I think the story was ostensibly written to draw a bit of sympathy for Sen. Lieberman. It basically concluded that he only found his comfort level at the very end of the primary and, after personal tragedies and failures, was morphing back to the Old Joe.
I think that's what I found so irksome...it's always about Joe.
I am pretty sure I know why Joe Lieberman lost and why I can't see him staying in the party. It's much more than the fact that he supports George Bush on the war. It's the total lack of respect he displays to those of us who are anti-war. That is his unpardonable sin.
Here's an especially illuminating passage from Lightman's report:
But by fall 2005, Lieberman had become even more vocal about Iraq, and those longtime friends tried to advise him to keep quieter, or at least emphasize his other work.
Instead, Lieberman returned from a trip to Iraq and seemed more alone than ever in his party. He detailed his views in a Wall Street Journal op-ed piece, and a few days later, President Bush quoted his Democratic friend extensively in a highly publicized speech.
The old friends called and visited and pleaded with him to trot out his Democratic bona fides. Churn out press releases, they said, make a major speech - anything to cement the idea in the public mind that he voted against Bush on nearly everything else. Stress your Democratic loyalty on other issues, they urged.
Instead, said one friend, "We saw a level of righteous indignation. You can call it hubris, or you can call it simply someone who believes in what he's doing." But he thought he was right on Iraq, "and that was that," the friend said.
It was more than Lieberman thinking he was right on Iraq, it was his using the dirty GOP tactics of questioning the patriotism of those who are anti-war. It was his public assumption that anyone who questioned the competence or tactics of George Bush was only doing so for partisan reasons....that it was somehow un-American.
Lightman writes:
The old Joe seemed to be back. Certainly the moral side was there. "He truly believes in public service, and truly believes things have become too partisan," said Riddle. "He believes it in his bones and in his core."
I think Mr. Lieberman has his priorities misplaced.
What he still doesn't understand is that there is no bipartisanship because the voice of the Democrats have been entirely shut down in Washington. The GOP controls the whole ballgame and, at a minimum, half the country have been silenced and cowed into invisibility. Lieberman's buddies have allowed no investigations to go forward, no room to debate.
The Senator from Connecticut doesn't want bipartisanship, he wants people to accept our presence in Iraq because he feels it's valid. In the face of everything we now know about what got us in, the lies and deception, and what keeps us there, sitting ducks in a civil war, Joe thinks we should just shut up and get behind George Bush in lockstep.
While more blood is shed, and money sucked out of the economy, with each passing day.
That's not bipartisanship Mr. Lieberman, it's insanity.
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