- ‹ previous
- 142 of 2822
- next ›
The Danger of Purging
The Wall Street Journal editorial board is pretty happy that conservative activists have taught the "GOP's backroom boys" a lesson by forcing moderate Republican Dede Scozzafava out of the NY-23 congressional race in favor of right-wing darling Doug Hoffman. No surprise there. However, they also offer a warning:
But that lesson will be for naught if conservatives conclude that their victory is reason to challenge any candidate who doesn’t agree with them on every issue....Democrats did themselves no favors by driving Joe Lieberman out of their party, and conservatives will do their cause no good by forcing GOP candidates in Illinois, California and Connecticut to sound like Tom DeLay. If conservatives now revolt against every GOP candidate who disagrees with them on trade, immigration or abortion, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid will keep their majorities for a very long time.
I sort of hate to admit this, but they're right about Lieberman. It would have been great to get rid of him — and it was worth a try in a liberal state like Connecticut — but in the end all it did was make him even more embittered and more estranged from the party than before. As a result, he's now loudly making the rounds of cable news shows promising to vote against cloture on any healthcare bill that includes a public option. As near as I can tell, this isn't motivated by any ideological objection to the public option at all. It's motivated mostly by fact that he's still pissed off about how he was treated in 2006. If he'd been left alone and had won reelection as a Democrat, he'd probably be going along with the Democratic leadership on this with no real complaints.
You can't win 'em all, I guess. And it was worth a try. But there's also a price to pay when you don't judge the chances of success with quite enough of a gimlet eye.
UPDATE: Sorry, I meant 2006, not 2008. Time sure flies, doesn't it? I've corrected the text.
Check your year
"It's motivated mostly by fact that he's still pissed off about how he was treated in 2008."
Or, 2006.
Or ...
Iowa telling him to go pound sand in 2004 ... that's where it really started
Lieberman is still a senator
Lieberman is still a senator only because the Boys in the Back Room stood behind their colleague despite him being tossed by the CT democrats. Somehow it doesn't sound equivalent to me.
CORRECTION
Liebermann was defeated in the Democratic Primary by N. Lamont in '06. So, any animus from that is three years old. & any animus from '08? Well, he was actively campaigning from WALNUTS!, & quite honestly, mouthing a slightly softened version of SaPa's patter. So, no, no reason to be upset with Dems angry over that.
doubtful
If Lieberman had not been challenged in 2006, it is likely he would be much more militant. Being challenged marginalized Lieberman the war senator, leaving him a weak obstructionist.
Yea, the difference is that
Yea, the difference is that Lieberman was backed by the party in his primary, and would've been backed in the general campaign if he'd beat Lamont. It's considerablly different then this case, where multiple GOP bigwigs threw the local parties chosen candidate under the bus in their rush to prove their tea-party bonifides.
Jiminy Christmas.
Jiminy Christmas. Lieberman's not motivated by ideology or intraparty pique.
He's motivated by home state business interests (Aetna) and campaign contributions:
Yes, this is the obviously
Yes, this is the obviously true answer.
But people like to make all world events about THEMSELVES. So they feel that Lieberman is motivated out of a desire to infuriate them (read: Democrats).
Fair Shot
I would note that when we talk about the chances of knocking off Lieberman, that he really had to resort to some extraordinary tactics to save his seat. Lieberman got beat in the Democratic primary, formed his own political party and ran as a third party and won. Pretty extra-ordinary. It was only a quirk in Connecticut election law and the fact that the GOP ran an utter nobody that he was able to get back in. By normal rules of politics, Lieberman got beat and should have lost his seat.
Self-fulfilling prophecy
Lieberman won re-election in '06 because several prominent members of the Democratic establishment offered tepid endorsements of the Democratic candidate or sat out of the race entirely. The party should have closed ranks behind Lamont; instead, Harry Reid announced that Lieberman would retain his seniority, Obama's endorsement of Lamont was a perfunctory paragraph, and the national party left Connecticut Democrats -- and their nominee -- twisting in the wind.
If congressional Democrats weren't afraid of their own shadow, they'd have embraced a gift-wrapped opportunity to replace the least reliable member of their caucus; instead, they kowtowed to beltway wisdom that says Democrats must repeatedly prove they're not "too liberal" for "conservative America" while the GOP routinely elects foaming-at-the-mouth wingbats who'd raise eyebrows at a John Birch Society convention.
It's also hard to say that Joe "it's all about meeee!" Lieberman wouldn't still be exactly where he is today (i.e., making the rounds of cable news and threatening to derail Democratic legislation) even if CT Dems hadn't lapsed into heresy; it's not as though Lieberman was a model Democrat prior to '06. NY-23's Dede Scozzafava, on the other hand, had paid her dues and been a good little GOP soldier, right up to the point where the GOP's Palin-Beck wing stepped in and bankrolled a third-party candidate.
The Democrats fucked
The Democrats fucked themselves in the ass by electing Harry Reid, not by jizzing on Joe Lieberman. But they probably got just what they wanted.
Lieberman an Embarassment
Isn't he proving the Dems were right to try to get rid of him?
