Not missing Joe at all

I was just thinking the other night that I'm so old, I remember when Joe Lieberman was my state Senator. If memory serves, he was always an insufferable prima donna, looking for the limelight. That aside, I don't have much else to say about him but Gail Collins farewell to Holy Joe is worth reading today. It starts like this:

On Wednesday, Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut announced that he won't be a candidate for re-election in 2012. Normally people look particularly appealing when they're promising to go away. This time, not so much.

Seriously, read the rest. It's funny because it's true.

Lieberman leaving the race

I loathe posting unsourced rumors but this one is likely to be true. Joe Liberman is leaving the Senate. He's expected to announce his retirement tomorrow. According to an unnamed person who is close to the Senator, Lieberman "chose to retire rather than risk being defeated."

Don't need to be a soothsayer to see he is in significant danger of defeat. His polling numbers are in the tank and he already has one official opponent. Former Democratic secretary of state Susan Bysiewicz announced her candidacy today. There will be more and the Tea Party Wrestling Woman, Linda McMahon, is said to be toying with running again on the GOP side.

Makes sense for Joe to make a gracious exit and go out on top. In a respectable amount of time he can quietly slip through the revolving door and use his decades worth of contacts to land a corporate job at an obscene salary. Giving up the spotlight will be tough for him I think, but betting he'll make enough money taking corporate welfare for working behind the scenes to take the sting out of it.

Meanwhile, it will be very interesting to see how he handles his last year in office.

HoJo has gotta go

You know I've come to loathe polls. I think they've contributed greatly to the trivializing of our political discourse. I avoid linking them on the premise it only encourages them to do more, but I just can't resist this poll on Joe Lieberman:

A new Public Policy Polling survey finds "there's one thing Democrats, Republicans, and independents in Connecticut agree on: they want this to be Joe Lieberman's last term in the US Senate. Only 24% of voters in the state say they would vote to reelect Lieberman in 2012 to 66% who say they will vote to replace him. Majorities of Democrats (72%), independents (63%), and Republicans (61%) alike say it's time to swap out Lieberman for someone new."

If only they had figured that out in 06, it might have changed a lot of outcomes in the Senate that HoJo screwed up with his prima donna theatrics. Thinking particularly of the Medicare early buy-in that he single-handedly blocked, but better late than never. Much as I hate to take pleasure in other's misfortunes, this is one downfall I'll be happy to see.

JoLie thrilled for GOP comeback

Joe Lieberman. Once a putz, always a putz. He's praising the heavens for a GOP comeback.

There were a lot of people, particularly Democrats, who were declaring after the 2008 election that we were beginning a period of Democratic dominance that would go on for decades," Lieberman told Newsmax. "Now, all of a sudden, the momentum is with the Republicans. And that's — thank God — that's the way people have spoken, you know? That's our democracy."

The senator also said that "everybody should listen" to former Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

Now, aren't you glad the Democrats decided to keep him in the caucus and let him keep his committee assignments? He's been such an asset. Oh wait. I think I added two too many letters to that qualifier.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News]

Lieberman shocked to learn privatization going on at DHS

In today's episode of "Our Senators Are Useless Lumps" Lieberman and Collins hold a presser.

The Department of Homeland Security has more contractors working for it than full-time employees, a situation two members of Congress said Tuesday was "unacceptable, untenable and unsustainable."

Sen. Joseph Lieberman, the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and ranking Republican Susan Collins said they were "astounded" to learn there are more than 200,000 contractor employees at the department.

They just figured this out? Lieberman has been Chair of the Committee since 1/4/07 and the previous chair was -- yes you guessed it -- Susan Collins. Isn't it their job to keep track of what's going on at DHS? They didn't notice until now that the Bush administration was privatizing the agency? Guess Lieberman was too busy calling for hearings on the H1N1 vaccine and killing health care reform to notice sooner.

On the bright side, the Obama administration is already on the case. They have been "actively converting contractor positions to government positions and will continue to build on these efforts at an even more aggressive pace this year." So I guess the point of the presser is to demonstrate how incompetent Lierberman and Collins have been in fulfilling their responsibility to exercise oversight?

[More posts daily at The Detroit News]

Rabbis protest Joe Lieberman

I almost missed this story. The symbolism of seeing Rabbis protest in this candlelight vigil seems pretty significant to me.

STAMFORD -- Quietly holding candles, hundreds of clergymen, congregants and reform advocates lined the sidewalks outside Independent U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman's Stamford home Sunday night in a show of support for universal health care.

