Howard Dean on "Rahm's contempt for base"

Sam Stein:

This week, Ari Berman of the Nation released his book "Herding Donkeys" that documents the growth of the modern Democratic Party from the nadir of the 2004 election through the triumph of 2008. The majority of the book looks at the efforts by former DNC Chairman Howard Dean to build a national network that could immunize the party from becoming either marginalized or regionalized. But the epilogue charts out how the style of Obama's governance drained the type of voter enthusiasm that, Dean acknowledges, was critical in those efforts.

"The White House began to believe that they could mobilize their supporters without hearing what their supporters really wanted in terms of specific change," Dean is quoted as saying. "The principal problem with OFA is the same one the president's having. You can't dictate to your base what's going to happen. It's got to be a two-way deal, and it hasn't been." MORE...

Howie P.S.: Booman says

"We've got bigger problems that some perceived slight that is almost never accurately depicted. The president, the vice-president, and anyone who isn't effing retarded is pointing to Rand Paul, Sharron Angle, Joe Miller, Carl Paladino, Christine O'Donnell, Mike Lee, Joe Miller, Ron Johnson, Ken Buck, Pat Toomey, and Speaker Boehner and telling you to wake the eff up."