Sunday, July 30, 2006

Fuck Lieberman

Granted, this op-ed, and much of the support for Ned Lamont, is clearly more of a negative vote against Lieberman than it is an endorsement for Lamont (who, frankly, I know nothing about). Nonetheless, Lieberman has been a douche. As the NYT says, he's been an enabler. Bi-partisanship is a two-way street, and the Republican party of the past, oh, decade have gone out of their way to exclude the opposition and ram through their own agenda. Being a patsy for that effort is much, much different than reaching across the aisle. After all, show me one reciprocal piece of legislation that Lieberman got in exchange for his kow-towing.

The Democratic party needs new blood willing to actually stand up to the Republican majority and, moreover, offer a concrete and coherent alternative. And that's not Lieberman.
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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

If you don't like Lieberman because you don't like what he believes and/or you think he's personally a Bad Man, great. Vote for "the other guy" (who I actually don't have an issue with, believe it or not).

If you're voting against Lieberman because he's not falling in line with Democratic Army, well, that's your right too but it's just pretty damn sad. There's always the complaining that there's too much infighting and posturing and trying to get reelected in Congress than there is anything actually getting done. But when someone stands for what he believes in, he's a "patsy" for the Others and should be replaced with someone with fresh powder.

Even the whole notion of bipartisanship, in this case, smacks of the same "us vs. them" that's supposed to be counterproductive in policymaking. So is Lieberman's main problem that he didn't keep quiet about his thoughts on the war until he could, I dunno, get Republicans to back higher gas mileage standards? That, instead of the usual Congressional horse trading where he could have gotten some pieces of silver for his thoughts, he opened his mouth and said, "We should stand by the president in wartime. Period."? Maybe he just wanted the love from some of that 32% of the polling public that still likes the job the president is doing....

Like I've said, Lieberman vs. Lamont could very well be a good fight on its merits. But if Democrats just need someone to toe the party line (which, last I checked, is still the "We're Not Republicans!" refrain), there should be a list of patsies willing to fill the part. It's just sad that everyone's stopped caring more about what a person's saying than who else is saying the same thing.

7:49 AM
Nick said...

Let me rephrase. One of two things is true:

1) Lieberman believes in the things he's saying a la ousting Hussein was a good idea, the Geneva conventions are "quaint," Gonzales is a good guy, etc., in which case his current claims to adherence of Democratic party ideals (assume for a moment they actually exist) are complete horse shit, and he is ideologically more a Republican than a Democrat (and, even if that's not true, his stances are such that, one way or another, he's helping to promote the agenda of the far right), or:

2) his credentials as a non-right winger _are_ valid, in which case he a) could have fooled me, and b)has been a despicable patsy for the administration and his attempts at "finding a middle ground" have resulted in giving away resistence and condemnation of totally fucked up policies (not to mention fodder for cynical claims by Republicans of bipartisanship) in exchange for, as far as I can tell, absolutely nothing.

Either way, he's bad for both the country and the Democratic party.

2:22 PM

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