Re: Lamont mania

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Maybe Lieberman's PR people should have realized a little earlier that "Holy Joe" wasn't a complimentary nickname?

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I want to make an Oedipus joke here, but I can't decide between Joecasta and Joedipus Tyrannus.

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The only down side is having to read so many "oh, the democrats have really done it to themselves this time!" braying from the rightosphere. Revelation: Republicans and Democrats have different political preferences. It thus stands to reason that Republicans' favorite Democrat wouldn't be so popular among actual Democrats, which would be too obvious to state but for the fact that many people seem to have missed it.

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I hope that the Joeverthrow sends a sharp and pointed message to Hillary Clinton about her presidential ambitions.

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well anyway the man has deserved contempt for a long time, so we can all be forgiven I think for a little Joebloquy.

Plus I actually like Lamont! It works out pretty well.

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you got to lay off the right blogs, FL, if you think that braying is in any way sincere, and not at best just wishful thinking.

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righty blogs, that is.

ok, no more from text.

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Judging from the position she took to Rumsfeld last week, many times reported, she'd already received the message. I was pleased to see it, if it makes her viable and acceptable to me.

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All true. Although I enjoy Joe's lugubrious invocation of the creator.

It's also true that partisan dems AND partisan reps both have different political preferences from normal people. Both these groups are objectively "extremist." The trick is always to try and hide this.

The GOP is making merry because the task of painting the democrats as extremist has been made easier. It is simply stunning to see a sitting senator who was the party's VP candidate bested by a non-entity. That's an unusual result. "Lieberman, not defeatist enough for the Democrats" is a hymn all can sing with gusto. And don't think John McCain won't be humming along when he campaigns for Lieberman...

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sure baa, but the people who will buy the "defeatist" bullshit have alread bought it; many of them are already sending it back as defective. Lieberman is and always has been a black hole of energy suck--regardless of content, he is unpleasant to listen to--and if you want that guy on your side, have at him.

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The GOP is making merry because the task of painting the democrats as extremist has been made easier. It is simply stunning to see a sitting senator who was the party's VP candidate bested by a non-entity. That's an unusual result. "Lieberman, not defeatist enough for the Democrats" is a hymn all can sing with gusto.

As Yglesias pointed out today (with specific reference to McCain and Lieberman), 60% of the country is now extremist cut'n'runners. Assuming that 60% is still, under this Supreme Court, greater than 40%, I think this cuts in our favor. But sing away, and (assuming, propably improperly, that our step-and-fetch-it leadership has seen the light) we'll find out in November.

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I was pleased to see it, if it makes her viable and acceptable to me.

Do I smell biscuits in the oven?

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Yglesias is in dreamland if he thinks "I wish we were out of this mess" translates into "I will support candidates I view as weak." Most people are just not plugged in and politically active, it just isn't *ever* true that "everyone who will be swayed by X" is already committed.

But let us quantify confidence. SCMTim, what odds will you give me that Lamont wins the general?

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I'm not sure Lamont's strategy was much different than other primary strategies: run hard to your base, then drive for the center once you've picked up the nomination. Lieberman's problem was that his base was too moderate, especially given the zillion Independents in Connecticut.

Anyhow, the GOP has to screech about something. It's got to be "Dems out of touch and more defeatist" because the alternative is "Fuck, the war is unpopular enough that it unseated someone who once held the party's VP nomination. We doomed."

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If by moderate, you mean "wimp," Cala.

What the democrats are doing here is the opposite of what we would normally consider "cutting and running" or "defeatism." Letting Republicans pick our candidates for us, that would be "defeatist" in my book. This defeatism, you call it, sure makes me feel like we might start winning.

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Not that I mean to imply I'm arguing against you in making any of those points, Cala. I'm just stuffing some straw into baa's shirt to keep this going a little.

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baa, I rather enjoyed John Cole and Radley Balko's takes. That's John Cole the disillusioned Republican and Radley Balko the committed libertarian, btw.

