Affirmative Action Past May Hurt Democrats

<http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=694&ncid=703&e=5&u=/ap/20031031/ap_on_el_pr/democrats_affirmative_action>

36 minutes ago

By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Howard Dean (news - web sites) is the latest Democrat to catch heat for changing statements on affirmative action, but he isn't the only one.

snip> Sharpton criticized Lieberman during the 2000 election, when the Connecticut senator was the Democratic vice presidential nominee. Although he supports affirmative action now, in 1995 Lieberman supported a California ballot measure that would have barred the state from awarding jobs or contracts based on racial preferences


snip> Three years earlier, John Kerry (news - web sites) expressed similar concerns about affirmative action creating reverse discrimination. In a speech at Yale University, Kerry said he supports affirmative action, which he lauded for opening doors for women, creating a black middle class and diversifying campuses, but he said the policy had costs as well as benefits.







the last snip is what is important: "Certainly these past statements create some doubt, but the question is what are the candidates committed to doing today?"

Come voting time voters have nothing but your record to judge ye.

From what I recall, Kerry wanted language changed to specifically describe it in legal terms, so the Republicans could no longer use the ginned up argument about quotas.

is just one of those things that always needs changing.

if, by "changing" you mean you'd stop considering race and gender.

and got in a heated debate on one of his quotes about this. I like Kerry, but, honestly, he didn't come off well. His argument was that he "bracketed" the incriminating comment with two other positive comments about AA. It wasn't a cool way to explain this issue.

that says he opposes the use of race as a factor. It quotes Kerry as saying that the "reverse discrimination" that sometimes occurred before Clinton's revised AA should be dealt with because it weakens the programs political support. Kerry never said AA shouldn't use race as a factor, the way Dean and Lieberman did.

the Kerry quote in that article seems out of place with the others.

and providing more specific legal terms so the GOP couldn't twist the policy any longer, using it as a political wedge.