The Republicans, by all but endorsing Lieberman, have made this race important.

If you're an Ind., then, by all rights you can play this however you want. For Joe, against. Whatever. But Democrats need to remember who's the one running against the Democrat in CT.

The more important issue is one of defining just who Dems are, and what we stand for. Strengthening the "movement" is something Dems hardly if do, certainly not in recent memory. There's finally a defining issue on which WE DEMS stand on the side the The People.

What strikes me as funny/ironic/pathetic is that for the last two or three years, we've all been arguing about moderate versus left Dems, and whether following the polls is a good idea, or pandering, etc, etc. Well, here's the most obvious issue, one where whether you follow the polls or follow "the left," the answer is the same -- we need a timetable to withdraw from Iraq. The overwhelming majority of people in this country wants to withdraw from Iraq. Every poll shows that.

So, finally Dems are on the side of the people on the most important issue facing our nation, and we're seriously arguing if we should back the one guy in our party that absolutely, positively doesn't want to leave Iraq?

Seriously???

I need an aspirin...

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We have an open Senate seat in Minnesota and the quality of the debate has been miserable, actually non-existent. Both candidates appear to be trying to hide their party affiliation. The Democrat won't even tell you she is a Democrat on her website.

Seems to me whatever party you're in and whether you are left, right or moderate, this country has serious issues to graple with and we have a political system that is utterly failing to come to grips with major choices.

At least the CT race has had some substance to it and for that alone Americans should thank the netroots.

And where is that Democratic message we were going to hear about someday....? Maybe we could start with Senate candidates who aren't afraid to tell you they belong to the Democratic Party.

I completely agree with your take on this:

Some people are saying that...

Dems should cut their losses on social insurance programs like Social Security to build up political chits with GOPers and extra revenue for universal health care. But I don't think it works that way. And I think the 1990s are the prime example. Give up on Social Security and that undermines progressive reform on every front. It's not a matter of coalition politics. It's that every win galvanizes and strengthens progressive reform as a whole.

 You have to think of republicans as narcissists.  If you do that, you can figure out what NOT to do.  Every time they win something it adds energy and arrogance to the next thing they want.  They are NOT interested in compromise or even cooperation.  It was not always like that, but it is now.

We have to get and keep momentum for the things that matter, and giving in on important issues with the idea that they will feel they "owe" us civility on other issues is a complete dead-end. 

I just saw An Incovenient Truth yesterday, and when Al Gore was explaining how Katrina picked up strength from the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico it reminded me of Karl Rove/  How he picks up more strength every time he wins another battle of negativity.  Every time he gets away with yet another lie, he just gets more powerful and more antagonistic.  He sees Democrats as enemies rather than sparring partners, and so giving him anything at all is a mistake.

I also think the Lamont race is very important, because it is finally a turning point for Democrats.  I know that others think it is short-sighted, and that the GOP will ultimately benefit, but isn't it about time Democrats stopped running scared and did something because it is the right thing to do?

If the reason to support Lieberman is so he can't get back at Dems if he wins, and if Democrats support him because of that, then we deserve to lose (again).  Lamont is the high road, and I am pretty much sick of the low road.  If Lamont pulls this off it will be a huge rallying cry for all Democrats who couldn't think of a good enough response when Rove accused them of loving terrorists, or hating the troops, or being weak on security.

It is time to stand up and look them in the eye and ask them why George Bush let the one person we know for a fact, sponsored 911, get away.  Why did he say he wasn't even concerned about him?  And then we need to tell them that nothing in the world has helped the terrorists more than this sick, wasteful folly in Iraq; that we need to spend those billions here on infrastructure and health care, and a real defense here at home. 

When Ken Mehlman changes his talking point from "Stay the course" to "Adapt to win," we have to just laugh, and say, "Nice try Ken, but you stayed the course too long.  It's time to turn the lights out and come home."  Let Halliburton stay there and rebuild Iraq's infrastructure if they want to, and we can hire good companies (through legitimate bidding) to do that for us here. 

The Lamont race is not about all of the above, but it is a starting point, and a symbolic sea-change.  I think, however, the conversation should be about Ned Lamont, and NOT on Joe.  The worst thing you can do to a narcissist is to ignore him. 

Jan Knaus

Well stated, as usual. John Edwards came to Connecticut on THursday and wowed the masses. as reported in the new haven register.

Former vice-presidential candidate John Edwards rallied several hundred people Thursday in a rousing populist speech for U.S. Democratic Senate candidate Ned Lamont, telling the crowd Americans are eager for change and real leaders.

"This campaign, including the primary election, is about change. It is what America is hungry for," said Edwards, the former U.S. senator from North Carolina. "America no longer wants the same old politics that they have now seen for decades.

They are looking for not politicians, but leaders. They are looking for somebody who will tell them the truth about what is happening in America today and somebody who has a different vision for where America needs to go. The man who is telling the truth and the man who will provide that vision in the next United States Senate from Connecticut is Ned Lamont," Edwards said to cheers from the crowd gathered on the lawn of Yale University’s medical campus on Cedar Street.

