So, not to rudely wipe my muddy boots on the welcome rug here at my new digs, but I meant to note this a couple days ago, when Andrew
said of Joe Lieberman:
Lieberman, from his scripted talking points on drilling for oil to his
endorsement of the Hilton-Spears ads, is now a Republican party hack.
In the end, the netroots drove him over the cliff, didn't they?
Probably not. Lieberman as "Republican party hack" is a new role, but Lieberman as acquisitive opportunist isn't. As Rick Hertzberg wrote, (now that I'm a blogger at the Atlantic, do I get to call that dude Rick? Hmm. Probably better that I play my position.) Ahem. As
Hendrik Hertzberg
wrote in 2006, lots of senators looked just like Joe Lieberman on paper, but only Joe was facing an insurrection:
If what we have here is an inquisition (not the mot juste, perhaps, to
describe a primary), then the only heretic who has anything to worry
about is named Joe. Lieberman's views are broadly similar to those of
such colleagues as Diane Feinstein and Ben Nelson, and nobody's trying
to burn them at the stake. As for Lieberman's party credentials, they
seem to be in reasonably good order. He is a three-term Democratic
senator from a state, Connecticut, that's as blue as a state can be
while still being the spawning ground of the Bush dynasty; six years
ago, he was the Democratic Party's nominee for Vice-President, an
unusual honor for a fake Democrat; he has the support of the
A.F.L.-C.I.O., naral, and the League of
Conservation Voters.
What really exposed Lieberman to the brunt of liberal outrage was the sense that Joe was, first and foremost, out to get his. Hertzberg recalls Lieberman's "pompous performance" at the height of impeachment mania, his unwillingness to give up his Senate seat while running with Al Gore and, of course, his rhetoric on Iraq:
"Lieberman's problem is not that he supported the Iraq invasion, nor
that he thinks we need to stay in and finish the job," Suzanne Nossel,
a young ex-State Department official and a fellow at a think tank
called the Security and Peace Initiative, wrote the other day. "He has
lots of mainstream Democratic company in both those positions. The crux
of Lieberman's problem is his unwillingness to acknowledge the severity
of what's happened in Iraq, and to demand accountability for it."
Joe Lieberman isn't anyone's victim. He was caught in a political trap when the Iraq War didn't go the way of Desert Storm. He made it worse by pretending that Iraq War actually was Desert Storm. Now he's doing what he can to salvage some semblance of a political future. Therein we have one more reason to support Obama: the start of an Obama administration would likely mean the end of Joe Lieberman.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
I agree absolutely that Lieberman is even more smarmily narcissistic than your average senator, which is saying a lot. But part of that narcissism is that he really, really, really believes that he's right, and that his right opinions are also very, very important.
He's not an insincere warmonger or moralist-tut-tutter. He's very sincere about both. Which makes him much worse than a cynical opportunist.
Living in CT, I think the more widepsread outrage against Lieberman began after he, and his amen chorus in Washington, essentially started questioning anyone's right to oppose him. Many of us, probably a majority of CT Democrats, were already fed up with his Holy Joe act but at least initially were willing to cut him some slack on Iraq et al, along the lines you mention regarding Feinstein and Nelson.
But what made me want to puke, and decide he really had to go, was his response to those who weren't ready to cut him slack. Basically Joe took the view "This is my position, and you have an obligation to vote for me so as not to punish me for my taking this very principled position." And then the DC media hacktocracy attacked the public for trying to steal Joe's property (aka a seat in the Senate representing the voters of CT): we had no right to want such a principled courageous man to go, it was Joe's seat.
The guy's fucking myopia and self-love are matched only by Hollywood types who can't believe that anyone gives them a bad review and stays away at the box office when they try something new.
And this rotten stew bulit up and pretty soon a lot of CT Democratic voters said, "time to go, Joe." It wasn't just Iraq, it wasn't just some of the other votes, it wasn't just the self-righteousness, it was the fact that this guy thought that we owed him, that the Senate seat was his, nor our's. He became a walking endorsement for term limits.