"When we heard not only would he vote against it, but he'd use his power, his position as a swing vote ... to block it from coming to a vote, we had to send a message so he knows people who vote overwhelmingly favor the public option," said Rabbi Stephen Fuchs, of Congregation Beth Israel in West Hartford.

The crowd was estimated at 475 which strikes me as a meaningful turnout as well. I sincerely hope that the corporate sellouts in the Senate are going to get their comeuppance at the polls next year. If this level of populist momentum holds, thinking that wish may well come true.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News]

Names and Races

Well as predicted the wingers jumped right on the White House visitor list and leapt to false conclusions. Some are admitting they were pwned, some are insisting the "real" people were there and it's all a conspiracy. I'd note for the record that I did a quick check out of curiousity and discovered there are 59 listings for Malik Shabazz on the internet White Pages and 6 for George Soros. I assume none of those are the "real" Soros. Figuring it's just a matter of time before some hit hungry wingnut starts trying to track down the "real" story and reports the personal details of some hapless American who happens to have a famous name.

Speaking of hapless, I haven't read the interview in the interests of keeping my blood pressure in check, but MoJo runs down 22 things Cheney can't remember about Plame. If only this all would lead to an indictment. But it won't.

In case you missed it, I'm sure you'll be shocked to learn Lieberman sticks the shiv into the Dems again. He will campaign for some Republicans next year and isn't sure he will run for re-election as a Democrat. Which assumes the state party would even want him back. Not that he's suffering in DC for it. His fellow Senators still refuse to call him out for his back-stabbing attention ploys.

On the bright side, for me, only 19% of North Carolina residents think my useless Senator Burr deserves re-election. Think I'll hold the champagne until I see who they think does deserve it though. It could end up being someone even worse.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News]

And now there are four...

This is unexpected. Joining Senators Leahy, Sanders and Dorgan, long time cohort of Joe Lieberman, Sen. Tom Carper, a regional chair of Lieberman's failed 04 bid for the presidency, "said the Connecticut Independent should pay a price for his campaign attacks against President-elect Barack Obama." He told The Hill on Monday,"There need to be consequences, and they cannot be insignificant."

I'm still not that happy with the closed door session, but maybe this won't turn out quite the way I expected after all. I would be very happy to be wrong and see Lieberman pay some meaningful price for his choices.

Update: The Politico posts the scenario for how it will go down and quote "insider Democrats" as giving Joe good odds on keeping the DHS Committee gavel.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News.]

Senate Dems set to screw progressives - again

I think John Cole is right. Much as I appreciate Leahy and Bernie Sanders calling for Lieberman to resign his chair, historically when Leahy fronts for our side with lofty rhetoric, it's a pretty good sign that the Senate 'leadership' is about sell us out. I think they'll let him keep it.

The secret ballot on Tuesday that will decide Joe Lieberman's fate pisses me off. I think they should go on record but I understand how politically delicate that can be and am willing to compromise on that point. I'm even willing to let Joe stay in the caucus, although it's certainly not my preference.

However, if they don't strip him of his gavel on the DHS Committee, it will be too big a betrayal to ignore. Lieberman cast his lot with the GOP two years ago and didn't look back. He actively sought to undermine the Democratic candidate and his public statements about President-elect Obama are unforgiveable. Furthermore he refused to use the power of his chair to exercise oversight over the current administration. He must suffer some consequence in the interests of accountability.

Progressives poured their hearts and their wallets into this election to give the Democrats their majority. To allow Lieberman to carry on as if nothing had happened, especially since we all know had McCain won, Joe would have joined the GOP and never looked back, would not only be a betrayal of the mandate progressives delivered to the Dems, it would be a validation of the GOP tactics that have so divided and ruined this country. Reid and the rest of the Democratic powerbrokers would do well to remember that the knife cuts both ways. What we did to the GOP in 08 can be also be done to the dead wood in our own party in 2010 and beyond.

Update: Of course the 'logic' the insider Democrats will be using is that punishing Lieberman will somehow insult moderate Americans. Glenn debunks that point nicely.

So, to recap: Moderate voters are going to rise up in rebellious outrage if the Democrats don't award a powerful Chairmanship to a Senator who espouses positions which most Americans hate; who spent the last year vigorously campaigning for the political party that, for the second straight election, got crushed; and who is widely disliked even in his own state.

