by Kerry's people, then I did misread your post and I apologize.

You said, however,
" I said there was no proof, but a lot of evidence."

How can there be evidence with no proof of it's existence?

The sealing of the records by Dean was reported on "All Things Considered"
on NPR.

Regarding this statement on Israel, what is the source? When and where
did he say that Dean wanted to pull out of our alliance in Israel?


" Dean used the word "even-handed." Kerry and the other candidates piled on, saying that we are Israel's ally, and how could Dean say we needed to be "even-handed" or impartial? My God, they railed, he wants to pull out of our alliance with Israel!"



Again, what is the source of the statement that Kerry wanted to execute
bin Laden without a trial? I find that hard to believe.

I interpret Kerry's remarks about Dean's tax plan differently. He just said
that he didn't have one. That's what was implied by it being "secret".
So, what is Dean's tax plan?

Kerry said that he would reduce the amount of tax for the middle class
and make sure that the wealthy would be a fair share.

You say,
"Kerry spins that to mean that Dean has a sinister plan but is keeping it secret."

I don't agree. Nothing sinister about it. It's a fact. It's not there.

I believe that Kerry or Clinton was not as dependent on "special interest"
money as is Bush. Special interest money is controlling the government
at the present time and was not as much during Clinton. It certainly isn't
Kerry's motive because his "war chest" doesn't come anywhere near
Bush's.    I'm not saying there isn't some "special interest" money involved in every election including that of Howard Dean's gubernatorial campaign. Special interest money is a fact of life. No president or public politician gets elected without it. I say it's a matter of degree. Historically not every president who takes it is beholden to the contributors. Otherwise we
wouldn't have the Sherman-Patman Anti-Trust Laws and other reforms
by presidents who received this money. I'm not in favor of special interests
controlling the government but I do believe that no elected official that I
know of has ever gotten there without it.

Regarding your "facts" I never said that I couldn't dispute them. I am doing so now.

You say,

"In the same way, there is no proof, but a lot of evidence, that Bush misled the American people about going to war. That is a claim that Kerry makes."

I never heard him make that claim. Bush did mislead the American people
and there is plenty of evidence for that.

You say,
" if you insist on complete smoking-gun proof for everything, you'll never be able to make a political decision."

I don't think so. I think there is obvious evidence that Bush mislead the
American people. The futile search for WMD's after what he said was
the pretext to going to war is self-evident even if Republicans deny it
for political reasons.

You say,
"So I respect your decision that the evidence in this case does not convince you that Kerry is guilty. It convinces me. But I strongly reject the notion that it was scurrilous (once again, see the bottom of this post), or even an attack."

I was specifically talking about the push-pull accusations when I used the
word scurrilous. That was in reference to the idea that Kerry supported this.
If that's not what you said, then I'm sorry but I reacted to it because there
seemed to be an inference that Kerry is conducting a "dirty" campaign.
If that's not what you said, then I apologize.


You say,


" At one point Dean was saying he was the only "major candidate" who opposed the war in Iraq. This pissed Dennis Kucinich off, because he was not being considered a "major candidate." DK took issue with Dean, and Dean has since been very careful to include Kucinich every time. At the last debate, for example, he said "All the congressional candidates, except for Dennis, supported the war."

Then it is true that Kucinich did take issue with Dean. Nothing scurrilous
about this observation. Dean said at one point that he was the only candidate that opposed the war. Dean recanted about Kucinich. I'm glad to hear that.
But it could have been sooner. Made Dean look like he was the only one.
That was a gaffe. It made him look bad.

" We're talking about correspondence, notes, memos, and other items that would in any other environment be considered private; we are NOT talking about policy decisions, bills, positions, political appointments, etc. All those things are public by nature."

How do you know this? Do you know which "records" were sealed and which were not? Why hide anything if you are running for president? If Dean is so free from corrupting influences why would he need to hide anything?

"The media-created "controversy," which you seem to have fallen for, is about the fact that Dean extended the seal for an extra four years."

Why did he need to do this? What was so important that he had to hide it?

"The reasons for records being sealed are many. Primary among them are privacy concerns of correspondents."

Such as items like Bush's DUI arrests. Not saying that Dean has anything
remotely like this in his past but why not reveal records?

"In this case, Dean signed some very controversial legislation, the first bill in the whole country providing equal civil rights for gay people. When he did that, he received a torrent of thank-you mail from gay Americans, from all over the country, some of whom were not "out" and therefore asked for confidentiality. If he simply released all his records, those people would be publicly "outed."

That seems legitimate but what about other records? After all, he is running for president and his life would be in a goldfish bowl anyway. Regarding
the records for the gay people, if they are being controlled by a Republican
wouldn't it make sense that they have access to these records anyway and
would use them maliciously if they needed to?

You say,
"There are other privacy concerns as well. Dean judged that ten years would protect these people better than six."

Well that's OK for the average citizen. Running for president is different.
Everything is fair game. It shouldn't be that way but it is. If you run for president, every record is called into question.

You say,
"Now, the other candidates have insisted that Dean make more of his correspondence public. He is perfectly willing to do so, as long as none of these people who need confidentiality are compromised."

But the fact that you know this and I know this makes them already compromised. Particularly if they are under the juridiction of some
Republican official.

You say,
" Someone therefore has to make individual judgments about each document, looking at each one and deciding if it represents a legitimate privacy issue. "Dean obviously cannot do this himself or pay someone to do it, or (very rightly) no-one would trust the results. So what is his best option? Release them to an impartial judge."

" The administration is Republican, by the way, so no one can cry that Dean turned this over to his cronies."

This hardly constitutes an "impartial" judge.

"Tell me, Frank, what would you have done differently?"

I would have stated by protestation that the gay informants were compromised by the revealing of these records or I would have burned
the letters that were written by those who needed to be protected.
I would not have given them to a Republican judge to make political
hay with it. The other letters or items could go into public record. Why not?

You say,
"Finally, I've been using the term "scurrilous" in fun to describe your own baseless and ill-informed attacks, because you used it in a post long ago above. But I don't think you know what the word scurrilous means.

You also say,
"It means abuse characterized by coarseness or indecency of language."

Excuse me but I looked up the word in the dictionary. It comes from the
word "scurril" and it means indecently abusive. And any suggestion that
a push-pull pressure on voters comes from the Kerry camp would fit
that definition precisely.

Frank   










.