Lieberman - WTF?

[nbcrusader]

And the rules are he can't run as a Democrat. The odds of winning as an independent are slim - but he may have broader appeal statewide among all voters than Lamont.

 

[Bluer White]

Sorry, the people who decided to vote in the democratic primary of CT have spoken. Same result. He agreed to the rules. He lost. He should bow out.

The Connecticut legislature should change the election rules, if that is the will of the people. Lieberman is well within the law as it stands now.

I can see why Lieberman detractors are irritated by him...he did state many times what a loyal Democrat he was, until he lost. But until the rules are changed....

 

[Dreadsox]

If he did not want to abide by the party process he should have declared himself independant and dropped out of the primary.

I wonder, what makes him want to stay in power soooo badly after being a democrat for sooooo long.

 

[sulawesigirl4]

In my not-so-educated opinion, Lieberman is welcome to run as an independent if he wants. But honestly, the whole thing just makes him look like a sorry loser who can't abide the thought that he might lose his seat in Congress. Looks more like immature selfish whiner than altruistic public servant.

 

[Bluer White]

In my not-so-educated opinion, Lieberman is welcome to run as an independent if he wants. But honestly, the whole thing just makes him look like a sorry loser who can't abide the thought that he might lose his seat in Congress. Looks more like immature selfish whiner than altruistic public servant.

I'm glad that you didn't resort to name calling, as a few have. I too think his candidacy is a large part self-interest, how could it not be? A Senate seat is very prestigious.

But also, Lieberman and Lamont have a few very strong differences in policy. I think that many people are discounting the possibility that Lieberman's motivation might have as much to do with *ideas* as it does with selfishness.

 

[deep]

I'll try and reframe from the name calling on Lieberman

It just seems that all this support is from Republicans wanting him possibly be elected to give the GOP votes they will not get from Lamont.

Yes, of course it is legal.

But, think about it, objectively.

In 2004 this guy ran for President in the Dem Primaries,
Why didn't he run as an independent Presidential Candidate
when Kerry won the nomination.

I am sure Rove, and all the people who think it is a great idea now
would have liked it then, too.

This guy wanted to be the standard bearer the DEMOCATIC party against Bush less than TWO YEARS AGO.

How shallow and selfish his motives are now.

If a GOP candidate, say a David Duke, (Klansman) won a primary and the GOP ran an independent because they were sure DUKE would lose
and they wanted a candidate that had a chance, there would not be as much of an out cry.

That is not the case here. His party establishment does not want
/ need him to run. Only the GOP does.

He should just quit the Dem party and run as an independent.
Like Jeffers did. You can't have it both ways.

 

[Bluer White]

In 2004 this guy ran for President in the Dem Primaries,
Why didn't he run as an independent Presidential Candidate
when Kerry won the nomination.

Well, Lieberman didn't have the votes or political machine to realistically win. And his candidacy would have risked Kerry's chances in a tight presidential race. Believe it or not, Lieberman wasn't rooting for Republicans to take the White House.

In this Senate race, he has a good chance to win. And as Anitram pointed out in an earlier post, the Republican nominee is basically a non-factor. So he can run without handing the seat on a silver platter to a Republican.

The dynamics of the situation in Connecticut are much different than the hypotheticals you are throwing out there.

 

[nbcrusader]

I wonder, what makes him want to stay in power soooo badly after being a democrat for sooooo long.

Interns?

 

[deep]

If he did not want to abide by the party process he should have declared himself independant and dropped out of the primary.

.

exactly

we got jeffers and sanders, they run as independents

jesse ventura ran as an independent


it reflects poorly on Lieberman's character to ask for Democratic votes one day
and then the next say to not honor the outcome of that primary vote?


If he runs,
he should do it as an Independent only.

I am sure if the Dems win the Senate 51-49
Cheney and Rove will offer him whatever he wants to vote for the GOP to run the Senate
and Lieberman is already on record
claiming to put the country and support for Bush (in time of war) whatever the f*ck that means,
before the wishes of the people that elect him.

Does anyone wonder why the Rove call
and the Melman support?