Ta-Nehisi:
Ben Nelson isn't primaried because it's unlikely someone more liberal than him can get elected from Nebraska(though Scott Kleeb is trying this fall). DiFi's problem is the cost of running in a state as expensive as California. Just look at the only Republican rumored to be even running against Barbara Boxer in 2010. It shows how money is such an issue with such a large state and the number of expensive media markets they have. Besides, Lamont funded his primary campaign with a large amount of his own money, not to mention the Republican candidate in 2006 wasn't even supported by his party.
lieberman deserves the antipathy he has generated, but it's hard to deny that for a man whose narcissism is so pronounced, being made public enemy number 1 by the "netroots" has made him even more disgusting.
various senators have their specialties - mcconnell is a sleazeball, brownback is an idiot, etc. - and lieberman's is that he is the senator you most want to punch in the nose. and he's proud of it.
personally, i'd have thrown him out of the dem caucus already and lived with the loss of majority status....
Ben Nelson may be the most conservative Democratic Senator, but he doesn't make a habit of going on TV and burning the Democratic Party. If anything, he drove Democrats "over a cliff" through 10 years of being a jackass:
Again, that's at least 10 years of this stuff.
Joe started his career as one of Nader's Raiders, ran the Connecticut Citizen's Action Committee, and has supported traditional lefty positions in the Senate on everything from the environment to abortion rights to civil rights to labor unions.
John Kerry virtually laughed off the question about kicking him out of the caucus on Meet the Press Sunday, which was about the same response as all serious Democrats.
The idiotic, self-destructive Lamonster phenomenon was all about the nutroots, and Lamont's self-financing. There are probably still people posting here who really believe Joe said we shouldn't criticize Bush in spite of the fact that he did so himself quite a bit. What Joe actually said was "Democrats attempting to undermine the credibility of the President in time of war do so at their, and the nation's, peril", which is objectively true.
Mr. C.
I don't think that Leiberman is the first politician to fall so in love with Washington that he forgets where he came from.
It seems to be a common disease.
With regards to the last section of your post I have a question. When you say that
"He (Lieberman) was caught in a political trap when the Iraq War didn't go the way of Desert Storm. He made it worse by pretending that Iraq War actually was Desert Storm."
I have often wondered if opposition to the Iraq war is based on principle or based upon the fact that the Bush Administration's policy isn't working and hasn't really worked since the looting started in 2003. I don't know where the anti-war camp stands and I am curious. For myself I believe that Saddam was another in a long line of brutal Dictators ideologically akin to Ahmed Khutib (He wrote In the Shade of the Koran) and needed to be removed. However I also believe it probably would have been best to wait until Afghanistan was cleaned up rather than invade Iraq and leave both countries up chocolate creek without a popsicle stick. Would someone explain to me whether Lieberman is being faulted for suppoting the war or for supporting a war that isn't going well?
robert, Lieberman rose to the Senate on the shoulders of that noted lefty troublemaker William F. Buckley. Lieberman devoted a few paragraphs of his long, gushing remembrance of Buckley, published in the National Review, to detailing Buckley's role in that Senate race. Here's some of what Lieberman says:
That unnamed "incumbent senator" was, of course, Lowell Weicker, one of the last Liberal Republicans remaining in DC after the Reagan firestorm blew in, and someone who had played a key role in ousting Nixon from office.
It's hard to tell 2 decades down the road what Lieberman's campaign focused on. This NYT article about a Lieberman-Weicker debate summarizes pretty predictable stuff -- accusations about Weicker's attendance record in the Senate; each candidate accusing the other of raising taxes; disagreement over supporting Bush or Dukakis. The one substantive issue mentioned that sticks out is this:
Lieberman was a hawk who was only too happy to be used by the right wing as a convenient tool for purging the GOP of one of the last national leaders of its moderate, non-looney faction. I'm assuming he knew that this was what was going on. He may just have been narcissistically clueless about Buckley's real motives.
From supporting the invasion of Grenada, to shepherding the Iraq Liberation Act on the Hill in 1998, to his current role as an advocate more war in Iraq and a new war on Iran, he's always been a self-righteous, militaristic asshole who relied on lots of GOP support when the chips were down. His utterly dishonest campaign against Lamont ("no one wants to end the war in Iraq more than I do") was just par for the course.
Opportunist, yes, but Lieberman's right-wings views on foreign policy and censorship are what led him to be called a GOP hack. I blogged about it briefly
Sorn wonders: "Would someone explain to me whether Lieberman is being faulted for suppoting the war or for supporting a war that isn't going well?"
He's faulted for both, of course. Those of us who opposed the war from the beginning could possibly forgive him if he had admitted his idiotic mistake at some point.
And while Saddam was everything you say he was, why did the United States have the right or the duty to invade a country which was no threat to us in order to remove him? There's a reason the war was sold to the public via lies and constant allusions to 9/11 - it could not have been sold otherwise. Liebushman still supports the lies, and he's telling more lies trying to force a war with Iran. He is either insane or evil or both, and that's why he's despised.
