The Man Behind The Curtain

As convention calls for, we call him "Mr. President."  His victory in the presidential race was impressive and despite a questionable performance as Chief Executive, he is due the respect his office commends.

I am talking of course about President Barack Obama. Someone should.

Appointed to the Democratic National Committee's Unity Commission as one of Bernie Sanders' representatives, activist Nomiki Konst tweets "Imagine a world where fall-in-love Dems hated former Dem VP nominee @Joe Lieberman as much as they hate progressive caucus members @SenSanders."

Senator Lieberman became unpopular among Democratic voters in Connecticut for continually and steadfastly supporting the Iraq War, and lost the Democratic primary for Senator in 2006. He then ran as an Independent, was supported by national Republicans and such conservatives as Rush Limbaugh, and easily won re-election.

Lieberman, who endorsed McCain-Palin in 2006 and was an opponent of the public option for health care, retired after that term.  However, he later appeared on the short list of the incoming Trump administration as a candidate for director of the FBI.

There was an uproar among congressional Democrats, and Lieberman obviously never was nominated. Understandably, then, Charlie Pierce had a point when in response to Konst's remark he snarked "Memer of Unity Commission Apparently Not Conscious For 15 years."

However, he missed another point, which may or may not have been in Konst's head. So did the individual who tweeted "Yeah, Dems 'loved' him for killing the Medicare buy in for ACA, oh man was he praised for that." One wonders how he was allowed to kill the Medicare buy-in.  The Guardian understood when it explained in 2009 that then-Senator Lieberman was

plumbing new depths of betrayal by using his deciding vote as an independent member of the Senate to hold hostage Barack Obama's reform of America's dysfunctional healthcare system.

Obama, desperate to ensure that the reform bid does not fail, has told congressional leaders to rewrite the legislation to keep Lieberman happy by removing any real competition to private insurance companies in an effort to get it passed by Christmas.

Lieberman's tactics have upset Democratic party members of Congress who are asking why a popular president's agenda is being stalled by a senator who has repeatedly turned his back on his old party. "I have no idea what Senator Lieberman's agenda is," said a Connecticut member of Congress, Chris Murphy. "I have stopped trying to be Sherlock Holmes."

Another member of Congress from Lieberman's home state, Rosa DeLauro, told Politico website: "No individual should hold healthcare hostage, including Joe Lieberman, and I'll say it flat out: I think he ought to be recalled."

Lieberman, 67, used his deciding vote in Congress to help strip out a provision for government-run medical insurance, intended to set up competition to the abuses of private companies, by threatening to filibuster the legislation.

One tweeter tried to rebut Konst by remarking "she seems totally ignorant of the fact that Joe Lieberman killed single payer, was supported by drug companies and is reviled by most D's. But Lieberman had an influential accomplice (video below from 1/12) in killing single payer and supporting drug companies. The Guardian continues

Senate leaders agreed to drop the public option for all in favour of allowing people over 55 to buy into an existing government-run scheme for the elderly. In September, Lieberman supported the measure, as he had when he was Al Gore's running mate. But just as it seemed that a deal was done, Lieberman scuppered it by announcing that he had changed his mind and would block any bill that expanded government insurance coverage. Obama gave way.





At least Konst realizes there is somewhere too little tolerance for progressive Democrats and a little too much for Lieberman. But like her critics, she does not recognize (or won't acknowledge) that Donald Trump was elected as a rejection of everything Obama, the most powerful Democrat of the last decade, who was ultimately responsible for killing the public option and most responsible for putting the Party where it is today.

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Race Confusion

Texas Repub Senator Ted Cruz was crowing. "I was convinced," he bragged, "that as Secretary of State John Kerry would place what he considered to be the wishes of the international community above the national security interests of the United States. I fear with these most-recent ill-chosen remarks, Secretary Kerry has proven those concerns well founded."

Unsurprisingly, AIPAC also pounced, maintaining "any suggestion that Israel is, or is at risk of becoming, an apartheid state is offensive and inappropriate" (comma after "is" and "becoming"- someone knows his/her English grammar!).  David Harris of the more mainstream American Jewish Committee added "In trying to make his point, Kerry reaches into diplomatic vocabulary to raise the stakes, but in doing so he invokes notions that have no place in the discussion.”