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If Lieberman drops out of the race, Lamont will take the general easily. The Republican challenger is a stooge with a gambling problem; the other Independent dropped out this morning.

If Lieberman stays in the race, I think he wins it easily if it's held today. But it won't be held today, and his chances depend on a few factors: a) what else Lamont has in the bag besides 'Lieberman hearts Bush' (which loses him the Lieberman supporters in the general, and doesn't win over Independents and moderate Republicans) b) how the GWoYucky is perceived in October, not August.

I think Lieberman will win the general over Lamont by five. And then he'll be a royal pain to deal with. Were I in charge, I'd be offering him lots of incentives to drop out and be a good Democrat.

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It is simply stunning to see a sitting senator who was the party's VP candidate bested by a non-entity.

You know what, though? Almost everybody I knew thought Lieberman was a thoroughly shitty pick for VP.

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I think you overestimate Lieberman's appeal as anything other than a place holder, Cala. If there's no leftier choice, lefties will vote for him. If there's no rightier choice, righties will vote for him. But let him speak as a human being, with no institution to lean on in either direction, and I can't see why anyone would vote for him.

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If by moderate, you mean "wimp,"

Hehe, not so much in this case, because his base is only partially wimpy Democrats. Lieberman's base isn't just Democrat, it's sort of a mixture of the flock of moderate Independents (Democrats who used to be i-bankers) and Republicans (i-bankers who aren't religious).

None of them can help him out in the primaries though.

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We know what the Republican strategy will be, and Lieberman's defeat will fit in with it. What's really in question is whether the Republican strategy will work, and that depends largely on whether the Democrats are able to counter it and offer something better. History says, probably not. On the other hand, there are lots of signs out there that the voters are wising up, including some in Bush's core constituency.

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The only reason I think it is because the righties ain't going to vote for Schlessinger, and I don't know that they'll just stay home if Lamont doesn't expand his message beyond being the überdem.

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I'm also amazed that Ned Lamont is being held up as an avatar of leftist extremism. Can anybody point me toward a remotely "leftist" stance he has taken on anything? Agreeing with Chuck Hagel on Iraq is not a leftist position.

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Lamont is also not a nonentity. Indeed, this is part of the astonishingly olde-fashioned combination of red-baiting and elite-bashing Martin Peretz leveled at him. (He might as well have claimed that Lamont wears striped pants.)

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He isn't an extremist, but his campaign has run him as a True Democrat, and most of the message has been 'I'm not Lieberman and Lieberman hearts Bush.' But you're correct that he's only an extremist if that word now means 'agrees with 70% of the country about the war in Iraq.'

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Is it just me who absolutely loved his statement in the NYT story that Cheney's saying Lamont's election encouraged terrorism isn't "“my fault,” he said. “They are not criticizing me for running an independent campaign, they are criticizing Democratic voters for the way they voted.”"

You know, if his toolishness weren't the reason Lamont won, it could have been his . . . toolishness.

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"Lieberman, not defeatist enough for the Democrats" is a hymn all can sing with gusto.

More like a tune to whistle past the graveyard.

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Just what I wanted to say, apos. I don't think Lamont is on record supporting gay communist open marriages in the military, or anything.

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And by "his," I mean of course Lieberman's.

More coffee, please.

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"most of the message has been 'I'm not Lieberman and Lieberman hearts Bush.'"

Are you sure about this Cala? That might be why a lot of people wanted to vote for him, but my guess is, he didn't use this as the opener for any of his speeches.

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Thanks for the link, Jackmormon. I was glad that John Cole pointed out that Lieberman seemed to be a wholly-owned subsidiary of the banking and insurance industries. Sure, Hartford is insurance central, but I trust Ned Lamont on those issues more than I trust Lieberman.

John Cole is concerned about that for reasosn that differ from mine, of course. I never trusted Lieberman to take real action on healthcare because of his ties to the insurance industry. I don't know that single-payer is the way to go, but I could never trust Lieberman to look at the issue objectively.

