Thursday, February 03, 2005

The New Republic Recaps the DNC Chair Race

From Ryan Lizza at the New Republic


From the congressional leadership to the governors to the Clintons, top Democrats were all terrified of a Dean victory....And yet none of them could stop him.
...
At one of five candidate forums held around the country for DNC members to interview the aspiring chairs, Roemer rose and, glaring at Dean and candidate Simon Rosenberg, lashed out at the "secret e-mails" that were circulating about him. He angrily defended his pro-life record and testily challenged the DNC members to show some tolerance on the issue. It was a brave speech, but it was also the end of his candidacy. Applause was scattered and perfunctory. In New York the next week, he told DNC members, "We shouldn't let a special interest group decide our view on choice." This time, the audience hissed. 

Now I understand better the second half of his closing statement that same week at the meeting in Sacramento (paraphrasing mine):

 Thanks all -- and thank you for not putting me after Howard Dean.  Churchill was once asked "Aren't you going to go outside?  There are 10,000 people waiting to hear you speak."  He replied, "If I was to be hanged, there would be 10 times as many".  There are people here wanting to see me hang.  If I believed everything I read, I might be out there watching.  My mother is a staunch pro-choicer, and I hear from her every day.  As DNC I would not overturn Roe v. Wade.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home