Moe
I understand the point that there were those (such as yourself) who opposed the war from the beginning. While I take issue with your side of the debate mainly because the first Gulf War never really ended. We have to wonder how long ONW and OSW could have continued. While your answer may answer for yourself and those of like mind what about those who supported the war in the begining and slowly turned away?
Would it make a difference for the support of the war (Hypothetically) if the strategy had been different and the invasion of Iraq really had lead to a secularized democracy in a region where it is sorely needed?
Is supporting a war contigent on its success? I am still unsure wether people dislike the war or dislike the war going badly.
Sorn writes: "Would it make a difference for the support of the war (Hypothetically) if the strategy had been different and the invasion of Iraq really had lead to a secularized democracy in a region where it is sorely needed?"
There was never a chance that this was going to happen. The Bushpigs told us we'd be welcomed with candy and flowers and that it would all be over with quickly and cheaply. Who exactly was stupid enough to believe that, given the realities of the region?
Iraq is now a LESS secularized place. There are about 2 million people displaced by the war - what happens when they (or significant numbers of them) want to return?
It's silly to pose a hypothetical question that has no basis in reality. Would the war have more support if all Iraqis were now peace-loving agnostics? Well, sure, but it's a silly question, akin to asking if you'd see skunk on a lot of menus if skunks didn't stink and tasted like chicken.
Ta Nehisi - I haven't read anything by you before so I thought I would give you a try. Based on this posting, I'm not sure I'll be back.
I live in Connecticut. There is nothing that Obama can do about Lieberman, whether or not Obama becomes president. If the Democrats win enough seats in the Senate, then they will no longer need Lieberman and they will kick him out of his chairmanship and dare him to switch parties. If they still need Lieberman, they won't do that. Obama has absolutely nothing to do with it.
As for why the Dems turned on Lieberman, well, you'd have to be a forensic psychiatrist to figure that one out. He's an extremely reliable Democratic vote on every domestic issue. His only blasphemy against the Democratic catechism was on the Iraq War. Why the Dems turned on him (and him alone) for that is beyond me. Like I said, that requires medical expertise to explain.
I was there and I saw and heard the firsthand reports of how warmly we we welcomed after the overthrow of Saddam and before the start of the looting.
The shift came shortly after the fall of the government (for a good reportage of this using unclass sources read James Fallow's Blind into Baghdad) when the policy transformed itself into hunting Former Regime Elements and the Fedayeen Saddam instead of stabilizing the populace and maintaining order. My contention is that the current mess was created because of a lack of ground forces to properly maintain order, and a lack of foresight on the part of the Administration in seeing the problems which the intelligence community had already forecast and tried to make the administration aware of.
So the questioon I posed to you is not entirely hypothetical.
The war could vary well have gone much differently than it did had the administration merely listened to the collective wisdom of the Intelligence community which had spent the previous 10 years familiarizing with Iraq mainly because of ONW and OSW.
DBL must be a Republican: "As for why the Dems turned on Lieberman, well, you'd have to be a forensic psychiatrist to figure that one out. He's an extremely reliable Democratic vote on every domestic issue. His only blasphemy against the Democratic catechism was on the Iraq War. Why the Dems turned on him (and him alone) for that is beyond me. Like I said, that requires medical expertise to explain."
No, it just requires a basic understanding of how American democracy works. The Democratic primary voters of Connecticut found Liebushman's unwavering support of a filthy war to be sufficently vile to get him defeated in the primary. He then rejected his old party and ran against its nominee. How should Democrats react to this, exactly - by kissing the traitor on the lips?
And now the slimy little creep is one of the most public faces of the McCain campaign. It's some sort of surprise that Dems want him gone? I suppose so, if you just arrived in this country from, say, Neptune.
I have a post in moderation (too long? too many links?) answering some of the "Why pick on Lieberman?" questions. Primarily, he's always been a militaristic hawk; he owes his Senate seat largely to William F. Buckley and the New Right's desire to purge the GOP of sane, Liberal Republicans like Lowell Weicker, whom he defeated to win his Senate seat in 1988; and he was not only pro-war, but enthusiastically pro-war even as early as his 1998 leadership on the so-called Iraq Liberation Act.
He's made a triumphantly militaristic foreign policy his main calling-card in American politics (well, that and moralistic finger-wagging). He can't complain about making that his big cause, and then being held accountable when his cause is proven to have such disastrous consequences -- consequences which many of us foresaw, and warned the country about.
