Frank, you're the one engaged in "scurrilous attacks" (but see the bottom of this post). But at least you admit that I have the facts, and that you can't dispute them. I see that as progress :-)

So here are Frank's latest baseless attacks revealed:

I stand by my conclusion that negative facts without evidence are
spin and scurrilous attacks. This was in response to the negative push-calling that Kerry was accused of.

I did not accuse Kerry. Read the post. I reported that these push-polls and night calls occurred (which I know from firsthand accounts of residents in Iowa and NH). I then clearly stated that there was no proof they were committed by Kerry's people, and then laid out a case why I (and Joe Trippi) think they were committed ny Kerry's people. This is not a case where I claimed there was proof. I said there was no proof, but a lot of evidence.

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.

So you can take your pick: either (1) I engage in scurrilous attacks and so does Kerry, in which case how is he so superior? Or (2) both Kerry and I make decisions based on evidence and present those decisions for what they are. You can't have it both ways; if you insist on complete smoking-gun proof for everything, you'll never be able to make a political decision.

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.

Here are some more examples of what you would call "scurrilous attacks," coming from your own post:

Dean claims that he was the only one who made the crucial issue decisions to change the Democratic party and has ignored Dennis Kucinich's contributions.

Not true. As above, with the "why didn't he say that?" comment, you are revealing that you watch the sound bites but not the interviews or debates. Dean has often pointed out Kucinich's contributions, and has done so particularly scrupulously lately. 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."


"Don't know how Dean did as governor in Vermont because his records were sealed by him until after the election. That's not a good sign for an open presidency."

You're wrong here on every count, Frank. First of all, the majority of Dean's records are not sealed at all and never were. Second, those that are sealed were sealed until after the election by Vermont law, not by Dean. Third, the term "records" is a misleadingly broad one, created by the spin doctors to make Dean look guilty. 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.

As you may know, most state governments seal some of these "records" for a period, and Dean's would have been sealed for six years (until well after the election) by the normal procedures of Vermont law. 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.

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

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

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. 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.

And guess what? Dean has long since released all of his records to the Vermont administration, who either have already or will select a judge, and the judge will decide what items become public. Dean has no further control over this, as it is in the hands of the administration in Vermont to assign judges to individual cases. The administration is Republican, by the way, so no one can cry that Dean turned this over to his cronies.

So the documents that are supposedly "sealed"--which were considerably less than half his records anyway, and mostly consist of correspondence--are actually in the hands of a Republican-appointed judge of the Vermont court, which is deciding which items can be released.

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

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.

It means abuse characterized by coarseness or indecency of language.

So the only person in this race who has said anything scurrilous was John Kerry, in the infamous Rolling Stone interview where said:

"Did I expect George Bush to fuck it up as badly as he did?
I don't think anybody did."

But Kerry's wrong on that. Dean certainly expected it. And, as you rightly point out, so did Kucinich. That's why they had the foresight to oppose the war, unlike Senator Kerry.