Joe Liebermann is paying the price for playing the lice in the Bush. Democratic activists and other leftists have denounced him roundly and soundly to the point that he now faces a serious challenge for his partys primary to retain his seat as Senator from Conneticutt. The challenger, one Ned Lamont, is running mainly as an anti-war candidate, and to the ire of Liebermann, the Joementum toward New Mexico was put into reversal a couple of nights ago due to the urgent need to face the challenger in a debate.
It was classic Liebermann, all at once petulant, arrogant, yet at the same time whiny and ingratiating. He knows he might be in serious trouble, for there's a chance he could lose to Lamont, who by all accounts ran as if he were the incumbent, knowledgeable and dignified.
It's of concern to the Democratic Party as a whole. Chuck Schumer, the Senior Senator from New York, is on record as saying that he will support Liebermann, even should he run as an independent against Lamont in the general election. Most Democrats say they will support whoever wins the primary, out of respect for the wishes of the Connecticutt party members. At the same time,however, they vow to support Liebermann in the primaries. Certain of them, such as Barbara Boxer of California, and Joe Biden, from Delaware, have caught a lot of heat for supporting Liebermann even to this extent.
Still, they are in a bind. If Liebermann follows through on his vow to run as an idependent if he fails to secure the party nomination-and he has begun a petition drive to do just that in the event-he could conceivably win the election. If he wins in that manner, the Democrats would of course hope he would continue to caucus with them, though at the same time they have to realzie that as an independent, he might have more of a free hand than ever to be just that-totally independent. And the party who retains power in the Congress could easily have the biggest pull on his loyalty, for the good of his state. This would be all the more ironic in that he could be responsible for the Repubicans retaining majority status in the Senate, if he does run as an independent and thus splits the Democratic vote.
He could make the claim that he was being targeted for elimination by the leftist elements of his own party, and that might be slightly justified. By the same token, the degree of support Lamont has gained from the liberal wing of the Democratic voters is indicative of the fact that Liebermanns Joementum has just been leaning too heavily for the right for quite some time, and to far too great a degree for them to feel comfortable with or good about.
There is a reason after all that Ann Coulter has gone on record as supporting Liebermann, even going so far as to advise him to become a Republican. The worse thing she has said about him lately is that if he were to do that, "he wouldnt be our best Republican".
And the facts are Liebermann is as he claims in many ways a traditionalist liberal Democrat. He is pro-choice, pro-civil and gay rights, pro-environment and pro-labor, if but moderately so.
My main bitch at him isn't his votes on Homeland Security, which he originally co-authored, or on the Iraqi War, or the "War on Terror". His votes along those lines were not so different from most Democrats, who also voted for these things, before they, of course, voted against them. Lieebermann at least has been consistent. No, my main bitch at him is his vote on issues like the bankruptcy bill, and his pandering to the religous elements of society, something I find personally abhorent.
That, and his conduct in the 2000 Presidential campaign,when he ran for Vice-Preisdent. If I didn't know better I'd swear that Liebermann was sitting there besides Cheney during this "debate", and all the while jacking him off under the table. He just comes across as ingratiating, as even servile, in the effort to exude a positive appearrance. If he had lived in Germany during Nazi times, Goebbels could have used him as two different characters in his propoganda films, as one character the arrogant, scheming Zionist Jew out for his own welfare at the expense of everything and everybody else, in another the servile, ingratiating type of Jew that would eaily colaborate with the Nazis as a way of saving his own neck.
And while that might seem extreme, it's worth pointing out that Connecticutt is not only Liebermanns home state, it is also the home state of the Presidents father, the former Preisident, George H. W. Bush. Who knows what shadowy connections the two of them might share? Connecticutt is an old money state, where family heritage goes back many years, and is deeply ingrained in the fabric of the society.
And if there is one thing that can bring Democrats and Republicans together, it's money.