Let the GOP continue with their idiotic "a vote for Lamont is a vote for Osama" nonsense while Lamont cleans up with the things Connecticut voters care about.

With a huge American flag as a backdrop, Lamont said "one of the first calls that Joe Lieberman got (after the primary) was from Karl Rove (Bush’s senior adviser). The first call I got was from John Edwards," Lamont said as example of Lieberman’s popularity with Republicans, which a poll Thursday said gives him an edge in the November election.

Lamont then launched into his platform speech on the need to raise the federal minimum wage, to provide universal health care and affordable housing and to lessen our dependence on foreign oil. As he has for the past six months, he said President Bush’s foreign policies have failed and have left us less secure.

"One of the reasons we are making bad choices is because right now we have the best government money can buy in Washington, D.C.," he told the receptive crowd of his disdain for the 63 lobbyists in the nation’s capitol for every congressman.

"No more Republican rubber stamp Congress. We want someone who is going to hold this president accountable. No more one-party rule down there in Washington," said Lamont in an appeal to also elect Diane Farrell in the 4th congressional district; Joe Courtney in the 2nd District and Chris Murphy in the 5th District.

Edwards apologized for his initial support for the Iraq war and says we now need to move out 40,000 troops and come up with a plan to bring the rest home in the next 12 to 18 months, a position similar to Lamont’s.

"I was wrong and I take responsibility for that," Edwards said, but he called the members of the armed forces serving there "patriotic and courageous."

His theme was America’s moral responsibility, first to its own people, and then to the rest of humanity and he said that entails telling the truth. "I don’t know anybody in their right mind who can think what is happening in Iraq right now is working," he said. "We need to make it clear that we are going to leave Iraq and the best way to make that clear is to actually start leaving." He blasted the Bush administration for just "reacting," rather than helping to solve the world’s problems. "There is absolutely no indication that we have any long term vision for the kind of world we want to live in."

Who would you rather listen to? Someone that plans on doing the right thing for the American people? Or someone that insists that "he's the man" because he says so?

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I find the Lieberman Question to be absurdly simple. This is a quasi democracy. We use a primary election system to select our party candidates for most offices. Before that primary election we all support the candidate we like best, hoping he/she will win the primary. But, after the primary we all need to unite behind the winner of our party race.

I am not a fan of Lieberman, but if he had won the primary I would be a supporter of his reelection. This is the same way I felt before the 2004 election. I was a supporter of Howard Dean, but once Kerry was the obvious winner, I was a supporter of John Kerry. That's how we Democrats need to operate if we want to win elections.

So, I am very disappointed when any Democrat supports Lieberman at this time, and I doubt that they are helpful to the process of winning back the Congress and Presidency. In fact, I feel very strongly that the Democratic leadership in the Senate should remove Lieberman from all positions of any importance, including all of his committee seats. At this point he is not a Democrat.  Not because he lost the primary, but because he opposes the Democrat who won.

Hoppy in Sacramento

Yeah, the law in OHIO is called "The Sore Loser Law." Kinda says it all, doesn't it?

Jan Knaus

I think the argument that centrist Dems are scared of Lamont is absurd. I consider myself a centrist Dem and want Lieberman to go away. But the more prominent centrist Dems, the Clintons, have both come out in support of Lamont. This is no longer a battle between centrists and "netroots" and it's pointless to bring it up over and over again.

My criticism of donating to Lamont is that he is independently wealthy and can finance his own campaign if he wanted to. I think its unfortunate that money is diverted from less well off candidates to a well off candidate. That's my beef. (Plus, I think Lamont has done poorly since the primary.)

Criticisms of incumbents getting a ton of money despite being "safe" shouldn't ignore the fact that these same incumbents also give heavily to other races/candidates.

Completely agree with you, Aj.

Let's note, too, that the argument Josh is making, the one that you and I don't see as describing what's really happening, is the version of the facts that Lieberman and Rove are trying to sell.

Apparently it's working. :(

I'll say that there are two questions inside the question, "How important is the L/L race":

1) How important is it who wins? To that I say that 6 more years of Joe is better than other options I could imagine (a Santorum clone, for instance), provided his snit doesn't lead to further vengefulness after the election.

2) How important is it to fully and convincingly defeat Lieberman's message about the Democratic Party. That issue is national in scope, especially when he takes his bs to the national talk shows, and he will every chance he gets.

My greatest fear is what Lieberman's campaign will do to the party, not that he'll beat Lamont. That's HUGE.

Matt Stoler's essay on this topic is cogent:

Every bill that comes before the House and Senate faces a clear set of right-wing pressure points. The first and most powerful one is the Republican K-Street Project, which can whip all Republicans very quickly and effectively in the House, and nearly as quickly in the Senate. This is the machine that forces Republicans to obey the wishes of a right-wing leadership class, through the carrot of cushy corporate jobs and the stick of vicious primary challenges from the Club for Growth.

