Anger Management
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 4, 2003; 9:02 AM
In one corner we have Howard Dean, the hot candidate of the moment (if you exclude a certain actor who plays a robot), ripping the Republicans and lifting the spirits of Democratic die-hards.
In another corner we have comedian-turned-author Al Franken, slashing away at the Republicans and the right-wing press for fun and profit.
I would not have thought to connect those particular dots. One man wants to be president, the other is having fun peddling a book about those he deems liars.
But maybe, as Salon suggests, there's something larger here. Both Dean and Franken are tapping into some serious liberal anger out there.
In Dean's case, anger may or may not pave a path to the White House. After all, a majority of voters aren't teed off at George Bush. And candidates who come off as too angry tend to lose to more optimistic candidates.
But Dean is smart enough to understand that. And what the pundits have missed, in zeroing in on his antiwar stance and use of the Net, is that he's displayed passion. He gets crowds pumped up because he says what he thinks and doesn't sound like a cautious, incremental Washington lawmaker. Saying what you think gets you in trouble, and Dean has made some mistakes and, McCain-like, will make more. But he has one of the most important assets in politics: the ability to get people excited.
Franken is trying to do for the left what Ann Coulter and Bernard Goldberg (not to mention best-selling authors Rush, Hannity and O'Reilly) have done for the right: Demonize the other side. Slap the conservatives around. Get some good licks in.
While Franken's book is strident, the former Saturday Night Live comic is helped by his sense of humor. But the reason he's getting so much attention (besides that colossally dumb Fox News lawsuit) is that it's rare for an admitted liberal to try to punch out the other side.
For hard-core libs who are angry about impeachment, Florida, the war, the budget deficit, the tax cuts, the "bring 'em on!" president, the Texas redistricting and the California recall, Dean and Franken, in different ways, provide a welcome sense of relief. Finally, someone out there who feels their pain! Politics as group therapy, maybe.
Here's Salon Editor David Talbot with his take:
"Nothing is so gratifying to a movie audience as the moment when a sorely abused hero (man, woman or animal) finally feels his strength and gives his tormentors what they richly deserve. From 'High Noon' to 'Rocky' to 'Seabiscuit,' America loves to see a comeback, a righting of wrongs, a bully brought to his knees. Which is why, I think, Al Franken and Howard Dean are the men of the hour. For years, we have suffered while right-wing bullies hijacked American politics and media -- persecuting a president for a consensual sex act; stealing the 2000 election; trashing the country's economy, environment and constitutional safeguards; handing the government over to the highest corporate bidders; deceiving the public into a bloody quagmire; and then brazenly smearing anyone who dared to criticize this orgy of dreadful leadership as un-American."
Wait, he's just getting warmed up.
"After Clinton left office, and in particular after 9/11, Democrats seemed to lose the will or skill -- or both -- to fight back. The opposition party was a sad palooka slumped to the canvas, cowering in anticipation of the next blow. Think Tom Daschle, the party's 'kick-me' standard bearer, being gleefully libeled as a Saddam-hugging traitor by GOP carpetbaggers in his own state while his brave colleagues . . . ran for cover. This wasn't the give and take of a robust democracy, it was a blood bath.
"But month after month, the resentment grew -- you could see it and feel it on Web sites that the corporate media dismissed as fringe. And then finally, it came pouring out, in a wave of money and volunteer energy for the Dean campaign. And it's still cascading, turning a candidate once scoffed at by the punditocracy into the Democratic front-runner -- and forcing his rivals to amp up their Bush-bashing rhetoric to match the party faithful's passionate mood. . . .
"The instant, runaway success of Franken's new book is not just a result of Fox News' inexplicable decision to shoot itself in the foot and head by launching an idiotic trademark-infringement lawsuit, but also the author's bold -- and roaringly funny -- knack for confronting the Bush presidency and its prevaricating apologists. The best parts of 'Lies' come when Franken literally gets in the faces of Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, and a surprisingly mean Barbara Bush. After watching National Review's preppy editor Rich Lowry denounce the Democrats on C-SPAN for 'sissifying' and 'feminizing' politics, Franken calls him up and challenges him to a 'Fight Club'-like mano a mano in his parking garage. . . .
"Again and again, Franken finds that the bullies of the right quickly fold when confronted, or are unable to back up their big talk about liberal perfidy and treason when challenged on their facts. Why did O'Reilly come so embarrassingly unhinged earlier this year at the notorious Book Expo showdown with Franken. . . . Because O'Reilly and his fellow thugs on the right are so used to having the stage to themselves that they can't take the heat when it finally comes their way."
