Tapped Has been Covering DLC's Attacks on Dean The Last Week

See posts from the 15th through the 20th.

It's a pretty impressive sign of how desperate the DLC is to derail Dean that it's now accusing him of being too liberal for the party at the same moment that he's smartly co-opting and building on a plan that was developed at the Heritage Foundation, introduced as legislation on numerous occasions by moderate Republicans and conservative Democrats, and that's backed by the current president.

DEAN VS. THE DLC, THEN AND NOW. ABC's The Note, er, notes that back before Howard Dean began stealing the thunder from Al From's preferred candidate (presumably the tepid Joe Lieberman), the Democratic Leadership Council was full of praise for the former Vermont governor. And indeed, the magic of Google makes you realize just how dishonest the DLC's recent hamfisted attack on Dean was.

In October 2000, the New Dem Daily praised a move by Dean, then-New Hampshire governor Jeanne Shaheen, and Maine governor Angus King to form a regional buying pool for prescription drugs. "Best of all, the regional plan will rely on market mechanisms rather than arbitrary price controls to lower the cost of prescription drugs," the Daily points out. Sounds like Dean's a pretty sensible center-left guy, no?