On the Democratic side, the pressure is just as intense, but more subtle. When a bill is introduced, a network of consultants, most of whom have corporate clients, begin to chatter about how taking a liberal position could weaken the Democratic Party. This is supplemented with a strong PR strategy by right-wing temporary coalition groups who put out networks of surrogates and ads to create a powerfully framed environment. Then business lobbyists come and visit Congressional offices, and make threats, attempt legislative bribes, or put out false but extremely persuasive pieces of information. There is often little real counterpressure, because liberal single issue groups have decided not to hold politicians accountable and do not cooperate with each other on issues not directly related to their vertical.

I just sent back a self-addressed stamped envelope to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee that solicited me for money. I've given to them before. This time, I checked "Other" for the amount and wrote in the amount "$0.00", writing that until they get right on the question of supporting winners of Democratic primaries (DSCC vice-chair Pryor supports Lieberman) they should look for no donations from me.

I will continue to criticize any Democrat who backs this turncoat. John Kerry is right. He's channelling Dick Cheney talking points.

I can forgive any Dem who backed Lieberman in the primary as long as he's backing Lamont now. Otherwise, forget about it. The Lieberman backers were claiming, during the primary that Lamont was jeopardizing a safe Democratic seat. They can't make that claim anymore. Lieberman did not have to do this.

Josh, you complained on TPM last week that Lamont didn't understand that he had only one week to get Lieberman out of the race and that he chose to go on vacation instead.

What possible course of action do you think you see that Lamont could have adopted to get Lieberman out of the race? He has too much support and too little shame to let go.

Lieberman just has to be beaten. That's all. Lamont has to put together a campaign organization to get that job done. It's not going to happen by Beltway types shaming Joe. If Lamont can get this done, he wins. If not, he loses.

Beltway types such as yourself who support Lamont can do their part by not spreading such defeatist nonsense. One poll does not an election make.

This election is like the 1983 Chicago mayoral. There too, entrenched powers showed they had no shame and no willingness to give up their power in the name of party loyalty. It took a ground war, retail politics, to elect Harold Washington in the face of such opposition, and it will take the same to elect Ned Lamont.

Josh, I am afraid that for people like myself the Iraq war is the only issue in 2006.

It's not just you. Check the polls -- Iraq is the number one priority in almost every poll (Fox is the outlier, and it's close).

But in some ways, it's because it's not a single issue (and Lamont has said this). It's terrorism, it's foreign policy, it's energy, it's security. It's even health care and social security and education, because all the money for everything we want to do at home is going over to Iraq.

Just about the only issue Iraq is not about is 9/11.

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I definitely agree that his condescending attitude and hostility towards opinions other than his own are what makes Lieberman a) really annoying and b) the Democrat who is probably the most corrosive to any semblance to honest and open political discussion these days. The fact that he seems to derive joy from undermining the Democratic party as a whole, to say nothing of progressives, in his rhetoric makes him much worse than Clinton in his effect on national politics.

But thats besides the point that I'm trying to make. I think that the idea to invade Iraq was so fundamentally horrible that everyone inside the government and the nation's chattering classes who helped bring it about should never be taken seriously ever again.

However, I voted for Kerry in the 2004 primary over Kucinich - because I'd rather go with someone who can win rather than someone who is ideologically pure. As Deng Xiaoping said "I don't care if a cat is black or white, I only care that it can catch mice"

If I thought it were possible to replace Clinton with someone who was better, I'd go volunteer for their campaign in a heartbeat. But Hillary has US $22 Million cash on hand for her campaign, which is roughly 22 times what everyone else in the race has combined.

We have limited resources and need to pick our battles based on our ability to win. And I think that people in the progressive netroots realize this.

Look, there is no way to disconnect a Lieberman victory from 2006/2008. 

If Lieberman is able to win, or even show strength in spite of a dismal Democratic track record (Schiavo, Birth Control, Vouchers, Clinton, Iraq) and an on/offon/off/on position for privatization, it will signal a party in disarray to all fence sitters come November. 

And it should be noted that his support for Iraq was of the worst possible kind - not only supporting the war long after it became clear that it was a mistake in conception, but even more his offensive support the president speech.  Many democrats had trouble rationalizing their position on the war, but I think only Ben Nelson would have agreed with Joe that you have to get behind Bush no matter what, and I don't recall even Nelson saying so in public.  That is the antithesis of a democratic government, at least that's the way Democrats see it. 

It is just not possible to treat this race any other way.   And the middle will be paying close attention to the Senate in it's response to the perceived truth that Lieberman is a Demi-Republican.  If the Democrats can't show strength and unity in the face of treason it will not be given the keys to the car.  I mean, what would be the point? 

Anyway, you can be certain that this is how it will be treated by the MSM talking heads.  Historically, there are many instances where events take on symbolic import beyond its immediate meaning (The assasination of Archiduke Ferdinand). Why else would Bushco come out of the closet with such a desperate effort to support Joe.  These people are masters of symbolism And they never work on stage. 

This race simply can't be parsed and, therefore, it is the November tipping point for Democrats.  If we don't treat it that way we will be very sorry come election day.

I can't for the life of me understand what Schumer and Reid are thinking.

When Ken Mehlman changes his talking point from "Stay the course" to "Adapt to win,"

 he is flip-flopping.  Flip-flop, flip-flop flip-flop.