Newsweek's Howard Fineman has a prediction about Kerry in tonight's Democratic debate:
"The once and former 'frontrunner' (so called, it must be said, only because some pundits decided that his resume was to their liking) will attack. He has no choice. He is 20 points behind Dean in New Hampshire, and a distant third in Iowa. Kerry has to stop Dean's 'Mo.' The attack lines will be: Unlike Kerry, Dean has no hands-on experience in foreign policy or military affairs (true); Dean wants to repeal all of Bush's tax cuts, including those for the middle class (sort of true); and Dean is not the political purist he claims to be (also sort of true). . . .
"Dean has a short fuse, and doesn't like to be challenged face to face. I asked one of Dean's top advisers what the biggest obstacle was facing his man as he tried to keep his lead-stock status. 'The biggest threat to Howard Dean is Howard Dean,' he said."
In the seems-like-he-can't-do-anything-right category, the New York Post's Deborah Orin offered this take on the ex-front runner:
"Maybe it's no surprise that slipping Democratic presidential wannabe John Kerry's emotions seem so close to the surface that he burst into tears at a jobless woman's sad story yesterday.
"For many months, Kerry was riding high as the Democratic front-runner, but now he seems to be in freefall against surging anti-war contender Howard Dean, and no one has more than Kerry riding on tonight's Democratic TV debate. . . .
" 'The pressure is on Kerry to have a "Where's the beef?" moment with Dean,' says a Democrat strategist, recalling the debate nearly two decades ago when Walter Mondale cut surging rival Gary Hart down to size with a crack from a fast-food ad."
By the way, Wesley Clark has finally revealed that . . . he's a Democrat! The former general still won't way whether he's running, but he told CNN's Judy Woodruff that he's doped out his party affiliation. As if anyone expected him to challenge Bush in a GOP primary.
Speaking of Bush, I always thought Republicans stood for shrinking the government, but this Wall Street Journal piece suggests otherwise:
"The Bush administration has brought the era of big government back, say a Brookings Institution scholar and a growing number of conservatives dismayed about such growth under the Republicans' watch.
"While the number of official government employees declined slightly after President Bush took office, the Brookings study to be released Friday finds the number of full-time employees working on government contracts and grants has zoomed by more than one million people since 1999, bringing the overall head count to more than 12.1 million as of this past October.
"The eight-page report is likely to fuel debate about the administration's approach, at a time when budget deficits are ballooning and Mr. Bush is pressuring Democrats to hold down federal spending."
And it's not just war and terrorism spending; the budget also zoomed at the Health and Human Services Department.
There was a debate in California yesterday, with one notable no-show, as the Los Angeles Times reports:
"Five candidates for governor in the recall election differed yesterday over taxes, the death penalty and campaign spending in a spirited debate that offered voters a widely varied set of solutions to the most contentious issues facing California.
"The forum, the first debate of the campaign, began with Democratic Gov. Gray Davis appearing separately from the candidates seeking to replace him. Davis vigorously condemned the effort to drive him from office, alternately sounding notes of frustration and contrition. . . .
"One major candidate, Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Republican front-runner, skipped the event. His absence was noted less than 30 seconds into the session when Dennis Richmond of KTVU-TV, the moderator, introduced the participants and said the actor had decided 'he would not speak directly to the voters of California at this time.' For the most part, however, the candidates ignored their absentee opponent, who sought his own platform earlier in the day with a speech at Cal State Long Beach, where he was hit with an egg. . . .
"Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante was thrown on the defensive at one point when he was asked about pledges by Indian tribes that operate casinos in the state to contribute more than $2 million to his campaign. He stressed his long relationship with the tribes, noting that he had visited their reservations when they had no money. . . .
Columnist Arianna Huffington sharply disagreed. The contributions were 'nothing but legalized bribery,' she said.
" 'Tell me how you really feel,' Bustamante replied, drawing laughter from the audience."
Finally, some fireworks.
Arianna is blogging again, this time with her rules for surviving the campaign trail:
"1. Absolutely no alcohol. Not even a sip of wine from somebody else's glass.
"2. No carbs. Although I must admit I broke down on the airplane and had a bag of pretzels. But it was a really tiny bag.
"3. Absolutely no high heels.
"4. Drink lots and lots and lots of water. And when you think you've drunk enough, drink another bottle. 4a. Make sure you have a well-trained advance person who always knows where the closest bathroom is.