 

[Maoilbheannacht]

Sorry, the people who decided to vote in the democratic primary of CT have spoken. Same result. He agreed to the rules. He lost. He should bow out.

Same result? A party primary is simply to nominate who will lead a particular party in a general election. If one loses that, why shouldn't that person be allowed to run in the general election as an independent or even the head of some other party if they let the person? Is it against the law?

 

[Maoilbheannacht]

If a person wants to run as an independent they should start out that way.

Whats wrong with any person who loses the primary for the party that wanted to run with, running as independents in the general election?

Why not let the voters decide in November?

 

[U2DMfan]

Why not let the voters decide in November?

They will.

I don't know what the big stir is, Lieberman has been cooked since he showed his astonishingly bad personality in the 2000 election.

Anyone paying attention to the 2004 Dem. debates, when there were no less than 9 candidates on stage, knew he was in abyssmal shape when he finished no better than 6th in any of the 3 or 4 debates. Nobody gives a shit about him. The Chris Matthews crowd wants to pretend it signifies an anti-war shift and the Reps want to say it show the Dems want to lose the Iraq war, wake up, nobody gives a shit about Lieberman, apparently not even those from Connecticut. He's a non-factor, period.

 

[U2DMfan]

It will be interesting to see polls taken this week. I'm guessing Bush, Republicans and Lieberman all show upsurges in popularity directly linked to raised concerns about terrorism.

Some of you may not like it, but many Americans take the War on Terror seriously, and they will vote this November accordingly.

You are absolutely right and most of them are glad we caught Hussein, the man who brought down the twin towers.

 

[deep]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Joe and the Jews

Our columnist is mystified that so many Jewish voters deserted Sen. Joe Lieberman.


By
Rabbi Marc Gellman
Special to Newsweek



Aug. 11, 2006 - Joe Lieberman did not lose the Democratic primary because of his support for the war in Iraq. He lost because of his lack of support from Jews. Joe got the support of black Baptists (except of course for Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson who stood so conspicuously behind challenger Ned Lamont on election night). He got the support of Catholic Union guys. He got the support of all the Connecticut papers, and he got the support of most Jews, but not at all an overwhelming number of Jews and that is why he lost. He lost because Barbra Streisand's highly publicized contribution to Lamont and because of the number of Jews who hated Bush and the war more than they loved Joe. That's why he lost, and I don't get it.

Please understand, this is not a political rant. Yes, I support the war and yes I support and admire President George W. Bush, but I understand and respect those who have come to another conclusion about how best to fight the war on terror. My disappointment is with my people. I simply do not understand why so many Jews bailed on Joe. I cannot understand why Joe's percentage of the Jewish vote was not in the high 90s instead of the 54-57 percent range (according to Lieberman’s campaign). I have opinions on way too many things I don't know nearly enough about, but I know about Jews. I am a professional Jew, and yet if you asked me to explain why Jews did not vote for Joe the way blacks voted for Barack Obama or Catholics voted for John F. Kennedy I would not know what to tell you.

In truth I am also bewildered about why Jews do not support President Bush more than the pathetic 22-26 percent (depending on which exit poll you look at) he received in 2004. Bush would win a landslide in Israel, and never once invited Yasir Arafat to the White House, but that is a bewilderment best left for another day. What has frozen me is the lack of support for Joe by Jews. Joe voted the Democratic line 90 percent of the time. Twenty-nine other Democrats also voted for the war and none of them was targeted (yet). Joe is the most famous Jewish politician of all time (unless you count former New York City Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia whose mother was Jewish). He is an observant Jew and obviously he was on the presidential ticket in 2000. He is modest and self effacing. He is moral and faithful. He is principled and intelligent ... and he is one of us! What more do you want of the guy?

So he supports the war. So what? The actual difference between intelligent people's positions on the war in Iraq is between those who know we must leave eventually but do not want to embolden our enemies and weaken our friends by telling them when we will leave, and those who also know we will leave eventually and also do not want to set an arbitrary timetable, but who really, really, really want everybody to know that we will be leaving. Those who want to bring all the troops home by next Monday, and those who want to “nuke the bastards” are both nuts. So among reasonable non-rabid people, the differences over Iraq are just not that big. And for this we dumped Joe? It just makes no sense to me and it ought to be a huge embarrassment to all card-carrying Jews whether they agreed with Joe or not.


