The End for Weepin'Joe?

[kent_allard_jr]

It's gonna be close, but so far it looks like Ned Lamont will beat Joe Lieberman for the Democratic nomination. I didn't like Lieberman when he beat Lowell Weicker in 1988, and like him even less today, so I'm happy to see him lose. On the other hand... The Republicans will make Lieberman a cause celebré (a role Lieberman will be all too happy to fill) and they'll make the Martyrdom of Holy Joe an issue in November. The Lamont campaign may have also sucked up resources that could've been spent taking back the House of Representatives. I'll be happy to be proven wrong, of course.

Comments

[doc-mystery.livejournal.com]

I see this as a test for the support the American public have for the war in Iraq (ie. much less than before), with voter voting for principles not personality.

If a Democrat anti-war candidate wins now (as it seems most likely looking at the numbers so far), it suggest that November could be a bloodbath with other Republican incumbants frantically trying to save their seats.

I noted with great interest that voter turn-out in Conn. was close to *double* that of previous nomination races, and many unregistered voters joined the Democratic Party in order to vote today.

::B::

P.S. Besides, today's (likely) winner shares the first name of your alternate pulp alter-ego; how could he lose?

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

Ahah! It's one of the Shadow's clever disguises! How could we miss that? :)

I suspect many of those new Democrats are Republicans who came to save Holy Joe's butt. I don't know for sure, though.

[jlc.livejournal.com]

What resources do you feel Lamont's campaign sucked up?

Hot air and utter senselessness from inside-the-beltway Democrat pundits? Uh...

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

Money

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

"The big pool of money" idea as Duncan Black dismisses it. No national Democratic party money went to the race, obviously, though I'm sure some PACs contributed. However, Lieberman ran his campaign on the cheap until right at the end, when it was too late to do any good. I donated to the Lamont campaign; I've never donated to another state's senatorial primary before, and I don't think I was unique. It won't affect my other spending--in fact, backing a winner in such an obviously righteous cause makes me more likely to spend more, because I feel like there's a reason for once. So that's money that simply wasn't there before.

[barking-iguana.livejournal.com]

I think each cycle, the most publicly egregious undecutter of the party should be singled out for a massive primary challenge. Just picking one will have marvelous effects on everybody who diesn't want to be the next one standing when the music stops.

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

Maybe. I'll wait to see if he wins the general election as an independent. If so, it could be a huge loss to the party...

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

Lieberman damaged the anti-Bush effort by being a Democrat who gave bipartisan cover to the neocons. There were a few issues on which Lieberman was a better Democrat than Lincoln Chafee, though not many, but the damage he caused by being Bush's fig leaf of bipartisanship and the scold of the left vastly outweighed those few little gestures towards liberalism. The party and the nation will be better regardless of who wins that seat in November, even if it's the no-longer-Democratic Joenertia.

[greenbaron.livejournal.com]

It is interesting that Dick Morris comapred this scenario to the 1980 NY Senate election when Al D'Amato ousted liberal Republican Jacob Javitz (his voting record was similar to Edward Brooke's who was to the left of Tsongas).

According to one Joey ad, Lamont was called Lowell Weicker's bear cub and presumed to be like Weicker in potential voting record (Weicker came to prominence as an anti-war, anti-LBJ Republican), but I doubt Kos would back a fiscally conservative dove.

In what I see as good news, but heavily unrelated, Cynthia McKinney is also out in Georgia, and surprisingly she didn't blame her favorite scapegoat.

What is kind of funny about the issue of Liberman is that Nebraksa's Senator Ben Nelson is much more conservative (aside from the issue of the Iraq war, Lieberman is pretty liberal), but I guess the Democrats know that Nelson is the best they can get in Nebraksa as some Republicans relaize Chafee is the best they can get in Rhode Island.

Also, the ghost of Tom Delay haunts his district as his name cannot be removed from the ballot.

The Connecticut Senate race will be a fun one, now. Joe Lieberman with all the excitement of Al Gore on valium vs Ned the WASP with a creepy stare vs Alan Gold/Schlesinger, the Gambling Man :)

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

Liberal bloggers often compare Ben Nelson to Joe Lieberman, and they claim there's a difference: Ben Nelson hasn't made a habit of going out of his way to attack his fellow Democrats. I don't know enough about Nelson to know if this is true.

[greenbaron.livejournal.com]

As far as I know, he hasn't. I do know his voting record is that of a conservative Democrat. Lieberman has amuch more liberal voting record, but he can engage in conservative rhetoric, kind of like the late Senator Moynihan.

Chuck Hagel is the other Nebraska Senator and he votes about like John McCain. Both are conservative, but don't tout the party line as much. Alan Simpson had a very moderate voting record, but was very partisan so he would be assumed to be conservative, while much more conservative Bob Dole appeared moderate.

Another example is in the House with Gene Taylor and Jim Traficant. Taylor is a classical conservative southern Democrat (and an alum of my HS) and probably the most conservative Democrat in Congress, while Traficant was more virtriolic, though I thought his "beam me up" speeches were a riot, but not as conservative.

[barking-iguana.livejournal.com]

Kos is not especially liberal. A lot of the other particiapnts there are very liberal, but Kos himself is populist but probably to the right of the party's center of gravity.

[greenbaron.livejournal.com]

Well I guess it is about image, then. I always pegged Kos to be more left-wing. I haven't heard him talk about anything beyond Iraq. Of course, ideologically I am a libertarian. My fondness for bowties shows muy conservative side while my views on gay rights and choice are more liberal, but the same is true of Barry Goldwater, except about the bowties.