Also, Lieberman fought the expensing of stock options, and stock options dilute the value of my shares, so I'd liek to know how much the promsied options are worth. It's true that you can do that sleuthing on your own a bit, but as an investor, I prefer clearer financial statements to more opaque ones.

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But let us quantify confidence. SCMTim, what odds will you give me that Lamont wins the general?

None, because my opinion is based on rampant amateur speculation. But if I had to associate a number with with my beliefs, I'd say there's a 70% chance that Lamont wins the general. A lot of this is going to be affected by what happens in the next month or so. Lieberman should face really, really strong pressure to drop out. Name Dems should come out and campaign for Lamont. HRC can mend fences (which she clearly needs to do--recall the recent piece on NH primary voters) without changing her position on the war by campaigning hard for Lamont. Absent institutional support, I think Joe's going to have a very hard time. There have been other primary victims in the past, and I think it's rare (if not unprecedented) to find one that runs as an independent. There's a reason for that.

Yglesias is in dreamland if he thinks "I wish we were out of this mess" translates into "I will support candidates I view as weak."

That's definitely true. But it remains unclear to me why Lamont will be viewed as "weak." There are at least two reasons (other than history) why Dems might be considered weak on defense. The first, favored by the neocon-ish Dems at TNR and the DLC, is that we do not aggressively support killing all Arabs, all the time. The second, favored by...well, me...is that people may not like a bully, but they trust him to respond with force when necessary more than they trust the nice accomodationist. The Dems in CT should hammer, brutally and maybe unfairly, Lieberman and the Republicans as pansies who won't challenge the President. Call them "war hippies"; that's what they are. You can't be trusted to fight for the country against the Islamoscaries if you won't fight for yourself against the weakened Republicans. As long as Lamont makes attacks not on moral grounds, but pragmatic ones, then I think Lamont should be fine.

But who knows?

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Re: McCain's campaigning, I really hope the Republicans get Joementum all over themselves. It's like sending Lenin from Germany to Russia by train.

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Pretty sure. His speeches are one thing, but the Kiss float, the Kiss buttons, and the ground sentiment hasn't advanced much beyond 'no-go on Joe'.

Lamont's a pretty boring Democratic candidate on the rest of the issues (this isn't a bad thing; Casey's boring, too.) and the focus has been very anti-Lieberman, very 'he's not a good Democrat', etc. Great primary strategy, but 'Lieberman's not a Democrat' won't work as well in general, unless it gets really ugly for Lieberman such that he loses a substantial amount of his Democratic support.

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"war hippies"

That's awesome.

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Oh, sweet.

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They're also a band.

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"Lieberman, not defeatist enough for the Democrats" is a hymn all can sing with gusto.

Well, not if we're decent, rational people.

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But with GWB's approval where it is, i can't imagine i'd be hard to get to 50+% esp. in CT just by being the only candidate who doesn't heart bush.

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I'm operating under these assumptions:

1. The world's really not that dangerous, right now
2. A lot of people are uncertain about 1, and think that maybe the might be dangerous
3. The War in Iraq has been handled about as bad as humanly possible
4. Nevertheless, people really, really hate admitting defeat
5. We've already lost
6. Neither the War in Iraq nor the GWOT are the most pressing issues of our day

I don't think Dems can win on pulling out of Iraq. Were I a Dem, I would talk constantly about what's going wrong in Iraq, and how it could be done better. Hell, just say you *could* do it better, even if you're not sure. (ex. "Right now, Iraqi's only get power a few hours each day. We can do better than that.")

But I'd also talk seriously about the end of oil, and how R's stifle technology that might help us with that. I'd run on global warming, and how R's treat it like a myth. We're hot, we're tired of natural disasters, and we're paying out the nose at the pump; people are ready to listen to these things.

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fcuk I need coffee. 5. above was meant to refer to the war in Iraq.

