Somebody Owes Howard Dean an Apology



Thanks to Mark from Carlisle for sending this in



From Common Dreams News Center



Dean Sees Red Over Code Orange  

by Joe Conason

 

Somebody owes Howard Dean an apology.



Over the
past few days, the former Vermont governor and Democratic Presidential
candidate has endured a barrage of bad press and nasty commentary,
simply because he expressed honest doubts about the government’s latest
terror alarm. Republican pundits and politicians predictably denounced
him. Senator John Kerry disowned Dr. Dean’s remarks, and Senator Joe
Lieberman went further, suggesting that anyone who harbors such doubts
must not be “in their right mind.”



In
short, to think that the Bush administration might issue an alert for
political advantage is a symptom of madness. The latest news reports,
however, indicate that Dr. Dean’s suspicions were hardly unfounded.



On Aug.
1, as every alert citizen knows, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge
held an unusual Sunday press conference to announce that the Bush
administration had raised its color-coded threat level from yellow to
orange in certain selected places—in New York and New Jersey’s
financial centers and the World Bank headquarters in Washington, D.C.
In his opening remarks, Mr. Ridge told America that the decision was
provoked by “new and unusually specific information.”



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