Joe Lieberman Hardly Repentant On "Meet The Press"

Joe isn't going

It is no secret that this blog, and other progressive blogs, have been clamoring for Joe Lieberman's ouster from the Democratic caucus.

Today on Meet The Press, Senator Lieberman was very eager to put his betrayal of Democrats behind him. Unfortunately, the closest he came to an apology was saying that there were statements he made that he regretted saying. He did not say what those statements were.

In fact, Lieberman was indicating that his removal from a committee that he had served on for 20 years wasn't even a reprimand. But in the alternate reality world of McCain/Palin and friends, truth was never high on the list of GOP priorities.

Lieberman's unpardonable sin

I could have forgiven Lieberman, had he merely supported and praised his friend John McCain. We all know he wanted to run with him. What is unforgiveable was his decision to speak at the GOP convention and make the comments he made about Obama, both at the convention and on the campaign trail.

We may be stuck with Lieberman for now, as President-elect Obama attempts to unite the country, and with the Democrats within very close range of possessing a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.

But I will not forget. And I will be watching his performance during the next 4 years.

I did find it encouraging that Obama will at least let Lieberman stew on something. He has apparently not responded to a direct call from Lieberman, leaving the job of contacting him to surrogates.

The Katrina parallel

Interestingly, Lieberman once again adopted a let's move forward posture on something that made him personally uncomfortable.

As was once pointed out at Think Progress, he made much of the same arguments in the investigation of the Bush Administration's handling of Hurricane Katrina.

Examining the errors of Katrina, according to Lieberman, was playing "gotcha" politics. He wanted to ignore what had been done and, as he put it, move forward. In other words, no one need take resposibility.

I don't recall that being Lieberman's mantra when it came to former President Clinton and Monica Lewinsky.

Meet The Press Video

Here is the latter 2/3 of the Joe Lieberman interview. I could not find the first third of the interview posted on You Tube, but it really should be seen. You can access the first part of the interview directly from the MSNBC site. Details below.



For the first part of the Lieberman video, point your browser here. Click on the November 23rd netcast and select the video that says "Lieberman: We must unite behind Obama."

It requires the viewing of a 30-second commercial.