Lieberman Refuses To Cut and Run After Primary Loss

When Joe Lieberman lost the Connecticut primary last week, he didn't cut and run as Ned Lamont and other Democrats might have done. Instead of quitting the race and handing a victory to the terrorists he decided to continue campaigning indefinitely. Lieberman is a glass-half-full kind of guy and he believes his strong second-place finish was even better than what he called "a three-way split decision for third place," which cynical political pundits unfairly described as a fifth place finish in the 2004 New Hampshire presidential primary. It shows that the blogger insurgency is in its last throes and that come November Connecticut voters will greet him as a liberator from all of the partisanship that is dividing Washington.

It may be true that Lieberman made a few mistakes early in the campaign. He probably went in to the last days of the campaign with too few get-out-the-vote troops on the ground. He may have underestimated the popularity of the insurgency. Some of his early campaign ads failed to win over the hearts and minds of Connecticut voters. But Lieberman refuses to pull out of the race by a date certain and give up the dream of restoring democracy to Connecticut by giving voters a real choice.

Unfortunately, as Vice President Cheney and Lieberman predicted, Lamont's victory has emboldened the terrorists. It's no coincidence that only days after the primary, they perceived that America's will was flagging and decided to embark on the terrorist plot that was foiled in Great Britain. They naturally saw this victory by what Cal Thomas calls "the Taliban Wing" of the Democratic party, as an open invitation to commit terrorist attacks against the United States. Voting for Lamont sent a message to Osama Bin Laden, according to Tony Snow, "that Americans were weak." And according to Vice President Cheney, Lieberman's defeat showed "the al Qaeda types" that "they can break the will of the American people in terms of our ability to stay in the fight and complete the task." By not supporting President Bush, as Lieberman has, the Democrat voters of Connecticut are supporting the terrorists.

Although many Democrats want to politicize the War on Terror for partisan gain, Lieberman is a man who hates politicizing politics. He would much rather be above the partisan fray. While a partisan simply repeats whatever people in his party believe, Lieberman eschews partisanship by saying the opposite of what people in his party believe. So when members of his party were defending President Clinton from what they perceived to be a partisan impeachment proceeding, Lieberman attacked Clinton. Now when members of his party launch partisan attacks on the President for his conduct of the War in Iraq, Lieberman defends him. When Republicans like Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Tom Delay and Martin Peretz want to prove they are not partisan, they can always point to their support of Joe Lieberman. Without Joe Lieberman for Republicans to support, all that will be left in Washington is partisan rancor.

It must be difficult for a man like Lieberman who is intellectually and morally superior to most Connecticut voters--who, let's face it, are not the sharpest knives in the drawer--to have to sell himself to the unwashed hordes who have the power to fire him from the job he so clearly deserves. It would be much better if he could simply sit the election out and not have to campaign for his job. Politics can be a dirty business and there is something tragic about watching Lieberman make the sacrifice of stooping to something so clearly beneath him as politicking, despite the fact, as he pointed out in his victory speech on the day of the primary, he could make a lot more money in the private sector. But Lieberman is a patient man and he realizes that someone must explain to Connecticut voters that by voting for Ned Lamont they are in effect surrendering in the War on Terror. As Lieberman himself put it in terms even a child or a Connecticut voter can understand, "If we just pick up like Ned Lamont wants us to do, get out by a date certain, it will be taken as a tremendous victory by the same people who wanted to blow up these planes in this plot hatched in England." Yet just as he is optimistic that the people of Iraq will come around to believing that the democratic government we have imposed on them is for their own good, he has faith that the people of Connecticut will come around to realize that accepting Lieberman as their Senator is for their own good. Despite the temporary setback Lieberman suffered in the primary, he knows that the next three months will be critical.

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Jon Swift, Joe Lieberman, Ned Lamont, Cheney, Democrat, Republican, Connecticut, Great Britain, UK, Cal Thomas, Tony Snow, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Tom Delay, Martin Peretz, Iraq, War on Terror, Terrorism, Bush, Foreign Policy, Politics, Moose Tracks, Carnival of the Vanities #204