Oh, how the mighty have fallen. The New York Observer has details.
That game, however, has ceased to work. In years past – 2004 and 2002, say – a public association with Mr. Lieberman was helpful to Democrats, a reassurance to a more hawkish electorate that they were as “tough” as the G.O.P. But in 2007, embracing Mr. Lieberman’s intransigence is a decided political liability – evidenced most startlingly by a recent poll that found that even 58 percent of Republicans in Iowa want a troop withdrawal in the next six months. When, as he did on Sunday, Mr. Lieberman uses a national television interview to dust off old attacks on the Democratic Party’s foreign policy credentials while at the same time actually declaring that “the surge is working,” it only benefits his former party’s standing with the war-wary public. There are few, if any Democrats, quaking at his threat to endorse a Republican in ’08.
Similarly, his prospective defection to the Senate G.O.P. seems less likely now – again because of Iraq. One after another, the Senate’s moderate Republicans are now making a break from the Iraq policy championed by the Bush administration and Mr. Lieberman. By September, it seems more and more likely, the President will either take the hint and reduce troop levels or watch as those fed up Republicans side with the Democrats to impose a withdrawal timetable. Indeed, Mr. Lieberman’s interview was preceded with a clip of Senator Richard Lugar’s time-to-junk-the surge floor speech last week. If Mr. Lieberman were to flip to the Senate G.O.P. now, he’d probably still be surrounded by colleagues intent on ending the war.
I’m not surprised. For all the crowing about the power Lieberman supposedly gained last November it never actually materialized. He does seem to get more TV time now but who is really listening? Lieberman repeats his usual sound bites and the public collectively yawns.
Last year the Connecticut GOP chose to align themselves with Lieberman, as well as many prominent Democrats around the state. How many of of Joe’s local supporters will continue to go down with his sinking ship?
H/T to Colin McEnroe.
Source.
Kornacki, Steve. “Altitude Drops For Lieberman the Hawk“. New York Observer. 7/02/07
DC is carved out of Maryland (they’re on the same side of the Potomac). The fed could try giving DC back to...
4 responses so far ↓
I would hope now that Joe has moved to Stamford, and he must be getting to enjoy the agony of Ffld Co.’s traffic first-hand, maybe, just maybe we could get some federal help for our own “Bid Dig”-like project. Couldn’t he make some excuse that it was needed for a potential emergency evacuation of NYC?
For more good news from the Lieberhaters, see here: http://blogs.courant.com/colin_mcenroe_to_wit/2007/07/the-unbearable-.html, and here: http://hartfordimc.org/blog/2007/07/05/liebermans-dual-citizenship/
Just can’t get enough of this stuff.
Pesci, if you’re happy with Lieberman please continue to embrace Joe.
Most of us Americans start freaking out when we see stuff in the Wall Street Journal like this:
“Iran’s Proxy War”
By Joseph Lieberman
Earlier this week, the U.S. military made public new and disturbing information about the proxy war that Iran is waging against American soldiers and our allies in Iraq.
According to Brig. Gen. Kevin Bergner, the U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad, the Iranian government has been using the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah to train and organize Iraqi extremists, who are responsible in turn for the murder of American service members.
Gen. Bergner also revealed that the Quds Force — a special unit of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps whose mission is to finance, arm and equip foreign Islamist terrorist movements…
ps– The dual citizenship charges are offensive, and being made by Greens and not Dems. I’m sure Lieberman, in his own screwed up head, is doing what he thinks is best for America. The tragedy is that he has made Israel so much less safe. Iran is the winner of our Iraq occupation.
TrueBlue
I’m not happy with anything Trueblue and congratulate you on joining me in condemning Lieberman’s grosser critics. The truth about the jihadists is a little more complicated than Lieberman’s critics know.
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