Alta Reports in from the QC House Party



 
Democracy for the Quad Cities, watching Dean speak

© 2004 Democracy for Iowa. All rights reserved.

About a dozen DFQCers
gathered at my house Tuesday night to watch Howard Dean address the
Democratic National Convention. Here are some of our impressions:



Howard (Go!) Dean
– You deserve the prolonged applause and standing ovation for slapping
some sense into the Democratic Party last year. As others have
commented, we too think Hillary realizes she will have to get in line
behind Dean if she wants to be President. And Terry McAwful (can’t
remember how to spell his real name) still doesn’t get it.



Barack Obama – A powerful, sincere speech that gave us chills. Our first Black President. No wonder he was one of the first Dean Dozen.



Ilana Wexler
– A 12-year-old more qualified to be President than the current
occupant of the White House. More common sense and probably better
educated, too! We agree with you, our Vice President said a very bad
word on the floor of the Senate. We’d send him to time out, too.



Ron Reagan
– Some real zingers in that non-partisan speech! We’re with you, Ron.
In November, we’ll join you in voting for Embryonic Stem Cells!



Teresa Heinz Kerry
– We love her! We loved the line about it’s time for the world to hear
the voices of women. Opinionated women rule! (Who was it that said:
People call me a feminist whenever I say or do anything that
differentiates me from a doormat? Who would have thought that in 2004 a
woman would be criticized for having opinions? I guess Laura Bush is a
GOP heroine because she doesn’t have any opinions? Unbelievable.)



Dick Gephardt – who knows? We watched a tape of Jon Stewart of the Daily Show interviewing Wolf Blitzer.
As usual, Jon Stewart is doing a better job than our craven press
corps. If you aren’t already watching the Daily Show, start
immediately. It’s on Comedy Central. Howard Dean said at Democracy Fest
that 50% of our young people get their news from the Daily Show. (I
say) it may be the only thing that will save us.



The
speeches all started to blur together (an effect of the drive for
“Democratic unity,” I guess) and we had trouble remembering who said
what. We all liked the line that our foreign policy (or was it actions
in the world?) should not be “thoughtless and greedy, but rather
thoughtful and generous.” But we couldn’t remember whose line it was!
Was it Barack Obama? Teresa Heinz Kerry? Ted Kennedy? We agreed it
wasn’t Ilana Wexler. If you have the answer, please leave a comment.



Alta Price, a refreshingly-opinionated woman, reporting in from Bettendorf, IA