Reply #13: Probably because in February he qualified the remark with a

[DemBones DemBones]

disclaimer about how poor whites need health care, too, and the remark was part of a speech. The recent comment just said he still wanted to get the votes of guys with Confederate flags on their pick-up trucks, and this time there was no disclaimer and those words weren't embedded in a lot of other verbiage.

There's certainly nothing wrong with saying he wants the votes of whites who have been voting Republican but bringing the Confederate flag into it shows very poor judgement. He screwed up again tonight by talking about Jesse Jackson going to South Carolina and talking to people in trailer parks, most of them whites making under $26,000. You can call it a trailer park if you live there, but others had best refer to mobile home communities. Southerners, whether poor or not, know and resent the stereotypes of Southerners all living in trailer parks and driving pick-up trucks, as if there were no trailer parks or pick-up trucks outside the South!

Dean's unwillingness to apologize to those he offended (blacks and Southerners) and his stubborn refusal to admit that he has been wrong to continue using this phrase remind me and others entirely too much of a certain other former governor, now a squatter in the White House. He should listen to Al Sharpton and John Edwards on this. Even though they're scoring points off him, they're also telling him how to save his political ass. (I'm referring only to what Sharpton and Edwards said at tonight's debate, not anything they or Kerry said at any other time since I haven't read all their comments.)