There are and have always been only two kinds of Jews: tribal Jews and cosmopolitan Jews. Tribal Jews love anything Jewish. Cosmopolitan Jews love anything but Jewish. Tribal Jews are not trying to pass, assimilate or deny their tribal roots, their attachment to Israel and their love of other Jews no matter who they are. Cosmopolitan Jews are trying to pass and assimilate and become an undifferentiated member of the majority culture. The problem with tribal Jews is that they have trouble loving non-Jews. The problem with cosmopolitan Jews is that they have trouble loving other Jews. The reason for this split is you are Jewish by blood and not by belief. Judaism, which is the religion of Jews, has many wonderful beliefs but you can reject them all and still be Jewish.

I learned this distinction from the men of the Western Shvitz. One day a tribal Jewish friend took me to a shvitz on Western Avenue in Chicago. A shvitz (there are hardly any of them left) is a place where heterosexual Jewish men used to go to sit in a searingly hot steam room, get hit with soapy oak-leaf clusters called pleitzas, eat herring and black bread with red pop, play cards and tell jokes. I was really beaten down that day. I had been unsuccessfully trying to raise money for Israel from an assortment of cosmopolitan university Jews, each of whom had some phony but articulate reason why they would be intellectually compromised if they gave me a dollar for Israel.

The men of the Western Schvitz were street guys. Most had money but none of them had a Volvo or had read Kant or Hegel or listened to The Dead or smoked dope. I had done all those things but they still let me into the schvitz because I was, after all, Jewish and a rabbi. I told them of my problems raising money for Israel and they laughed at me the way wise guys laugh at someone who has no clue. When I returned home that night I felt something in my jacket. It was an envelope filled with cash for Israel and a note that read, “From the guys at the Western Schvitz, Stick with your tribe.” Joe Lieberman lost because the guys I met at the Western Schvitz do not live in Connecticut.


My best friend is a priest, so I have to explain Jews to Christians all the time. Usually it is easy and fun. Because Joe lost, it's no longer easy and it's no longer fun.

 

[verte76]

You are absolutely right and most of them are glad we caught Hussein, the man who brought down the twin towers.

Excuse me, but Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11. Bush wants us to believe he did but he and bin Laden have lost no love on each other.

 

[BVS]

You are absolutely right and most of them are glad we caught Hussein, the man who brought down the twin towers.

Been drinking?

 

[nbcrusader]

it reflects poorly on Lieberman's character to ask for Democratic votes one day
and then the next say to not honor the outcome of that primary vote?

He is honoring the outcome by not running as a Democrat. Lieberman is not running for a seat only representing Democrats, but all of the people of CT.

Speaking of independents, what did you think of Ross Perot’s entry in the ’92 presidential race?

 

[Dreadsox]

Speaking of independents, what did you think of Ross Perot’s entry in the ’92 presidential race?

refresh my memory....did he not get his party nomination at a convention?

Or did he run as an independent?

 

[nbcrusader]

I thought Lieberman is running as an independent (just like Perot).

 

[Irvine511]

I thought Lieberman is running as an independent (just like Perot).

when did Perot lose the Democratic Primary to Bill Clinton?

 

[nbcrusader]

Does that matter? I asked for thoughts regarding Perot.

 

[deep]

I thought Lieberman is running as an independent (just like Perot).

looks like you thought wrong

"For the sake of our state, our country and my party," he went on, "I cannot and will not let that result stand," and therefore he was going to run as an "independent Democrat" in the general election in November.
What Lieberman neglected to add was that he was doing so for the sake of Joe Lieberman. His decision to undercut the man who beat him fair and square in the primary, political neophyte Ned Lamont, was a thumb to his nose at the 52 percent of Connecticut Democratic voters who said they didn't want him representing them anymore.
The next day, Lieberman added insult to injury by taking a shot at the primary system itself, saying he preferred to be judged by all Connecticut voters, not just his fellow Democrats. If that was the case, why didn't he just skip his party's primary and run as an independent in November?
The reason, obviously, was that when the contest started, the polls had him miles ahead and Lamont a total political unknown. Lieberman didn't dream, surprisingly, that his conspicuous support of President Bush and the war in Iraq, hugely unpopular in his liberal home state, would be such an anchor around his neck that a Democratic nobody could beat him.

just like Perot?

