[lbo-talk] McEntee: Dean is "nuts"

Michael Dawson -PSU mdawson at pdx.edu
Fri Feb 20 10:13:24 PST 2004


That's about the usual amount of imagination and political courage of an "international" president. Not a word about how the corporate media and the political right (DLC included) fucked AFSCME out of its millions by fucking Dean. Not a milligram of a thought that, gee, maybe the DP itself is a problem, maybe this whole game is rotten.

AFL-CIO = wholly-owned DP subsidiary. 13 million left-leaning members with a very high rate of voting...What a waste.

----- Original Message ----- From: "Doug Henwood" <dhenwood at panix.com> To: "lbo-talk" <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org> Sent: Friday, February 20, 2004 8:45 AM Subject: [lbo-talk] McEntee: Dean is "nuts"


> New York Times - February 20, 2004
>
> Labor Supporter Says Dean Ignored His Entreaties to Quit
> By ADAM NAGOURNEY
>
> WASHINGTON, Feb. 19 - One of Howard Dean's most powerful labor
> supporters, Gerald W. McEntee, said on Thursday that he had decided
> that Dr. Dean was "nuts" shortly before he withdrew his support for
> Dr. Dean's candidacy and begged him to quit the race to avoid a
> humiliating defeat.
>
> Mr. McEntee, the president of the American Federation of State,
> County and Municipal Employees, defended his decision to abandon the
> campaign, saying he told Dr. Dean that he did not want to spend
> another $1 million of his union's money "in order to get him a couple
> of extra points in Wisconsin."
>
> "I have to vent," Mr. McEntee, the often blunt leader of the nation's
> largest public service union, said in a leisurely interview in his
> office here. "I think he's nuts."
>
> Mr. McEntee said he reached his assessment of Dr. Dean after watching
> what he described as a series of halting appearances in Iowa, leading
> up to his shouted concession speech. He said that he did not believe
> Dr. Dean, the former governor of Vermont, understood how substantial
> his decline was after that, and that he was stunned when Dr. Dean did
> not bow to pressure from labor unions to pull out earlier this month.
>
> "I go to Burlington, and I meet with him," Mr. McEntee said. "I'm
> telling you, I threw more ice water on his head in about 25 minutes
> than probably he has ever had. And I said: `Don't do Wisconsin, O.K.?
> Don't go in.' I told him to get out. I said, `You can't win.' "
>
> "He said he's still going into Wisconsin," Mr. McEntee continued. "I
> said: `We're not. We're off the train. If you think I'm going to
> spend $1 million to get you another point after this election is
> over, you're crazy.' "
>
> A spokesman for Dr. Dean, Jay Carson, said Mr. McEntee's attacks on
> Dr. Dean could endanger the party's chances of defeating Mr. Bush.
> "All Democrats have to be united to win this election," he said.
> "This kind of personal attack is not going to help us beat George W.
> Bush."
>
> The remarks by Mr. McEntee came the day after Dr. Dean ended his
> candidacy. In the speech Dr. Dean made on Wednesday, he went out of
> his way to praise the other two big unions that had joined Mr.
> McEntee in endorsing him, the Service Employees International Union
> and the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, for
> sticking with him.
>
> Mr. McEntee, who flirted with endorsing John Kerry and Gen. Wesley K.
> Clark before settling on Dr. Dean, said his union was probably going
> to sit it out for a while. "At this point, there's no way we're going
> to endorse anybody," he said. "I think we need a rest. Maybe in an
> asylum."
>
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