Yeah, I disagree. Lieberman
Yeah, I disagree. Lieberman wasn't treated shoddily by any of the establishment Democrats. or the establishment money. After he campaigned for the Republican nominee in 2008, he didn't even get a slap on the wrist! Lieberman is just a jerk, and we were right to try and get rid of him in '06. And if the Democratic Party had backed its actualfax candidate, we probably could have.
Lamont won the Democrats.
Lamont won the Democrats. Lieberman won the Republicans.
No, they Miss the Point
The radicals in the Republican party want it to be a small and marginal party, because they know that eventually, the populace will tire of the Democrats, as a nations people always succumb to the desire to throw the bums out, and when that happens, they anticipate implementing their agenda with unified unthinking fervor.
They are taking the long view, that they can destroy^h^h^h^h^h^h^h irrevocably change this country in 2-4 years once their turn comes.
WTF
Kevin, you're saying there was a time when Lieberman wasn't a treacherous, back-stabbing weasel? I find that hard to believe.
There is a lesson in the
There is a lesson in the Connecticut 2006 primary. Omar, from the Wire, (and Machiavelli) said it best: "When you come at the king, you best not miss."
You probably should have told Democrats
in the Senate that before they endorsed Lieberman and gave Lamont no support...
you reap what you sow...
Yup, Joe Lieberman sure
Yup, Joe Lieberman sure wasn't out there going against Democrats before Lamont challenged him. That crazy Ned Lamont, just out there making a fuss for nothing.
I must have dreamed Joe Lieberman kissing George Bush and supporting the war and being a nuisance ever since he got dissed in the 2004 primary.
Kevin, is this snark?
Lieberman was never a Dem
He's always been in the Connecticut for Lieberman party, he just used to pretend to be a Democrat to have fewer opponents on election day.
I don't suppose Kevin remembers Unholy Joe's performance during the Lewinsky brouhaha, or his pathetic performance as Gore's running mate (and his wholehearted abandonment of the effort to let Florida voters have their ballots counted fairly). That's the only reason Kevin could possibly have for believing that crap about Lieberman only having a beef because of the '06 election.
And I blame each and every idiot in Connecticut who voted for the bastard for the situration we're in. Lieberman is a shit, and has always been a shit, and should have been scraped off the nation's shoes before he could track in even more shit.
You left out that he's
You left out that he's Jewish, but we get your point.
Not the OP, but...
Pretty sure you missed it, actually.
You're serious?
You're serious?
Yes, he's serious. That's
Yes, he's serious. That's how many Jews are. Any attack on any Jew is always motivated by antisemitism.
Goldstone should detail
Goldstone should detail Lieberman's support for Israel's Gaza massacre and press to have him indicted for war crimes by an international court.
The only thing Lieberman understands
...is a beat-down. Just like every other right-wing demagogue. He was handed one in 2006, and played ball. He got off scot-free in 2008, and look at what he have. Harry Reid needs to strip Lieberman of committee chair and seniority yesterday. Then he'd be a good little doggie and do as he's told. If you're nice to him, not so much.
1) He's always been a
1) He's always been a self-absorbed politician who loves the attention of being the swing vote.
2) He went insane about foreign policy following 911
3) He lost the frickin primary to another moderate democrat. Yeah he was embittered. He was embittered immediately. I was in Connecticut. I realized it. He didn't lose my vote in the primary. He lost my vote for his reaction to the primary. The rest of Connecticut should have seen it to.
I'd call it "the danger of electing an embittered politician".
Kevin Are You Insane?
Kevin, your claim that Lieberman was ok until Lamont beat him is as stupid as your initial support for the Iraq war.
All this
All this talk of the Repub establishment (yuo know - Democrats lite) feeling purged completely ignores two facts:
The GOP establishment has always sought to marginalize and purge actual conservatives- they are the true exclusionists.
The GOP nominated and ran a center-left candidate last time for POTUS. How did that work out?- And both Bush's were not conservatives - Bush Sr won solely on the basis that he was the VP of one of the great Presidents of all time and Jr won because of the disgust with Clinton and the ineptitude of Gore.
McCain...center left?
only if you think the middle is represented by someone so ludicrously right-fringe like Virginia Foxx.
Reminded
Why is it that Hoffman's picture makes me think of this guy?
How he was treated?
As when the Democrat citizens of CT in a primary decided they were fed up with his lying and treachery and gave him the boot? You mean how the democratic process he was subject to rejected his horrible record? Now his massive narcissism is still not assuaged even after he was welcomed back into a leadership role in the Senate and further even after his egregious betrayal the Democrats and his disgraceful behavior during the 2008 campaign. This mentally ill and harmful person needs to be ostracized completely from decent society, even in the relative decency of the world of politics. He's an insect, a weevil. He's beneath contempt.
Wrong, Kevin. *If only* the
Wrong, Kevin. *If only* the Democratic establishment had done the right thing, and closed ranks behind Lamont, we'd have been rid of this cancer called Lieberman. I think Obama, for one, has egg all over his face for supporting Lieberman back then. As does Harry Reid.
Not to mention Obama's reported support for Lieberman keeping his committee chairmanship after campaigning for McCain.
Nobody likes spineless fools. Nobody!