Perot did not run as an "independent Democrat"

didn't he run as a member of the "Reform Party"?


btw, Perot did not put Clinton in the Whitehouse as many GOP claim

the country knew very well who and what GHW Bush offered. They had 8 years of him as Reagan's VP and 4 years of him as president. Perot votes were a no on GHW Bush.


and I am reframing from name calling on Joe Lieberman

but I have the lowest opinion possible of him.

 

[Dreadsox]

Does that matter? I asked for thoughts regarding Perot.

Well, it matters in the sense that Perot ran as an independant PERIOD. He did not play to one party or another, lose the nomination and then run as an independant.

I was a Ross Perot supporter in 1992 and in 1996.

I thought he was a good thing at the time.

 

[nbcrusader]

Let's look at it this way. If Lieberman and Lamont ran against each other in a state-wide election, who do you think would win?

Perot bought his way into a Presidential election. I'm not sure that dropping large party support to run as an independent is necessarily worse.

 

[deep]

Bush Refuses to Back GOP Candidate

White House Press Secretary Tony Snow said this morning that President Bush will not endorse Connecticut U.S. Senate candidate Alan Schlesinger (R) over Sen. Joe Lieberman even though he's the Republican nominee.

Update: Tom Swan, Ned Lamont's (D) campaign manager, responds: "It is not surprising that Joe remains Bush’s favorite Senator, he is looking to run the exact same campaign that Bush did in 2004. Fortunately, the voters of Connecticut were smart enough to reject it then and we are confident they will again. It is alarming to see how far Joe will go, undermining every candidate across the country from his former party, to cling to his spot in Washington."

 

[nbcrusader]

Is Lamont running simply as the "anti-Bush" or does he have is own platform and ideas?

 

[Macfistowannabe]

yeah right

you are a hard core conservative

and Irvine is fearing for the Republican party

the truth is
both of you are hoping the party, you don't support, is not successful




5 more reasons why Lieberman sucks

why is it that only Republicans are lamenting his defeat?

You might consider me "hardcore." Fine. But today's Democratic Party has scored a ZERO in diversity of thought.

The party of JFK was respectable in spite of its flaws. You didn't have to be a socialist to be a Democrat back then. Hell, you could even believe in national sovereignty.

Would I still care if they were in power even if they had a plan for the war? Obviously. But the fact is they are baffled on the issue, and the only thing they agree on is that victory would only make the Republican Party look good.

The Republicans see Leiberman as a common sense outcast who, while not a conservative, is not a neutral-minded politician.

 

[BVS]

You didn't have to be a socialist to be a Democrat back then.

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=2314440&page=2

Clinton also discussed Sen. Joe Lieberman's loss in Connecticut's Democratic primary last week to anti-war liberal Ned Lamont.

Lieberman has characterized his loss — and the need for his subsequent independent run — as liberals in the party purging those with the Lieberman-Clinton position of progressiveness in domestic politics and strong national security credentials.

"Well, if I were Joe and I was running as an independent, that's what I'd say, too," Clinton said.

"But that's not quite right. That is, there were almost no Democrats who agreed with his position, which was, 'I want to attack Iraq whether or not they have weapons of mass destruction.'"

"His position is the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld position, which was, 'Does it matter if they have weapons? None of this matters. … This is a big, important priority, and 9/11 gives us the way of attacking and deposing Saddam.'"

Clinton said that a vote for Lamont was not, as Lieberman had implied, a vote against the country's security.



he continues on the next page

 

[Dreadsox]

[Q]"Well, if I were Joe and I was running as an independent, that's what I'd say, too," Clinton said.

"But that's not quite right. That is, there were almost no Democrats who agreed with his position, which was, 'I want to attack Iraq whether or not they have weapons of mass destruction.'"
[/Q[

Sounds like Hillary's position too....which is why she will not win the nomination.