Two prominent Jewish Democrats also were repulsed.  Nita Lowey of New York, the ranking member on the House Appropriations Committee, took to Twitter to comment  “Inflammatory rhetoric comparing Israel’s democracy to repugnant apartheid policy is irresponsible, inaccurate & counterproductive.”   Senator Barbara Boxer of California less explicitly remarked that comparing the Jewish state to apartheid "is nonsensical and ridiculous."  A statement from Democratic Senator Mark Begich of Alaska argued “Secretary Kerry knows as well as anyone that negotiating lasting peace in this region of the world is difficult but it’s not productive to express his frustration in this way,”

The outrage was sparked by a piece in The Daily Beast (from which the photo below is taken) in which Josh Rogin  reported Senator John Kerry had told "a room of influential world leaders in a closed-door meeting" on April 18

A two-state solution will be clearly underscored as the only real alternative. Because a unitary state winds up either being an apartheid state with second-class citizens—or it ends up being a state that destroys the capacity of Israel to be a Jewish state.   Once you put that frame in your mind, that reality, which is the bottom line, you understand how imperative it is to get to the two-state solution, which both leaders, even yesterday, said they remain deeply committed to.

Kerry's critics are right, but not for the reason they imply.  Continuation of the present trend (and no one has suggested how that trend can be interdicted) would lead to a majority Palestinian state in what otherwise is rightfully a Jewish state.  :Ultimately, Kerry was not labeling Israel an apartheid state, suggesting instead that continuation would be either a non-Jewish state or one characterized by apartheid. A similar point was made by former Israeli Prime Minister and Defense Secretary Ehud Barak, who explained in 2010 "as long as in this territory west of the Jordan River there is only one political entity called Israel it is going to be either non-Jewish, or non-democratic.  If this bloc of millions of ­Palestinians cannot vote, that will be an apartheid state."

However, although Kerry's critics have assiduously avoided citing an inaccuracy in his "offensive, irresponsible, ill-chosen, counter-productive" remarks, Barak and the US Secretary of State are wrong for one, fundamental reason.  Rogin notes

According to the 1998 Rome Statute, the “crime of apartheid” is defined as “inhumane acts… committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime.” The term is most often used in reference to the system of racial segregation and oppression that governed South Africa from 1948 until 1994.

By one racial group over any other racial group.

Race can be an elusive subject.  However, Merriam-Webster defines "semite" as"a member of a group of people originally of southwestern Asia that includes Jews and Arabs." By that definition, control of Palestinian Arabs by Palestinian Jews (otherwise known as "Israelis") hardly would be apartheid. Further, modern Jews may be descended from Europe or from the Middle East. Still no apartheid.

But the Secretary of State is not alone in failing to recognize the trickiness inherent in defining ethnicity. Then-Senator Joseph Lieberman, himself a Jew, was one of the first Americans in the modern era to refer to "Jewish-Americans." Judaism, he implied, is not a religion but rather an ethnicity akin to Polish-American, Italian-American, or African-American (a reference to Americans of African ancestry).   He not only passed over the varied national background of Jews, but failed to recognize Judaism as a religion.  It's that Old Testament thing, which an orthodox Jew such as Lieberman might have been expected to notice. Nevertheless, he avoided proper condemnation for practicing atrocious anthropology without a license. And very bad anthropology at that, practiced with the self-righteousness Lieberman sometimes appeared to have invented.

It is, no doubt, a wistful thought that the policies of the Secretary of State should come under greater criticism- or praise- than his careless use of the word "apartheid."  But like a certain National Basketball owner with loose lips, John Kerry is of the modern era, another public figure evaluated for his words while his actions go relatively unexamined.

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Syria Bringing Out The Worst


What is worse- lying about intelligence or minimizing the Holocaust?

Both were on display on Monday's Piers Morgan Live on CNN.   Morgan began questioning his guests by asking Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense for President GWB, "how much responsibility do you feel -- it's very tricky question this, but I'm going to throw at you anyway. For the lack of trust in this Administration's claims about chemical weapons used by Assad and people saying what is all because of alliance of Iraq?"  Wolfowitz responded

No Piers, they were no lies, everybody saw the same intelligence and a lot of people changed their tune about it afterwards. The real point is look, people are concerned not because of the intelligent I think so much as they're concerned about the possibility of American casualties and on that point I would actually agree with Secretary Kerry who says there's -- this is not Iraq, it's not Afghanistan.

Everybody saw the same intelligence.   Last week, however, Sidney Blumenthal wrote in Salon

On Sept. 18, 2002, CIA director George Tenet briefed President Bush in the Oval Office on top-secret intelligence that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, according to two former senior CIA officers. Bush dismissed as worthless this information from the Iraqi foreign minister, a member of Saddam’s inner circle, although it turned out to be accurate in every detail. Tenet never brought it up again.

