Howard Dean Blowing Smoke

The Associated Press reported last week that new Democratic Chairman Howard Dean is miffed at New York Republican Party head Stephen Minarik.

“Howard Dean, the new chairman of the Democratic National Committee, called on the head of New York's Republican Party to apologize or resign Wednesday over remarks linking the Democrats to a civil rights lawyer convicted of aiding terrorists.

“Dean called Stephen Minarik's comments offensive, and said, 'The American people deserve better than this type of political character assassination.'

“On Monday, Minarik said that Dean's election shows that 'the Democrats simply have refused to learn the lessons of the past two election cycles, and now they can be accurately called the party of Barbara Boxer, Lynne Stewart and Howard Dean.'"

Considering that Dean and Stewart share a number of political positions, including opposition to the PATRIOT Act, support for civil rights for enemy combatants, and a rabid hatred for former Attorney General John Ashcroft and President George W. Bush, it’s somewhat surprising to hear him complain that linking Lynne Stewart to the Democratic Party is “political character assassination.”

Lynne Stewart was recently convicted of providing material support for terrorism by helping her client, the “Blind” Sheikh Omar Abdul Rahman, who orchestrated the 1993 bombing of the World Trace Center, send messages to his radical followers in Islamic Group, an Egypt-based terror organization. Interestingly, Stewart was asked to defend Rahman by Ramsey Clark, Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Communist-leaning Attorney General. The same Ramsey Clark who joined Bush’s opponent, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, on the Viet-cong propaganda circles in the early 1970s.

He is also the same Ramsey Clark, an outspoken member of the communist Workers World Party, who founded the International Action Center and International A.N.S.W.E.R. A.N.S.W.E.R. organized and sponsored dozens of anti-war rallies around the world during the build-up to the Iraq war. They also helped organized some of the largest protests during the Republican National Convention in New York City in 2003.

Speakers at these rallies have included numerous members of the Democratic Progressive Caucus, which includes such predominant members of the Democratic Party as House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-Texas), Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Washington), Rep. James P. McGovern (D-Mass.), Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Cali.), and is co-chaired by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) and Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Cali.).

And let us not forget that Howard Dean himself announced his candidacy for president on Monday, December 8, 2003, at an anti-war rally in Portland, Oregon, organized by International A.N.S.W.E.R.

It doesn’t seem Minarik has any reason to apologize at all.