Dean grilled, stands ground
Questioning focuses on draft exemption
By Sarah Schweitzer, Globe Staff, 12/2/2003
CAMBRIDGE -- Democratic presidential contender Howard Dean parried energetically last night with cable news television host Chris Matthews, defending his exemption from the Vietnam draft for back problems and showcasing his new book before a largely student audience at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
In the hourlong question-and-answer session broadcast on MSNBC's "Hardball," part of a series of discussions with the Democratic candidates, Dean seemed to enjoy himself as he volleyed with Matthews, getting in a few laugh lines, most at the expense of President Bush.
Asked whether Osama bin Laden or Saddam Hussein should be tried in the United States or the Hague should they be captured, Dean responded that the issue was premature for discussion because "the president can't find either one of them."
The evening's hardest line of questioning came when Matthews dug into Dean's 1970 medical deferment from the draft, one he received after showing military doctors X-rays that he says were evidence of a back condition.
Matthews pressed Dean repeatedly on whether he felt bad about someone else taking his place fighting the war, to which Dean replied, "I thought the war was wrong." Asked whether he had been hoping to be deferred, Dean said he had not been looking forward to going to Vietnam. When Matthews pressed again with the same question, Dean replied, "Yes."
In the standing-room-only auditorium, students followed Matthews's lead, hitting Dean with hard-line policy questions, including probes about his decision to seal nearly half his governor's papers upon leaving office after 11 years and his decision to forgo federal campaign funding, a move that freed him from abiding by spending caps and one he has said was necessary to compete with Bush, who has already outraised Democrats.
Matthews did lighten the mood at one point, asking Dean to name his favorites -- movies ("A Beautiful Mind"), musician (Wyclef Jean), and presidents (George Washington and Harry Truman).
Asked about his favorite book, Dean smiled and said, "Chris, I hate to do this to you." Without pausing, Dean reached for a copy of his newly released, straight-to-paperback book, "Winning Back America" a mini-autobiography published by Simon & Schuster Inc.
It was inscribed, Dean said, "To Chris: With warmest wishes."
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