Nor was the intelligence included in the National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002, which stated categorically that Iraq possessed WMD. No one in Congress was aware of the secret intelligence that Saddam had no WMD as the House of Representatives and the Senate voted, a week after the submission of the NIE, on the Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. The information, moreover, was not circulated within the CIA among those agents involved in operations to prove whether Saddam had WMD...

On April 23, 2006, CBS’s “60 Minutes” interviewed Tyler Drumheller, the former CIA chief of clandestine operations for Europe, who disclosed that the agency had received documentary intelligence from Naji Sabri, Saddam’s foreign minister, that Saddam did not have WMD. “We continued to validate him the whole way through,” said Drumheller. “The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming, and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy, to justify the policy.”

Now two former senior CIA officers have confirmed Drumheller’s account to me and provided the background to the story of how the information that might have stopped the invasion of Iraq was twisted in order to justify it. They described what Tenet said to Bush about the lack of WMD, and how Bush responded, and noted that Tenet never shared Sabri’s intelligence with then Secretary of State Colin Powell. According to the former officers, the intelligence was also never shared with the senior military planning the invasion, which required U.S. soldiers to receive medical shots against the ill effects of WMD and to wear protective uniforms in the desert.

Instead, said the former officials, the information was distorted in a report written to fit the preconception that Saddam did have WMD programs. That false and restructured report was passed to Richard Dearlove, chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), who briefed Prime Minister Tony Blair on it as validation of the cause for war.

Secretary of State Powell, in preparation for his presentation of evidence of Saddam’s WMD to the United Nations Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003, spent days at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., and had Tenet sit directly behind him as a sign of credibility. But Tenet, according to the sources, never told Powell about existing intelligence that there were no WMD, and Powell’s speech was later revealed to be a series of falsehoods.

Both the French intelligence service and the CIA paid Sabri hundreds of thousands of dollars (at least $200,000 in the case of the CIA) to give them documents on Saddam’s WMD programs. “The information detailed that Saddam may have wished to have a program, that his engineers had told him they could build a nuclear weapon within two years if they had fissile material, which they didn’t, and that they had no chemical or biological weapons,” one of the former CIA officers told me.

On the eve of Sabri’s appearance at the United Nations in September 2002 to present Saddam’s case, the officer in charge of this operation met in New York with a “cutout” who had debriefed Sabri for the CIA. Then the officer flew to Washington, where he met with CIA deputy director John McLaughlin, who was “excited” about the report. Nonetheless, McLaughlin expressed his reservations. He said that Sabri’s information was at odds with “our best source.” That source was code-named “Curveball,” later exposed as a fabricator, con man and former Iraqi taxi driver posing as a chemical engineer.

The next day, Sept. 18, Tenet briefed Bush on Sabri. “Tenet told me he briefed the president personally,” said one of the former CIA officers. According to Tenet, Bush’s response was to call the information “the same old thing.” Bush insisted it was simply what Saddam wanted him to think. “The president had no interest in the intelligence,” said the CIA officer. The other officer said, “Bush didn’t give a fuck about the intelligence. He had his mind made up.”

It is one of the lingering urban myths of President Bush's Iraq policy that no one knew and no one could have known.  However, the evidence was there but had to be manipulated, ignored, or suppressed. CIA deputy director John McLaughlin saw the intelligence.  Deputy Director George Tenet saw the intelligence. President Bush saw the intelligence.  But Secretary of State Colin Powell and Congress did not see the intelligence, and National Security Advisor Wolfowitz says "everybody saw the intelligence."  (Blumenthal doesn't mention National Security Advisor Mushroom Cloud Rice, who may have not been considered important enough to tell the truth to, or to be lied to.)

Persistent, too, is the urge to compare to the Holocaust whatever one particular dislikes.  It should not be surprising that this old chestnut was raised by Joe Lieberman (interviewed with Woflowitz), who disingenuously created the loathsome term "Jewish-American."   Thankfully, we have no "Catholic-American" or "Protestant-American" (does not sound quite right, does it?). As God  reminded us in The Last Testament- A Memoir:  "breaking news from Mt. Sinai:  Judaism is a religion."

And on Monday, Lieberman went Holocaust on us, which is a new low for him (or maybe not).   Morgan had shown video of Secretary of State Kerry nearly incoherently arguing

The real issue here is whether or not the Congress is going to stand up for international norms with respect to dictators that have only been broken twice until Assad, Hitler, and Saddam Hussein.

Very short term effort that degrades this capacity to deliver chemical weapons without assuming responsibility for Syria's civil war. That is exactly what we're talking about doing. Unbelievably small, limited kind of effort.

