Dick Gephardt Totally Explained

Everything about Dick Gephardt totally explained

Richard Andrew "Dick" Gephardt (born January 31, 1941) is senior counsel at the global law firm DLA Piper, an active consultant for Goldman Sachs, and a former prominent American politician of the Democratic Party. Gephardt served as a U.S. Representative from Missouri from January 3, 1977, until January 3, 2005, and Minority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003. Previously, from 1989 to 1995 he was Majority Leader. He also ran twice for Democratic nomination for President of the United States (in 1988 and 2004), but these attempts were unsuccessful (in 1988 he lost to Michael Dukakis, and in 2004 to John Kerry). He was also mentioned as a possible Vice Presidential nominee in 1988, 1992, 2000 and 2004, and is a possible nominee in 2008.

Early life

Gephardt was born into a working-class family in St. Louis, Missouri to Louis Andrew Gephardt, a Teamster milkman, and Loreen Estelle Cassell; part of his ancestry is German. He graduated from the former Southwest High School in 1958. Gephardt is an Eagle Scout and recipient of the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award from the Boy Scouts of America. He earned his B.S. at Northwestern University in 1962 where he was a member of Beta Theta Pi and earned his J.D. at the University of Michigan Law School in 1965.
In 1965, he was admitted to the Missouri bar. He then entered the Missouri Air National Guard, where he served until 1971.
He and his wife Jane have three grown children, Matt, Katie, and Chrissy. His brother, Donald L. Gephardt, is the Dean of The College of Fine and Performing Arts at Rowan University in Glassboro, New Jersey.

Political career

He was Democratic committeeman for the 14th ward in St. Louis between 1968 and 1971, moving up to 14th ward alderman 1971–1976, as part of a group of young aldermen known informally as "The Young Turks." He was elected as a Democrat to the 95th succeeding Congress, and was repeatedly re-elected until he chose to not to run for re-election in 2004.
Gephardt was an unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic nomination in the 1988 presidential election. Gephardt ran hard and early in 1987/88 and finally started moving ahead in Iowa after running an the "Hyundai ad" that criticized what he thought were unfair trade barriers by Korea and Japan. Gephardt won the Iowa caucuses and South Dakota primary in February, but ran out of money and dropped out after losing badly in the March "Super Tuesday" primaries, when he won only the Missouri primary. An ad aired by the campaign of Governor Michael Dukakis focussed on Gephardt's "flip-flopping" voting record, and showed a Gephardt look-alike doing forward and backward flips for the camera. Many felt that the ad killed any chance Gephardt had of winning the nomination. He dropped out after winning only 13% in the Michigan caucus, despite support from the United Auto Workers. Dukakis did consider picking Gephardt to be his running mate, but he instead chose Texas Senator Lloyd Bentsen.
Gephardt again found himself under consideration when Vice President Al Gore named Gephardt to his short list of possible vice presidential candidates in 2000. The other names listed on the short list were Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, then-North Carolina Senator John Edwards, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman, and New Hampshire Governor Jeanne Shaheen. (External Link

) Gore eventually selected Lieberman.
Gephardt was Democratic leader in the House from 1989 to 2003, serving as majority leader from 1989 to 1995 (101st through 103rd Congresses) and minority leader from 1995 to 2003 (104th through 107th Congresses). He was considered a keen politician who worked hard at passing legislation as well as raising money for Democratic House candidates. Although Gephardt worked hard for many of President Bill Clinton's programs, he and his union supporters strongly opposed NAFTA and other "free trade" programs.