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I'd replace 4 with 'Nevertheless, it's not anyone nearby that's dying.'

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Were I a Dem, I would talk constantly about what's going wrong in Iraq, and how it could be done better.

The counter-argument.

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I would like to see one major figure, not necessarily running, go out and take the position Arthur's advocating there. Maybe it's repeatedly been tried and media-squelched or just not reported, so that I don't notice. It wouldn't have to be everybody, just somebody who couldn't be ignored, if any there be.

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Cala, people are going to die, either way. At least where I live, you can't underestimate how much people do not want to admit defeat.

Therefore, the war and invasion were and are immoral and absolutely unjustified.

Saying this does not actual inform one about what the next step should be.

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I'd run on global warming, and how R's treat it like a myth.

Last night, while a bit cracked out on nyquil, I heard the debate for the NY Republican primary. Both candidates were pretty extreme, but one of them was running explicitly on a plan to reinvigorate upstate NY (the perennial campaign question) by investing heavily in green energy. That, and "my candidate is a schmuck," was her main platform. I think there's a real voter base ready to hear about short-term sacrifices for longer-term safe energy, and it's not just a Democratic base.

The other guy was the official Republican Party choice, mind you.

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As long as I'm pretending to be a political thinker, I'll also say that I think people are ready for some politician to offer them purpose in the grander scheme of world events. I'm exactly sure what that would be, but some calls of doing this or that for our country or world would probably resonate right now. Why? Because we've been bombarded with news from the world stage for years now, except no one except a few guys in Washington have been involved, and people are frustrated.

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45: Like this?

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pwned?

Last night, while a bit cracked out on nyquil...

We've all been there, though usually these stories don't result in watching Republican primaries.

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Therefore, the war and invasion were and are immoral and absolutely unjustified.

Saying this does not actual inform one about what the next step should be.

Disagree; I think it makes just leaving a great deal easier.

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"'Lieberman hearts Bush' (which loses him the Lieberman supporters in the general, and doesn't win over Independents and moderate Republicans)"

This is clearly wrong.

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IE it winns over all types of voters who aren't Schlesinger voters.

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51. well, i'm pretty darn sure you're in a small, small minority there.

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50--How about listening to them absentmindedly on the local NPR?

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IE it winns over all types of voters who aren't Schlesinger voters.

In a three-way race, the voters that aren't Schlessinger voters are closer to the Lieberman position and presumably reasonably non-commital about the war in Iraq; telling them that they're like Republicans probably isn't going to bother a whole bunch of Independents who aren't Democrat loyalists. It's sort of why they're Independents.

I think the Independents swing Lieberman, and I don't think you get them not to swing to Lieberman by telling them they're too much like Lieberman & Bush.

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51. well, i'm pretty darn sure you're in a small, small minority there.

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double-post fun. And my reply was too curt. The trouble with the morality of the war's beginnings issue is that it ignores two other issues, which I think most people find most pressing, and those are 1) Our moral commitment to the mess we've made, and 2) Not being embarassed.

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49: I'm glad to see that story, and glad that the Tribune picked it up from AP. Now, the Tribune is a morning paper, and that story's time is Saturday afternoon. I've just dug out my Sunday Tribune to find it, because I remember reading several stories in the first, "news" section, and I can't find it.

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I'll also say that I think people are ready for some politician to offer them purpose in the grander scheme of world events. I'm exactly sure what that would be, but some calls of doing this or that for our country or world would probably resonate right now.

I think you're insane, and anyone who used this as the basis for a major campaign would lose badly. We're split as a country, and the appropriate move is to find as small a group of credible "wrongdoers" as possible and demonize the fuck out of them. Americans don't make mistakes; subsets of Americans who actually hate America lead us astray.

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subsets of Americans who actually hate America

Hey that's a pretty harsh way to talk about the Republican leadership.

