**Throughout his 11 years as governor of Vermont, an office he held longer than anyone else in this century, Dean was unafraid to speak out for equal right of all people. He signed the first Civil Unions legislation in the nation in Vermont, guaranteeing homosexual couples the same rights as heterosexuals. Despite the measures initial unpopularity (35% in the polls), Dean nonetheless went on to win reelection by 12%.
**Using his experience as a medical doctor, Dean implemented universal health insurance for all children in Vermont and raised insurance rates among adults to 92%, even though Vermont is only 26th in income among the states in the US.
**Despite having no Constitutional obligation to do so, Governor Dean balanced the budget all 11 years that he was in office. No Republican President has balanced a federal budget in over 30 years.
**Deans proposed plan for Universal Health Care is affordable and does not require a radical change to our current health care system. His record of insuring every child in Vermont shows that he has the experience to make his plan work on the national level.
Facts courtesy of Benjamin Lauderdale and Gregory Elinson, Harvard University.
**Dean instituted early childhood intervention programs in Vermont that succeeded in lowering child abuse in the state by 40% and child sexual abuse by 70%.
As you can see, Howard Dean has a view of America that benefits everyone, not only the wealthy corporate elite: the ones who benefited the most from the Bu$h tax cut. Deans intensity and passion have propelled him to holding the status of one of the major contenders in the Democratic nomination for President. While at this point any of the current candidates would be a large improvement over the current President, the rest of the candidates seem to lack something that Howard Dean has: the will to fight back against Bu$h's atrocious domestic and foreign policies. This year alone Bu$h has cut funding for veterans, and the Head Start educational program, and used those funds to pay for his tax cut and his seventy five billion dollar war in Iraq. Howard Dean is putting the fight back into many disgruntled Democrats who have seen their representatives time and time again vote for the PATRIOT Act, and authorize force against Iraq. He is the one to lead America back from the murky leadership of the Bu$h junta, to restore it to its former glory as a leader of the free world, and to rule by tolerance instead of by fear or bigotry. Howard Dean in '04!!
