Sunday, June 05, 2005

Mad? That's not quite the word

After Howard Dean's dumb speech at the Campaign for America's Future conference Thursday, C-Span aired a panel discussion--self-inflatingly titled Blogfire--of leftie bloggers who had attended the care-and-share fest.

Supposedly Wonkette and Joshua Micah Marshall were going to be there, but either I missed them (I caught only the second hour) or they blew it off. So it was pretty boring without the head and, er, heart of the left blogosphere.

But at least one panelist, the professionally feisty radio blatherer Stephanie Miller, did say something fascinating, or at least caused a reaction that was fascinating. (The other b-teamers were Duncan ("Atrios") Black; Christopher Rabb of afro-netizen.com; somebody going under the name Jerome Armstrong of something called mydd.com; and The Nation's egregiously lipless Washington editor David Corn.)

What Miller said was that the Democrats need Howard Dean as DNC chairman, for a number of reasons but mainly because "he makes the Republicans so mad." The audience cheered and clapped at this, but the panel seemed rather . . . quiet, and I believe Rabb actually said he didn't support Dean. Very interesting, in light of what Sens. Biden and Edwards said about Dean today. The Republicans think they are the party in disarray, but, as the differing reactions to Dean's speech show, they've got nothing on the Dems.

Update: Dean's speech is featured nowhere on the Campaign's site. You have to click on "Media Center" to find a .pdf or .doc transcript. No video.

Update II: Bonus Miller. "Barbara Boxer is not just doing the Lord's work, she is the Lord."

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