"5. Keep plenty of blotting tissue handy for dealing with shiny patches in-between interviews. Especially if, like me, you have Greek olive oily skin -- it's great for wrinkles, but bad for TV.
"6. An ample supply of café lattes.
"7. And, most importantly, it helps to no end to have a set of ideas you passionately believe in -- and that you don't mind saying again and again and again and again and again and again."
If this governor thing doesn't work out, maybe she has a future as a writer.
National Review's Andrew Peyton Thomas finds a wild card in California:
"October 7 looms as the big day in the California recall election -- the date when most of the state's voters will troop to the polls and cast their ballots. But largely overlooked is the fact that the recall election, like all statewide elections in California, is a rolling referendum in which actual voting begins a full month before Election Day. The reason: absentee ballots. This increasingly popular mode of voting will likely be more critical than ever in this year's recall battle. Ironically, a method of voting that is popular among Republicans may turn out to be quite damaging to their fortunes. . . .
"The percentage of Californians voting by absentee ballot has grown from 24.5 percent of the total electorate in 2000 to 27 percent last year. The number may reach 30 percent in this year's recall election, and will certainly be no less than one-quarter of the vote.
"Absentee voters are disproportionately Republican and conservative. A Field poll taken right before statewide elections in November 2002 found that 47 percent of absentee voters in California were Republicans, while only 41 percent were Democrats. This was despite the fact that Democrats enjoy a 10-point registration advantage in the state."
Andrew Sullivan says he still backs the war:
"A few of you complained that I was going wobbly in the war on terror in my posts. Au contraire. It's precisely because I believe in this war passionately that I believe we need more commitment, more money and more troops to aid the effort. The issue should never be: do you support the president? The issue should be: is what the president doing going to work? I'm not omniscient, but it's simply crazy to deny the real problems we are facing right now and the need for clear and urgent thinking about them. Many Americans who support the war agree. That's not going wobbly; it's doing what any thinking person should do, which is try and figure out what's going wrong and how to fix it.
"Mercifully, the administration seems to be trying to find a way to make the liberation work, with more international back-up. They're not that pig-headed. The president has no bigger fan in his conduct of the war so far. But my fear is that he is going astray. Am I supposed to keep that under wraps?"
American Prospect Co-Editor Robert Kuttner offers his assessment of a Clark candidacy:
"Wesley Clark has told associates that he will decide in the next few weeks whether to declare for president. If he does, it would transform the race. Call me star-struck, but he'd instantly be among the top-tier.
"Clark, in case you've been on sabbatical in New Zealand, is all over the talk shows. He's the former NATO supreme commander who headed operations in Kosovo, a Rhodes Scholar who graduated first in his class at West Point, and a Vietnam vet with several combat medals including a purple heart.
"He has been a tough critic of the Bush foreign policy, including the Iraq war. His domestic positions are not as fully fashioned, but he'd repeal Bush's tax cuts and revisit the so-called Patriot Act.
"More interestingly, Clark is progressive on domestic issues by way of his military background. . . . He's also pro-affirmative action and pro-choice.
"My favorite Clark riposte is on guns. He grew up hunting, in a family that had more than a dozen hunting rifles. But he's pro-gun control. 'If you want to fire an assault weapon,' he has said, 'join the army.' The NRA can put that in its AK-47 and smoke it.
"Clark is the soldier as citizen. Even better, he's the soldier as tough liberal. Just imagine Clark, with his real and distinguished military record, up against our draft dodger president who likes to play top-gun dress-up. Imagine the Rhodes Scholar against the leader who can't ad lib without a speechwriting staff. Oh, and he's from Arkansas.
The New Republic's Jonathan Cohn tries to put his finger on the Kerry problem:
"More than any other Democrat running for president, John Kerry has gotten grief over his stance on the war with Iraq. And as a number of smart political observers have noted recently, that seems a little unfair. Kerry has mixed feelings, yes, but so do the American people. What's wrong with saying that you were for the war, but wish Bush had fought it differently?
"Nothing, actually. But when Kerry talks about Iraq, it's often unclear whether he's trying to explain his complicated position or simply whitewash his record. A case in point was a line in yesterday's 'announcement' speech: 'I voted to threaten the use of force to make Saddam Hussein comply with the resolutions of the United Nations.'
"Notice the curious phrasing, about voting 'to threaten the use of force.' It's curious because last October's war resolution didn't authorize the threat of force--it authorized the use of force. . . . .
"Kerry probably understood what the vote meant--and simply felt it was the right thing to do based on the information presented at the time. Whether or not he now regrets that decision, he should be honest about it."
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