That was over the top.    Bringing up Hitler to urge Congress "to stand up for international norms with respect to dictators" was nearly absurd, given that Assad has nowhere near the designs on his region that Adolph Hitler had.  But American politicians have claimed for the past fifty years that failure to take military action in a particular instance is akin to Neville Chamberlain's sell-out at Munich, popularly referred to as "appeasement."

Nevertheless, the former Connecticut senator took it a step further when, responding to Morgan's criticism of Kerry's remark as nearly ambiguous, he maintained

Well, I'm sure John Kerry wishes he hadn't said unbelievably small. I noticed that in the briefing that Tony Blinken, the Deputy of National Security adviser gave this afternoon, he described that an attack as being limited and -- but the size of that's much a better phraseology. But I'll tell you Secretary Kerry had a point that we've been challenged here, not just by the use of gas which links Bashar al- Assad to Adolf Hitler. But by all that happened during the '30s as the US particularly watch drawn by isolation at some back, watched Hitler and the facets (ph) of move forward, and finally come in at a late hour and think out decisively.

Lieberman not only agreed with the Secretary of State but additionally gave a nod and a wink to the Holocaust when he pointed to "all that happened during the '30s."  It may be only a difference in degree, but a difference of degree in winter (perhaps from 31 to 30) can mean the difference between clouds and a blizzard.



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No Trip To Charlotte



Senator Joe Lieberman hasn't been invited to the Democratic (or Republican) National Convention this year and a few people are offended.

The Hill's Alexander Bolton reports

Some Democrats think keeping Lieberman away is a mistake. After all, he served as Al Gore’s running mate in 2000, becoming the first Jewish American to run atop a major party’s ticket.He also presided for several years as chairman of the Democratic Leadership Council, which helped transform the ideology of the Democratic Party and laid the groundwork for Bill Clinton’s election in 1992.

“Even though he’s no longer a member of the Democratic Party, he caucuses with the Senate Democrats and provides a vote for their majority. It would be a good thing to invite him,” said Tad Devine, a Democratic strategist who served as a senior adviser to Gore’s campaign. “He doesn’t have to be invited to give a speech. He doesn’t have to have Clinton’s time slot."...

“Joe Lieberman is a victim of polarization. He’s another person cast aside by people who aren’t interested in centrist views,” said Professor Ross K. Baker, a professor of political science at Rutgers University, who has worked as a scholar in residence in the Senate.

Dan Schnur, director of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at the University of Southern California, said Lieberman’s approach is out of step with the times.

“Given how polarized the political process has become, my guess is that Joe Lieberman is taking this, appropriately, as a tremendous compliment,” said Schnur. “If there were a convention being held in the days between Tampa and Charlotte that was devoted to bridging partisan gaps and moving forward on the country’s challenges, Joe Lieberman would probably be the keynote speaker.”

In response, Hullabaloo's David Atkins (with a deserved swipe at Bill Clinton) explains

Holding contradictory partisan views doesn't make one a "centrist." Supporting lower taxes on the wealthy while supporting action on climate change isn't "centrist." A hypothetical candidate who wanted to ban abortion entirely while supporting single-payer healthcare wouldn't be a "centrist," either. A centrist is someone who supports milquetoast, inoffensive positions on a variety of issues: say, simplifying the the tax code while raising taxes slightly on just the richest incomes. Or advocating toothless carbon exchanges as a "solution" to climate change. Or decrying abortion but wanting to make it "safe, legal and rare." Or converting welfare programs into work programs.

You know, the mainstream positions of the modern Democratic Party. That's centrism. It's not the voters' fault if centrism has been wholly adopted by one political party while the other sits squarely in crazyville. That's just the breaks.

Like Baker and Schnur, Bolton is perturbed that such a deserving, open-minded guy like the Democratic-turned-Independent senator from Connecticut is being being denied what he appears to believe is a constitutional right of being invited to a party convention.   He writes

Lieberman made a memorable attempt to bridge party divides in 2008 when he endorsed Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) over then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), a move that infuriated many Democrats and nearly cost him a top committee slot.

“I am here tonight because John McCain’s whole life testifies to a great truth: Being a Democrat or Republican is important, but it is nowhere near as important as being an American,” he said in the 2008 speech.

He went on to praise McCain for taking on “corrupt Republican lobbyists” to reform campaign finance law and for trying to reform the nation’s immigration laws and “actually do something about global warming.”

In 2000, Joe Lieberman pulled the rug out from under Al Gore and did his part to make George W. Bush president.    Not content with helping one Republican enter the Oval Office, in 2008 he didn't merely endorse the G.O.P. candidate for president.  He spoke at the party's convention, slamming both the Democratic nominee for allegedly being unwilling "to take on powerful interest groups in the Democratic Party" and by implication, those very "interest groups." That would be those selfish minorities, women, public employees, members of unions.

