my post is from the washingtonpost owned by graham family - a wellknown liberal democrat family and reputable it is word by word from the source
washingtonpost.com
Dean Vows to Stay In Race Even If He Is Winless Tuesday
By John F. Harris and Jonathan Finer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, February 2, 2004; Page A01
Former Vermont governor Howard Dean vowed yesterday to stay in the Democratic presidential race even if he goes winless in the seven states holding primaries Tuesday, but pledged that he will not take his candidacy to the convention simply to "prove a point" if he falls insurmountably behind in the battle for delegates.
Dean, appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" and at news conferences, combined humility over the strategic errors that have hobbled his formerly front-running campaign with new blasts at Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.) for a "complete lack of principle" over such issues as the Iraq war, education reform and ties to Washington special interests.
...
In the NBC interview, Dean tried to make light of his circumstances, quipping, "How the mighty have fallen." More seriously, he acknowledged that he regrets his decision to pour many millions of dollars into Iowa and New Hampshire in a failed bid to rack up early victories and create unstoppable momentum. "We took a gamble, and it didn't pay off."
His gamble now is to take aim even more sharply at Kerry. He accused the Massachusetts senator of being a weak and equivocating figure in his votes supporting the Iraq war and the No Child Left Behind education bill, and of being beholden to Washington influence-peddlers.
"Not only has he taken more special interest money than any other candidate in the United States Senate in the last 15 years," Dean told reporters on his way to Detroit from Milwaukee, "we now find he took special interest money from Johnny Chung."
Chung was one of the key figures to emerge in the fundraising scandals that plagued President Bill Clinton after his 1996 reelection. Chung eventually pleaded guilty to fundraising violations that included illegal contributions to Kerry's 1996 reelection effort.
An article in the current Newsweek returns to the Chung controversy, which has dogged Kerry intermittently for years, by disclosing that he helped a Chung associate, Liu Chaoying, get a meeting with securities regulators. Liu was later disclosed to be a lieutenant colonel in China's People's Liberation Army. |