2004 campaign for President

second run for President on January 5, 2003. His successor as Minority Leader, Nancy Pelosi, endorsed his bid for president. Gephardt was seen by many as too old fashioned and unelectable, with his fundraising efforts behind that of former Vermont Governor Howard Dean and Senators John Kerry, John Edwards, and tied with Joe Lieberman. Furthermore, Gephardt's support of the Iraq War resolution hurt him among liberal activists. Gephardt promoted a form of universal health care, and was supported by a dozen labor unions, but didn't have enough support to receive the endorsement of the AFL-CIO.
Although Gephardt was ahead in the Iowa caucus throughout early 2003, Vermont Governor Howard Dean pulled ahead in the polls by August, his campaign fueled by anti-war activists. The Gephardt campaign was embarrassed by an early August St Louis Post-Dispatch article that revealed that 11 of 33 "Gephardt team leaders" listed on his Iowa campaign's web site were actually supporting other candidates or neutral. The race between Gephardt and Dean became negative, and took an ugly turn in October when a Gephardt staffer reportedley pushed a Dean staffer out of a meeting while calling him a "faggot". Dean chairman Joe Trippi (who had previously worked for Gephardt in 1988) and Gephardt chairman Steve Murphy became involved in a war of words over that incident. In the final days of the campaign, both Dean and Gephardt faded and finished third and fourth, respectively.
Although he dropped out of the Presidential race, Gephardt was mentioned as a possible running mate for John Kerry. On March 7, 2004, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, seen as a strong possibility for the position himself, endorsed Gephardt for the Vice Presidency. "I think he's the best candidate," Richardson said of Gephardt in an interview with the Associated Press. "There's a good regional balance with Kerry and Gephardt." Nevertheless, Kerry announced that he'd chosen John Edwards as his running mate on July 6, 2004. Interestingly, on that same day, the New York Post published an incorrect headline stating that Gephardt had become Kerry's running mate. Shortly after this false story broke, the headline was compared to the 1948 "Dewey defeats Truman" front page of the Chicago Tribune, which incorrectly reported the presidential election results of that year. In 2007, it was revealed in the book No Excuses: Concessions of a Serial Campaigner by Bob Shrum, who served as Kerry's campaign adviser in the 2004 US presidential election, that Kerry wanted to choose Gephardt as his nominee for Vice President but was convinced by Shrum and others to choose Edwards.

Political views

Since his election to the U.S. House in 1976, Gephardt's political views gradually moved to the left. Originally, Gephardt was strongly anti-abortion and was viewed as a social conservative. He was initially extremely critical of the Supreme Court's landmark Roe vs. Wade ruling that legalized abortion. He wrote on the subject in 1984: � :"Life is the division of human cells, a process that begins with conception. The (Supreme Court's abortion) ruling was unjust, and it's incumbent on the Congress to correct the injustice... I've always been supportive of pro-life legislation. I intend to remain steadfast on this issue.... I believe that the life of the unborn should be protected at all costs."

In 1987, when Gephardt decided to run for president, he announced that he'd discontinued his support for pro-life legislation. He informed the National Right to Life Committee; "I now don't support any Constitutional amendment pertaining to the legality of abortion."
Gephardt's views on economic policy have also changed over the years. He voted for Ronald Reagan's tax cuts in 1981; in the 2000s, however, he became a staunch opponent of similar tax cuts by President George W. Bush, saying that the enormous surplus created during the administration of Bill Clinton should have been spent on health care instead. Gephardt is widely viewed as an economic populist. He supports universal health coverage, fair trade, and progressive taxation. Although he once chaired the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, Gephardt in his later years in Congress distanced himself from the organization, finding his pro-labor views at odds with the DLC's pro-business positions.
On October 10, 2002, Dick Gephardt was among the 81 House Democrats who voted in favor of authorizing the invasion of Iraq. However, three years later Gephardt would rebuke his previous support for the war, saying "It was a mistake ... I was wrong."

Retirement

On January 3, 2005, Gephardt's three-decade political career ended with the expiration of his fourteenth term in the House of Representatives. The Hill reported that Gephardt was close to signing a contract to work for investment banking firm Goldman Sachs. Gephardt joined the international law firm of DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary LLP as Senior Counsel in June 2005.
   In his new capacity as Washington lobbyist, Gephardt, on behalf of the Republic of Turkey, has been actively lobbying against the House resolution regarding the events of 1915 in the Ottoman Empire. Gephardt has been targeted by the Armenian lobby for opposing the resolution that they've spent millions of dollars over the years to promote. He was a supporter of the Armenian resolution while in Congress, and has since been arguing that facts need to better known before any position is taken over this historical controversy.
   Gephardt joined the EMBARQ Corporation Board of Directors in June 2007.
   On July 5, 2007, Gephardt endorsed Hillary Clinton's campaign for president, leading some to speculate that he's interested in running for vice president in 2008. DLA Piper has become a major donor to Clinton's campaign, donating about $190,000.
   A collection of Gephardt's congressional documents, ranging from 1944 to 2004, was processed from 2006 to 2007 by the Missouri Historical Society for academic use, with a grant through the Institute of Museum and Library Services. From 2008 on, it should be made available to the public.

Quotes

� "I never felt it was inevitable that we'd to go to war." — on the invasion of Iraq.

� "It’s a great day for our troops, for this administration, for the people of Iraq. My hope is that this will decrease the violence our troops will have to face." — on the capture of Saddam Hussein.

� "I want to say a special thank you to every member of every labor union in this country who has stood by my side... throughout my career. Your fight is my fight, and it'll always be that way." — conceding defeat after winning no delegates in the Iowa Democratic caucus of 2004.

� "Politics is a substitute for violence." — at the 2004 Missouri Democratic Convention

� "This president is a miserable failure on foreign policy and on the economy and he's got to be replaced." — in a presidential debate on September 4 2003

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