Lieberman didn't only endorse the GOP presidential nominee, he campaigned for him.   And in so doing, he implied the Democratic nominee was unfaithful to American soldiers, accusing him of "voting to cut off funding for our troops on the ground."   Not a mention from the paragon of bipartisanship and independence, however, that, as Media Matters noted in 2008, John McCain "voted against legislation to fund the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq or that Obama has voted in the past to provide funds for troops stationed there."

Joe Lieberman is entitled to support actively anyone he wants for any office and to advocate for what he believes in.  But when those views are antithetical to the causes central to the Democratic Party and he works strenuously to defeat a Democratic nominee for president, it would be political malpractice to invite him to the gathering which will renominate that individual he found so repugnant in 2008.




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When Centrists Prevail

The notion that Democrats have become too liberal and Republicans too conservative has become conventional wisdom among the Beltway media.     Hand-wringing over the alleged emergence of uncivil dialogue and loss of bipartisanship in the US Congress accompany the narrative in which Democrats are given equal blame as Republicans, who made a decision over three years ago to oppose anything Democrats support.     Digby explains

So, even as the Republicans have moved hard to the right, the Democrats protect the status quo. Which, with each passing year, has moved farther right. Basically, Republicans enact their agenda and it becomes the status quo. Then the Democrats come along and protect what they've done. That becomes the center. At which point the Republicans call the Democrats communists and move even farther right.

Politico has been in the forefront of perpetuating the myth of even-handedness, so it's no surprise to read today from Charles Mahtesian and Jim VandeHei

“In light of what happened in Pennsylvania — you see a guy like Tim Holden lose a primary, who was very middle of the road, reasonable, worked with both sides. You see him losing a primary to someone who’s a good bit more liberal — I think we’re seeing this loss of the middle,” said former Rep. Michael Arcuri, a Blue Dog Democrat.

“It just leads me to believe that it’s going to be harder and harder to get things done. It’s not that you don’t have good people there that want to work together, it’s just that their views are so far apart.”

No one would deny that Senator Joseph Lieberman (I-Ct) is a part of this wondrous and virtuous middle.       Ezra Klein, defending President Obama's role in working for passage of the Affordable Care Act, describes just how the "middle of the road, reasonable" approach worked during the debate over health care:

Late in the negotiations over the public option, a group of five conservative Democrats and five more-liberal Democrats seemed near to an unexpectedly smart compromise: Allow adults over 55 to buy into Medicare. This idea had a couple of different virtues: For one, it opened an effective and cheap program up to a group of Americans who often have the most trouble finding affordable insurance. For another, the Congressional Budget Office has said this policy would improve Medicare's finances by bringing healthier, younger applicants into the risk pool. Oh, and it's wildly popular with liberals, who want to see Medicare offered as an option to more people, and since Medicare is already up and running, it could've been implemented rapidly.

But Lieberman killed it. It was never really clear why. He'd been invited to the meetings where the compromise was developed, but he'd skipped them. He'd supported the idea when he ran for president with Al Gore, and he'd reaffirmed that support three months prior to its emergence in the health-care debate during an interview with the editorial board of the Connecticut Post. But now that it was on the table, he seemed to be groping for reasons to oppose it. About the best he managed was that it was "duplicative," which was about as nonsensical a position as could be imagined. Nevertheless, he swore to filibuster the bill if the buy-in option was added. The proposal was duly removed.

This is the classic bipartisanship to which the media is in thrall.     A Democrat (with whose party he caucuses) opposes a progressive initiative of congressional Democrats, and the latter are forced to drop the proposal.       A compassionate plan, fiscally responsible, and popular with the electorate, it was just too darned liberal.     It would have worked but had to be defeated because "moderation"-  moving rightward with the Republican Party- must prevail.   

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Joe Lieberman As Himself

When Joseph Lieberman, faced with near-certain defeat, announced last week he would not be running for re-election to the U.S. Senate in 2012, several Democrats were effusive in their praise of the Connecticut senator. Very generous they, applauding the guy who lost the Democratic primary in 2006 and went on, with support from virtually the entire state GOP establishment, to defeat the Democratic nominee.

The New York Times' David Brooks reported that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid wrote him an e-mail: "He was an integral part of the Democratic caucus and his dedication to public service, ability to work across the aisle and broad range of experience will be missed." Brooks received also an e-mail from Vice President Biden, who wrote "The Senate will not be the same without Joe’s leadership and powerful intellect. But it is his civility that will be missed the most." And Senator John Kerry said "He’s defined himself by his conscience and beliefs.”