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60. Not as a basis for a major campaign, no. I was thinking of it as icing. I've noticed people, young and old, trying to get involved, using churchs or whatever, but being pretty frustrated by their lack of options. And there are a lot of global issues: terror, hearts and minds, our troops, waste, water, global warming..those kinds of things. Anyway, the last two campaigns Dems basically went with, "those guys are teh suxxxors" and people just complained they needed a reason to vote *for* Dems, not just *against* Repubs.

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I think the Independents swing Lieberman

I'm not convinced this is the case. Most of the polling I've seen show independents tracking along with registered Democrats in their views on Iraq. These have been national polls, so how that maps to Connecticut's political landscape isn't clear to me, but Lieberman has two albatrosses to deal with: 1) being as strongly pro-war as anybody in the Senate when the country has largely turned sour on it, and 2) being an incumbent in what seems to be a strongly anti-incumbent year.

Add this to no longer having access to DNC funds/ads/support, low cash on hand, the bandwagon effect of backing a winner, and major Democratic figures lining up behind Lamont (which is happening and I expect to continue) and Lieberman has a tough hill to climb.

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the voters that aren't Schlessinger voters are closer to the Lieberman position and presumably reasonably non-commital about the war in Iraq

Why? As a matter of culture, even Republicans in CT are closer to most Dems than to Southern Republicans. Bush is a Southern Republican, and so is the majority of his base. The CT Republican doesn't have to hate Republicans or the Republican Party; he just has to hate Southern Republicans and their neocon bedmates. On a bet, that's 80% of CT voters.

Clinton, I think, made an analogous claim recently.

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Anyway, the last two campaigns Dems basically went with, "those guys are teh suxxxors" and people just complained they needed a reason to vote *for* Dems, not just *against* Repubs.

People always complain that they don't like negative ads. Campaigns use them because (IIRC) they demonstrably work. The problem last time was that we said two things: (a) those guys suck, and (b) we're just like them, so don't be scared of us. We need to stick with (a) (and to varying degrees, be (b)).

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I agree with 64. New Englanders raised as Republicans have converted wholesale to Democrats in the last few years, one of the places where this has happened. Another is the upper Midwest. In CT, where "Independent" is apparently a much more viable self-identifier than it is some other places — remember JM's comment about registering as such in NYC yesterday — someone so raised need not turn her back on "the party of Lincoln." But the cultural differences between such people and the Southern, Evangelical, crass and boastful face of the contemporary Republican party are vast.

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Sure. But the culture thing just gets CT not to vote for Schlessinger (that and that he's a stooge); why Lamont over Lieberman then? Iraq seems to be the big difference; I don't think Iraq is a big enough difference to go for Lamont over Lieberman -- even among Democrats alone it was still a tight race.. (The big profile guys coming out for Lamont might be, but we'll see. Could Lieberman be that out of touch?)

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Cala, because he's a sanctimonious doofus?

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. But the culture thing just gets CT not to vote for Schlessinger (that and that he's a stooge); why Lamont over Lieberman then? Iraq seems to be the big difference; I don't think Iraq is a big enough difference to go for Lamont over Lieberman -- even among Democrats alone it was still a tight race.

Because--and we should say similiar in every other election we face this fall--a vote for Lieberman is a vote for Bush and those hysterical, barbaric, un-American pansies that lead the Southern Republican Party. We've trusted those fucks for six years, and look where we are; do you want to trust them for another six?

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A big deal has been made that Lamont is only an "anti-Lieberman." In my opinion, this is demonstrably false; they guy speaks well and is likeable, and that goes a long way. He seems to track moderate democrat--that is, sane--on all the issues and has proven to be at least a competant businessman.

But so what, take it as a given that Lamont has run against Lieberman. He won. At this point, given that Lieberman doesn't have the nomination, the roles have shifted. Lamont is the democratic candidate. A voter for Leiberman needs to give some affirmative reason for casting her vote in that direction. And what plausible argument can be made in favor of the man?

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what plausible argument can be made in favor of the man?