And Jim Henley makes the important point that nobody but us poli-junkies are really going to care. But I would add, we're the ones that cared enough to work the GOTV efforts and pushed back hard on the false narratives. Our contributions made a difference and our influence is still growing. The Democratic establishment ignores that at their own peril.

[More posts daily at The Detroit News.]

Links and coffee

I slept for 11 hours last night so I'm a bit groggy and I have a dentist appointment today that is likely to be long so just a few links to get us started this morning. The first two via Avedon who of course always has much more on the homepage. I also like the Secret Service code names for the Obama family and find Bush's name particularly apt.

And I'm apparently the very last to hear that Krazy Kristol may be losing his prime real estate at the NYT. That would certainly be a gift to journalism.

Moving on, under the heading tone deaf, conservative pundit Michael Barone firmly inserted foot in mouth with this remark.

A roomful of academics erupted in angry boos Tuesday morning after political analyst Michael Barone said journalists trashed Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republicans' vice presidential nominee, because "she did not abort her Down syndrome baby."

Barone said in an e-mail that he "was attempting to be humorous and ... went over the line."

Who in their right mind "jokes" about Down's babies? And speaking of that baby, Barone would have done better to "joke" about how Palin hauled that poor infant around like a sack of flour, shamelessly using him as a stage prop. Not to mention her ruthless exploitation of the youngest daughter Piper. If Palin was a black woman on welfare, DSS would taken those kids away for conduct like that.

And finally Joe Lieberman's fate still hangs in the balance. Steve B reiterates a point I made earlier.

Look, the proposal that's on the table is a "compromise." In fact, for Lieberman, it's a generous compromise. In one side, we have the possibility of kicking Lieberman out of the caucus. On the other side, we have the possibility of doing nothing, effectively rewarding Lieberman's betrayals. In the middle, we have Harry Reid's offer: Lieberman stays with the caucus, keeps his seniority, but gets a different committee to lead. This really isn't complicated. [...]

In other words, what Lieberman is asking for here is special treatment. Worse, he's asking for special treatment he hasn't earned, as evidenced by his awful two-year tenure as the chairman of the committee he wants to keep.

That's the real issue. It's not like he was doing such a great job as Chair of DHS committee. There's no reason he should keep that gavel. I sincerely hope the full caucus also notes as Steve does, that there's plenty of precedent for stripping him of his Chair. Rewarding Holy Joe for his betrayal to the party hardly seems like a good precedent to set.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Lieberman's fate in the hands of the full caucus

There's a lot of speculation about what is going to happen to Joe Lieberman's chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee. The establishment Dems are all over the place from letting bygones be bygones to various degrees of punishment. Of course, I'm already on record as wanting him to be kicked out of the caucus and stripped of his gavel. Obama is wisely staying out of it, as is appropriate now that he's President and no longer a Senator. Meanwhile, Greg Sargent has the latest buzz from inside the Beltway.

In the wake of Obama's statement today that he doesn't hold any "grudges" against Lieberman and his decision not to take a position on whether Lieberman keeps his chairmanship, I emailed a leadership aide to ask whether the vote would definitely go forward. His response:

"Yes -- this is a decision that will be made by the caucus next week. Absent a stunning series of events there will be a vote next week in the caucus on whether to strip Senator Lieberman of the chairmanship."

That would appear to make it official.

This strikes me as the way to go. Joe went really far off the reservation and not only campaigned against Obama but also against down ticket Democratic candidates. It seems just to me that everyone on the caucus should get to vote. I hope it's an open vote and not a secret ballot though, so we can find out where they all stand.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Learning to laugh again

Always nice to start the weekend with something a little lighter. I know you're probably as tired of hearing her name as I am, but this is funny, so here's a clip of Rachel conducting an annotated interview with Sarah Palin.


Rachel on Palin

Bob Geiger's Saturday Funnies are also especially good this week.

And while this article is rather lame and I have to say that Dodd proved to be something of a disappointment in the end, it's always fun to freep a poll. This one asks if Lieberman should be tossed out of the caucus. You'll find it in a box in the middle of the article.

Bonus link: I think it's not too presumptous to finally post this picture.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Just go Joe

Reid and Lieberman had some kind of private confab today. Here's Joe's press statement afterward.



Options? He has options all right. He should opt to not let the door hit him on the way out.

Jane Hamsher tells us he's having a series of meetings with Reid to decide what to do. What's to decide? He should resign his committee gracefully and leave the caucus for his new BFFs in the GOP. Make it official already. He hasn't voted with the Democrats on anything important in literally years.