There was no indication whether the "civility" Biden cited included Lieberman's lecture of Iraq war critics in December, 2005. Nearly accusing members of his own party of treason, he declared "It’s time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge that he will be the commander in chief for three more critical years and that in matters of war we undermine presidential credibility at our nation’s peril."

Whatever "conscience" John Kerry was referring to on Lieberman's part seems to have evaporated by the time the Senator had this transaction (video below; transcript from The Huffington Post) with Arianna Huffington on Thursday's Morning Joe:

ARIANNA HUFFINGTON: It was stunning to hear you say that there was evidence that Saddam Hussein was working on weapons of mass destruction, given that even President Bush himself has now accepted that there had been no evidence. So on what basis are you saying that?

JOE LIEBERMAN: I'm basing it on the so-called Duelfer Report. Charles D-U-E-L-F-E-R conducted the most comprehensive report on behalf of our government. And it was, nobody thought it was partisan. I want to be very clear: he didn't find big caches of weapons of mass destruction. But he found, and proved I think, that Saddam had every intention, and particularly to develop nuclear weapons, was developing chemical and biological weapons, and had a structure in place including nuclear scientists that he was prepared to support if he broke out of the sanctions, which he was inclined to do. So I think that the evidence is clear that if we did not do what we did that Saddam Hussein would today have at least chemical and biological weapons and have a nuclear program probably like Iran's beginning to move toward capabilities, and that the entire world would be a much less...

HUFFINGTON: Well, based on this completely unfounded assumption, I sincerely hope for the sake of the country that you do not become Secretary of Defense.

LIEBERMAN: Now Arianna, these are not unfounded. Go read the Duelfer Report.

HUFFINGTON: There is nothing in the report that proves anything that you have said.

Lieberman would follow with "I don't think you've read it, sweetheart." Don't seat the condescension- no one has ever accused Joe Lieberman of being insufficiently sanctimonious. Nevertheless, there remains the substance of the Senator's claim that Hussein

was developing chemical and biological weapons, and had a structure in place including nuclear scientists that he was prepared to support if he broke out of the sanctions, which he was inclined to do. So I think that the evidence is clear that if we did not do what we did that Saddam Hussein would today have at least chemical and biological weapons and have a nuclear program probably like Iran's beginning to move toward capabilities....

Let's go to the Washington Post article of 10/7/04, in which Dana Priest and Walter Pincus explain

The 1991 Persian Gulf War and subsequent U.N. inspections destroyed Iraq's illicit weapons capability and, for the most part, Saddam Hussein did not try to rebuild it, according to an extensive report by the chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq that contradicts nearly every prewar assertion made by top administration officials about Iraq.

Charles A. Duelfer, whom the Bush administration chose to complete the U.S. investigation of Iraq's weapons programs, said Hussein's ability to produce nuclear weapons had "progressively decayed" since 1991. Inspectors, he said, found no evidence of "concerted efforts to restart the program."

The findings were similar on biological and chemical weapons. While Hussein had long dreamed of developing an arsenal of biological agents, his stockpiles had been destroyed and research stopped years before the United States led the invasion of Iraq in March 2003. Duelfer said Hussein hoped someday to resume a chemical weapons effort after U.N. sanctions ended, but had no stocks and had not researched making the weapons for a dozen years....

Hussein, the report concluded, "aspired to develop a nuclear capability" and intended to work on rebuilding chemical and biological weapons after persuading the United Nations to lift sanctions. But the report also notes: "The former regime had no formal written strategy or plan for the revival of WMD after sanctions. Neither was there an identifiable group of WMD policy makers or planners separate from Saddam" tasked to take this up once sanctions ended.

Having announced his eventual departure from the Senate, Lieberman could have suggested he had reconsidered his support for the U.S. adventure in Iraq. Or merely that events since The Awakening had resulted in an Iraq creeping toward democracy and political stability. He could have demonstrated a little of that vaunted "conscience," honesty, or humility. But that would have been out of character and Joe Lieberman, to whom his former party has pandered for over four years, had no reason to display class which consistently has eluded him.

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Joe Lieberman Fortunate He's Not Lisa Murkowski

"I belong to no organized political party. I'm a Democrat."- Will Rogers

The Republican Party shows how it's done.

No, really. A popular United States Senator loses her bid for renomination- so narrowly it spurs a (futile) recount- and the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee reacts as, well, a party leader should:

Sen. John Cornyn, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee has issued a clear warning to Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), telling her that she risks losing her party leadership role if she goes through with recent plans to run for reelection as a write-in candidate, Politico reports.