What's Lieberman's history with bringing federal money back to CT and constituent service? I don't know the answer, what with never living in Connecticut, but it's a plausible one.

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I don't know either, what with having never lived there myself, and sure, that would be a plausible argument. But I don't expect to see it. And I don't see it winning over lots of moderate "don't call me a democrat" Independants.

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Repost from Tapped (so sue me):

Lieberman, by seniority, was the Democrats' main man in the Senate on finance. Ken Lay was Dubya's biggest single supporter, and Dubya was the single biggest recipient of Lay's money, but the Democrats could get no traction when Enron collapsed amidst fraud charges, because too many Democrats were effectively in Enron's pocket. Notably Lieberman, who was Arthur Anderson's boy -- AA was so badly implicated with Enron that they went out of business.

His statement on the issue was "The Enron scandal cries out for governmental action, but we must acknowledge before we act that there are twin dangers -- of doing too little and doing too much." This is a truism, but the real message is that Lieberman was going to make sure that his friends came out OK.
Lieberman on Enron

This is a dropped political opportunity, but it's an important issue even though it's wonkish. The DLC Democrats did a lot of selling out of this kind, getting money in return for favors.

The Greens are probably beyond hope, but the US and the Democrats would be in much, much better shape if the Democrats had been willing to work with Nader on things like this 15-20 years ago. The DLC really was a Trojan horse within the Democratic Party in this and other respects.

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Today I talked to an odler couple from Connecticut. They were both independents and hadn't voted in the primary. I said that I would have voted for teh guy who won, and I thought that Lieberman was just being petulant when he launched his independent bid. The husband said, "but only 10% of the voters/people fo CT voted for Lamont." I said, "but that's the way that the system works, and if Lieberman had lost, he would have brandished his Democratic nomination and told Lamont to stand down." The wife agreed with me.

I'm heartened that Chuck Schumer has pledged to get behind Lamont. Dean's been great. I'm pissed as hell that Ken Salazar of Colorado has publiclyM stated that he still supports Lieberman.

Also Reid has refused to say that he will ask Lieberman to step down. Salazra sucks ass. Why did anyone work for the guy?

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How much do I love The Editors?

So, Joe Leiberman lost his primary. I haven’t heard this much righteous indignation since Steven Colbert’s press club routine. The fucking humanity.

Joe Leiberman lost because he was a Joetard and everybody was sick of his shit. Friends of Joe have tried to make Ned Lamont - the non-descript millionaire who beat him - out to be some kind of bomb-throwing hippie anarchist subversive Pol Pot figure from the Chamber of Commerce, while Ned boosters have him as some kind of RFK reborn progressive dynamo. Both seem equally plausible, and I suspect the truth is in the middle. From what I’ve seen of Lamont, he takes his morning coffee with cream and Rohypnol. A nice man, I’m sure, but let’s be serious.

Speaking of date rape, Joe’s now decrying partisanship, and David Brooks and a bunch of people who might as well be David Brooks are creaming at the prospect of a unity party ticket. Joe himself is now calling himself an “independent Democrat” - which I think is something like an “agnostic Baptist” - presumably in order to glom off some of that Lyndon LaRouche mojo. Watch your back, Queenie!

Amusingly, Republicans are now touting Joe’s loss as a great victory for them, on accounta how everybody loves Joe and Ned eats babies at the Hippy Freak-Out Free-Love Islamo-Be-In. The bet here seems to be that voters will be so outraged be the horrors of the War on Joe (current casualties: one Senator’s enormous ego) that they will forget all about the War in Iraq, now coming up on 3,000 US soldiers dead. I’m as cynical as the next guy, but I really don’t think voters are quite that Joetarded. The big loser here is, of course, George W. Bush, who lost his beard when Joe lost his party.

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67
"I don't think Iraq is a big enough difference to go for Lamont over Lieberman"

To me, Iraq is so big that it's really all that matters -- Iraq and the failure of the Congress to fulfill its oversight responsibilities.

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