Why bother with this silly charade? They don't need him if he doesn't come through the votes anyway and if he goes to the GOP then he can be all bi-partisanish when he crosses the aisle to support President Obama's proposals.

It's a simple choice. Joe must go. If you would like to make that clear to the Dems, sign the No More Joe petition.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Too late Joe

Joe Lieberman tries desperately to maintain his slithering hold on his imaginary, co-dependent, bipartisan line, but he's slipping. He admits that Palin wouldn't be ready on day one to step into the presidency. He also takes the opportunity to flick his forked tongue in the direction of the Democrats, assuring us he will work across the aisle for an Obama administration. I liked Kate Phillips' response to that:

While that may be his intent, Mr. Lieberman’s full-throated endorsement of Mr. McCain, his criticisms of the Democratic leadership on the war in Iraq and his extraordinary speech at the Republican National Convention have all but guaranteed that he may be frozen out of a walk-across-the-aisle kinda thing in the next session. Especially since the aisle seems to be tipped more favorably toward a heavier lineup of Democratic desks in the chamber.

Joe also claims that Palin would eventually be ready to step in should something happen to McCain, saying she's smart and a quick study. That's true to some extent. Palin, although she's clearly inarticulate in her interviews, is not stupid. She is smart and learns quickly. The problem is, that she uses her intellect solely to further her ambitions rather than further her knowledge of the world.

[More posts daily at The Newshoggers and The Detroit News.]

Lieberman's last stand?

By Libby

Would have loved to be a fly on the wall for this conversation.

While it was unclear what the two were discussing, the body language suggested that Obama was trying to convince Lieberman of something and his stance appeared slightly intimidating.

Using forceful, but not angry, hand gestures, Obama literally backed up Lieberman against the wall, leaned in very close at times, and appeared to be trying to dominate the conversation, as the two talked over each other in a few instances.

Still, Obama and Lieberman seemed to be trying to keep the back-and-forth congenial as they both patted each other on the back during and after the exchange.

Afterwards, Obama smiled and pointed up at reporters peering over the edge of the press gallery for a better glimpse of their interaction.

Long overdue public spanking of Holy Joe. I can't think of much that would be better for the Democratic party than banishing him from the inner circle.

There's no middle ground in this election and Joe's made his choice clear enough. It's time he either recants his support, or picks up his tin cup and joins his organ grinder McCain on the Bumbling Bus to Oblivion full time.

All's fair in lies and war

by Capt. Fogg


What a great thing it is that Joe Lieberman never found his way into the White House.

"We have to allow the president to allow the toughest measures to be used when there is an imminent threat to our country,"

he said yesterday.

"If we've got somebody that we think can tell us where a nuclear bomb is planted in an American city, then I want the president to be able to authorize that to be used."

Of course that's not the circumstance under which it has been used or is likely to be used and if that were the case an exception would always be made. No victim of US torture whether at Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo or in our secret dungeons anywhere has ever had any remote connection with a nuclear plot and much of the extracted information has been dangerously false.

Lieberman I'm afraid, is just another scare monger and panic pimp for the fascists who have taken over our government. What we have used it for has been to develop a case for having arrested someone. As John Stewart pointed out the other night, we tried and executed Japanese officers who waterboarded prisoners and in fact we did attack Japan and we did nuke them and the torture was done in the name of avoiding their destruction.

It's just another way for pious, Sabbath observing Lieberman to express his sense of America's divine purpose to dominate; a purpose which transcends the morality of the religion he flaunts. It's just another case of his and the administration's opinion that whatever we do is OK because we, like the Japanese and the Germans, are at war. We're at war with anybody we pick up on the street for any reason. We're at war with anyone we say we're at war with and anyone who talked to anyone or might talk to someone or sent an e-mail to his uncle Al Schneider in Al Abama.

Terrorists terrorists! We're at war! and if freedom and justice and sanity and our very humanity gets trampled in the panic, so much the better. Isn't it time we started calling them what they have always been - fascists? Secretly examining all our e-mail, our faxes, our phone calls and torturing us if they "think" we might know something or someone, and punishing us if we object - it's terrorism - It's Fascism what the hell else do you call it? Isn't it time we had the kind of guts Keith Olbermann shows; time to stop being the mewling cowards we're told to be and call them what they are?

Cross posted from Human Voices