"It's hard to see how you stay as part of the Republican leadership if you are no longer running as a Republican," Cornyn said according to Politico. "I think that's pretty much the end of that."

Sen. Murkowski currently serves as the vice chairwoman NRSC and has more than $1 million in funds potentially available to her if she remains on the ballot in November.

On Wednesday, Fox News reported that Murkowski is strongly considering running as a write-in candidate after her shocking loss in the GOP primary to Tea Party-backed Joe Miller. Murkowski had sought to run as a Libertarian third-party candidate, but the Alaska Libertarian Party rejected her candidacy last month, saying that her voting record disqualified her from that party affiliation.

It is not at all clear that a write-in candidacy by Murkowski would help ensure the election of Tea Party favorite and reactionary Joe Miller, suggesting that Cornyn's approach is not grounded in any fear that the incumbent might throw the election to Democrat Scott McAdams. Rather, Miller is the GOP nominee, and that's that.

Compare that to the Democratic Party. In 2006 Ned Lamont defeats incumbent Joe Lieberman in the senatorial primary in Connecticut, defects to run as an Independent and, backed (with a wink of the eye) by Republicans and many prominent Democrats, defeats the hapless GOP nominee and Ned Lamont. Democrats retake the Senate and Lieberman is awarded chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee.

In April of 2008, asked whether likely Democratic nominee Barack Obama is a "Marxist," Lieberman said

Well, you know, I must say that’s a good question. I know him now for a little more than three years since he came into the Senate and he’s obviously very smart and he’s a good guy. I will tell ya that during this campaign, I’ve learned some things about him, about the kind of environment from which he came ideologically. And I wouldn’t…I’d hesitate to say he’s a Marxist, but he’s got some positions that are far to the left of me and I think mainstream America.

Lieberman went on to endorse John McCain for President, was nearly selected as the vice-presidential running mate, spoke in prime time at the Republican National Convention, and was virtually inseparable from the Arizona senator on the campaign trail. On October 5, he would tell the Fox News Sunday audience "you know, Senator Obama has really been spreading falsehoods about John regularly since then about his tax plans, about his health care plans, which are good for middle-class America." Eighteen days later the Connecticut senator would outdo himself(link from Think Progress to politickernh.com no longer available), commenting

There are ways I suppose you can make an argument that there are some similarities between what Sen. Obama is talking about (‘spreading the wealth’) and classic, what used to be known as socialist theory…[but] I’m not going to use the name calling.

After Senator Obama is elected and Congress is reorganized, there is an a movement to remove from his leadership position the guy who arguably was the most fervent opponent of the fellow who was elected president. Nonetheless, Mr. Beyond Partisanship/Above Partisanship, President-elect Barack Obama, "and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada struck a conciliatory tone in public, allowing Lieberman to remain head of the influential committee. The secret ballot vote was 42 to 13."

Unfortunately (here at least), ye shall repeat what ye sow. Having noticed that Blue Dog Democrats get their way by standing up to President Obama,

Lieberman, who caucuses with Senate Democrats, expressed his "strong" support for the temporary extension of the across-the-board tax cuts in a speech to the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce in Connecticut. His support for the Republican position of not raising any taxes in the midst of a recession highlights the intense battle set for Congress as lawmakers return to Washington Monday.

A true Machiavellian might speculate: Barack Obama is pleased when a moderate or conservative Democrat comes out in favor of extending the Bush tax cuts for individuals earning over $200,000, or joint filers earning over $250,000, annually. That way, he can, after posturing as a supporter of the middle class against the wealthy, take the easy way out and support extension of all the cuts. That may be overly cynical, however; the President, who was obsessed during the health care debate to have reform fully paid for, similarly now has stood steadfast against reimposing the the deficit-exploding tax cuts for the wealthy.

Once again, though, Joe Lieberman is there to undercut the Democratic Party, if not Barack Obama.

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Don't Back Down

A skirmish is ensuing between the AFL-CIO and the administration of Barack Obama. Following the primary victory on Tuesday of incumbent Democratic Senator Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas over her progressive challenger, Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter, Ben Smith of Politico reported

A senior White House official just called me with a very pointed message for the administration's sometime allies in organized labor, who invested heavily in beating Blanche Lincoln, Obama's candidate, in Arkansas.

"Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members' money down the toilet on a pointless exercise," the official said. "If even half that total had been well-targeted and applied in key House races across this country, that could have made a real difference in November."

Lincoln relied heavily both on Obama's endorsement, which she advertised relentlessly on radio and in the mail, and on the backing of former President Bill Clinton, who backed her to the hilt.