People were and still are furious about this war, and it was obvious that Lieberman would continue supporting it and would go on to support more and more wars in the future -- as he has gone on to do in the case of Iraq.
And DBL, "the Dems" didn't turn on Lieberman -- registered Democrats in Connecticut decided to nominate Lamont to take his place in 2006. The Dems in DC pretty much all lined up behind Lieberman's Independent run, despite the fact that their own party had another candidate who'd won the primary fair and square.
Sorn writes: "I was there and I saw and heard the firsthand reports of how warmly we we welcomed after the overthrow of Saddam and before the start of the looting."
Oh, every last Iraqi in the country welcomed you, huh? Get real. Half the country was busy trying to get as many weapons as possible because they knew what was coming. Anyone with any sense did. We knew that the rosy scenarios being painted by the Bushpigs were a joke. A few Iraqis waving at you in the beginning is about as meaningless an anecdote as I can think of.
"The war could vary well have gone much differently than it did had the administration merely listened to the collective wisdom of the Intelligence community which had spent the previous 10 years familiarizing with Iraq mainly because of ONW and OSW."
All you had to do to know that they weren't listening was to pay attention to what they were saying. That wasn't hard. They were unanimously crowing about what a cheap and easy cakewalk it would be - and how the flowing oil would soon make it an enterprise which would pay for itself.
Mission Accomplished!
Lieberman is doubling down. If McCain doesn't win Joe's political career is over. Yes, he can get a job on Fox, but he'll never get re-elected in '12 after what he's done, so his only hope is a cabinet position in the McCain admin.
Mr. Dave,
Sen. Lieberman is highly unlikely to run for re-election when his term expires, no matter who wins the White House. That has given him the freedom to say what he believes, even if it pisses you off.
DBL says: "That has given him the freedom to say what he believes, even if it pisses you off."
Of course his popularity in Connecticut is going completely down the tubes, but it's not like he gives two shits about his constituents, anyway. He's too busy playing Dick Cheney's remora fish on TV.
"He's an extremely reliable Democratic vote on every domestic issue."
Except for things like freedom of speech and other civil liberties.
Part of the problem with Lieberman is that he doesn't seem to understand that people can respectfully disagree with him on policy and still be serious. I disagree with Dianne Feinstein on a lot, yet I still respect her. Lieberman has anointed himself the chief justice of seriousness even when his foreign policy proposals are utopian swill. Add in the fact that he repeats GOP talking points as a way to keep himself on camera just to further his own ego quest and it's easy to see why he is so hated.
reality man beats me to it: lieberman is not a "reliable" vote on a number of issues in addition to his neo-con views.
but the argument for throwing him out of the caucus, as noted above. is that he uses his position to actively undermine the democratic party, not merely to cast oppositional votes.
meanwhile, can it really be that there are people like sorn still out there? the gap between saddam's military defeat and the start of the looting was hours in length....
howard points out: "can it really be that there are people like sorn still out there? the gap between saddam's military defeat and the start of the looting was hours in length...."
Exactly.
"Here's what we'll do. You take your mother and the kids and go throw flowers at the Americans and cheer. We'll be busy raiding the ammo dumps that the idiots have left unguarded."
That depended upon where you were in the grand scheme of things cetain areas were peacefull longer than others. We invaded in March, were at Biap in April, and the major looting and rioting didn't start until the middle/end of May. Unless you have some information that I don't know about.
My memory is probably a little faulty but that is how I remember it.
Your memory is a lot faulty, Sorn. I guess having "been there" doesn't count for much at all.
Rumsfeld's famous "stuff happens" quote about looting was reported on April 12th. Here's an article that might also help jog your memory:
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/mariner/20030414.html
And it kept getting worse:
http://ciderpresshill.com/blogs/ciderpress/comments/criminally_negligent/
This was a war begun by corrupt, evil morons and run by thieving idiots. There was never a chance it would work out to be anything but a disaster.
Might the fact that Lieberman frequently frames issues in the context of their effects on Israel rather than their effects on the United States have to do with anything? Particularly in the wake of Mearsheimer and Walt? Lieberman doesn't even try to hedge, and feeds into the old dirty accusation that Jews aren't patriotic Americans.
"Acquisitive opportunist"?
What does acquisitive mean here? I think it means "skinny". Maybe "arrogant".
I'm sure that some of your best friends are skinny. But that's a strange word choice.