The Discerning Texan
All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
-- Edmund Burke
-- Edmund Burke
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
HUGE: Is Lieberman about to put on a Red Jersey?
The New Yorker is no conservative rag. And its recent article on Joe Lieberman is--to say the least--eye opening.
It appears to come down to this: if the Dems show signs of defunding the War, Lieberman may jump. Don't believe me? Just see Lieberman's own words as quoted in the New Yorker article (h/t to Captain Ed):
Then, of course, there is Lieberman. He was the lead Democratic co-sponsor of the 2002 Senate resolution authorizing the war, and seems to have had no second thoughts. Indeed, it is difficult to locate a Republican who is quite as sunny about Iraq’s future as Joe Lieberman is. Even McCain, who supports the President’s new plan, is openly frustrated with the Administration’s prosecution of the war, and has been especially critical of Vice-President Dick Cheney; Lieberman won’t criticize anyone involved but the comprehensively discredited former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Iraq is the reason that Lieberman calls himself an “independent Democrat.” Democratic voters in Connecticut abandoned him in last year’s primary, favoring the antiwar candidate Ned Lamont. Lieberman ran as an independent, and beat the ineffectual Lamont in the general election in large part because Republicans voted for him. In the campaign, Lieberman said that he would join the Democratic caucus if elected, and his victory was the deciding one that gave the Democrats control of the Senate. But he told me recently that his attachment to the Party is based in some measure on sentiment, and should not necessarily be thought of as eternal.
“A lot of Democrats are essentially pacifists and somewhat isolationist,” he told me. He had particular problems with Senator Edward Kennedy’s proposal to deny the President funding for a troop surge, and with an idea recently raised by the senior senator from Connecticut, Christopher Dodd, to cap the number of American soldiers in Iraq. Lieberman was not willing to say whether he would remain a Democrat if the Party cut off funding for the war. “That would be stunning to me,” he said. “And very hurtful. And I’d be deeply affected by it. Let’s put it that way.”
It appears to come down to this: if the Dems show signs of defunding the War, Lieberman may jump. Don't believe me? Just see Lieberman's own words as quoted in the New Yorker article (h/t to Captain Ed):
Then, of course, there is Lieberman. He was the lead Democratic co-sponsor of the 2002 Senate resolution authorizing the war, and seems to have had no second thoughts. Indeed, it is difficult to locate a Republican who is quite as sunny about Iraq’s future as Joe Lieberman is. Even McCain, who supports the President’s new plan, is openly frustrated with the Administration’s prosecution of the war, and has been especially critical of Vice-President Dick Cheney; Lieberman won’t criticize anyone involved but the comprehensively discredited former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Iraq is the reason that Lieberman calls himself an “independent Democrat.” Democratic voters in Connecticut abandoned him in last year’s primary, favoring the antiwar candidate Ned Lamont. Lieberman ran as an independent, and beat the ineffectual Lamont in the general election in large part because Republicans voted for him. In the campaign, Lieberman said that he would join the Democratic caucus if elected, and his victory was the deciding one that gave the Democrats control of the Senate. But he told me recently that his attachment to the Party is based in some measure on sentiment, and should not necessarily be thought of as eternal.
“A lot of Democrats are essentially pacifists and somewhat isolationist,” he told me. He had particular problems with Senator Edward Kennedy’s proposal to deny the President funding for a troop surge, and with an idea recently raised by the senior senator from Connecticut, Christopher Dodd, to cap the number of American soldiers in Iraq. Lieberman was not willing to say whether he would remain a Democrat if the Party cut off funding for the war. “That would be stunning to me,” he said. “And very hurtful. And I’d be deeply affected by it. Let’s put it that way.”
Labels: Democrat, Joseph Lieberman, US Politics, War strategy
