COMMERCIAL BREAK
Let me give you some quotes here from this New York Times story headlined, “Disdain for Bush Simmers in Democrat Strongholds.” Quote: “Geoff Garin, a pollster who is working for Senator Bob Graham of Florida, who is seeking the Democratic nomination, said the Democratic anger toward Mr. Bush was “as strong as anything I’ve experienced in 25 years now of polling,” and perhaps comes closest to the way many Democrats felt about President Richard M. Nixon. Some compare it to the hostility conservatives long harbored toward President Bill Clinton. For the past two and a half years, after all, a fairly consistent 38% of respondents in the New York Times/CBS News Poll have said that Mr. Bush was not legitimately elected president.”
They’re still tied one that; they’re still occupied with that. And here’s a pollster says these guys, these Democrats, hate Bush even more than they hated Reagan. It’s close to how much they hated Nixon. Which, folks, is an eye-opener. I’m not trying to make a bigger thing out of this than it is; it’s already pretty large. But we’ve said over and over and over on this program – and you know it and it’s not just said by me – that much of the Bush domestic agenda is right out of the liberal book. I mean, not the playbook, but the way we’re spending and treating education, the attempt to create a brand-new welfare entitlement: the first in 40 years with prescription drugs.
I mean, you know, there’s a lot here on the domestic side that, if these people were really being honest with themselves, and with us, and if they were really paying attention, I mean they might back these things. They might have some resentment over the way Bush was elected; they might have some resentment over the foreign policy success. And I know they’ve got general resentment at conservatives anyway, don’t misunderstand that. But the rational reason for this degree of hate that these people have – in fact, this story only barely references the so-called Clinton-haters, and this story makes it plain that the Bush-haters in the Democratic Party outdo in almost all respects the so-called Clinton-haters in the Republican Party back then in the conservative movement.
And then the second quote from this story. This is not the same as the sound bite; it’s just a little different. In the sound bite, he says, “We’re going to stand up against Rush Limbaugh and the right-wing.” I guess this is from an appearance in Iowa: “When Dr. Dean entered the room, sleeves rolled up, looking as if he was ready to fight, he was greeted like a rock star. ‘It’s time we stood up to this president and stopped being intimidated by the Rush Limbaughs on the radio,’ he said. ‘We can do better than that.'” Then here, behind all this, is a story about Howard Dean from the Washington Post: “As Governor, Dean was Fiscal Conservative – Presidential Candidate Imposed Discipline on Vermont Legislature’s Efforts to Spend.”
So we’re getting a whole new spin now. I guess the media says, “Okay, he’s up there. We’re not going to be able to take him out so it’s time to protect him – and he’s not a liberal.” You’ve heard this everywhere, “He’s not a liberal. Oh, no! He’s just a centrist. He’s a moderate. Why, he’s even a fiscal conservative.” Friends, there wouldn’t be enough of this to stake out of the barn here. You have any room left inside. This is just unbelievable. I’ve got a new name for this. This is what the Democrats always tried to tell us about the Soviets: “Well, they’re just misunderstood people. They’re really not our enemies. They’re just afraid of us because of our nuclear arsenal.” I’ve got a new name for Howard Dean. I’m going to call him “Nikita Dean.” I mean with the way the press is trying to position this guy, not going to get away with it. He’s Nikita Dean from now on.