Lincoln foe Bill Halter had the unstinting support of the AFL-CIO, SEIU, AFSCME and other major unions. And labor officials Tuesday evening were already working to spin the narrow loss of their candidate, Bill Halter, as a moral victory, but the cost in money and in the goodwill of the White House may be a steep price to pay for a near miss.

Fortunately, the AFL-CIO responded promptly, with its spokesman Eddie Vale (no, not this Vale) explaining

If that's their take on this, then they severely misread how the electorate feels and how we're running our political program. When we say we're only going to support elected officials who support our issues. When they say we should have targeted our money among some key house races among Blue Dog Democrats — that ain't happening.

Labor isn't an arm of the Democratic Party. It exists to support working families. And that's what we said tonight, and that's what we're gong to keep saying.

Organized labor isn't the puppy dog of the Democratic Party, though sometimes it is so perceived, to the detriment of both the labor movement and the party whose candidates it usually supports. It's not too wise to tell the American people that Barack Obama expects labor to march in lockstep with his Party.

Labor need to eschew personality crusades and instead support the issues which benefit its members, for to do otherwise would be a severe disservice to those members. That should be obvious to the White House but evidently is not, and may be reflected in the apparent threat from the administration delivered via Smith: the loss of "money and goodwill," as the journalist put it, from the White House.

Perhaps the AFL-CIO isn't really frightened of retaliation from its reluctance to play Stepford Wife to President Obama. Blanche Lincoln, for instance, pledged to filibuster against a health care public option, which we were led to believe and are still being told, President Obama supported. Yet, there was President Obama doing a robocall on behalf of Lincoln, a conservative Democrat, in her (successful) bid to derail the candidacy of Bill Halter.

And then there is the case of Joe Lieberman. In April, 2008, asked if Obama is a Marxist, Lieberman replied "I must say, that’s a good question … I will tell you that during this campaign, I’ve learned some things about him, about the kind of environment from which he came ideologically. And I wouldn’t … I’d hesitate to say he’s a Marxist, but he’s got some positions that are far to the left of me and I think mainstream America."

The next month he told CNN's Wolf Blitzer "the fact that the spokesperson for Hamas would say they would welcome the election of Senator Obama really does raise the question, "Why?" And it suggests the difference between these two candidates."

In August, 2008 he framed the upcoming presidential election as "between one candidate, John McCain, who has always put the country first, worked across party lines to get things done, and one candidate who has not.’’

The next month, Lieberman delivered a nominating speech for Obama's opponent, Republican John McCain, then a few days later shamelessly admonished nominee Obama for voting to "cut off funding for our troops on the ground."

After he was elected, President-elect Obama, saying he "doesn't hold any grudges" against Lieberman, gave his de facto support to keep a position as chairman of the Homeland Security Committee to the man who implied Obama may be a Marxist, is supported by Islamic terrorists, does not put the country first, and wants American soldiers to be shot dead in combat. It's one thing to forgive- it's quite another to boost an avid opponent against another Democrat (who would have become chairman) who supported Obama's election.

Has Barack Obama changed? Probably not. In May at the White House, President Obama presented the Duke Blue Devils with a plaque honoring their NCAA basketball championship. He joked “(Coach K) went out with all these guys and won, so he could come to the White House and crow bout it. Payback is sweet, isn’t it, coach?"

Obama's reference to "payback" derived from his failure to pick Duke to win the national championship but could have been to something far different. Shortly before the tournament began in March, coach Krzyzewski, informed that Obama had selected Duke rival North Carolina to win the national championship, took a shot at the President: "Somebody said that we're not in President Obama's Final Four, and as much as I respect what he's doing, really, the economy is something that he should focus on, probably more than the brackets."

It may be helpful, though really odd, for a basketball coach to remind us that in the full scope of a nation's priorities, sports doesn't matter. And admittedly, this doesn't rise nearly to the level of Lincoln or even Lieberman. But for criticizing President Obama for doing what a U.S. President does, "Coach K" (cute, isn't it?) gets this: Barack Obama joyfully reminding the guy that he stuck it to him and came out on top.

And now, a White House official warns if you oppose us, we'll cut you off? Incumbent Lincoln (who only recently was not favored to win her race), Lieberman, who defeated the Democrat (the Republican was less than a token opponent) in his re-election bid, and Krzyzewski had one thing in common: they were winners. Organized labor, meanwhile, has failed to obtain card check or even a modified Employeees Fair Check Act, to derail an excise tax on comprehensive health care plans, or to prevent an increase in premium costs for COBRA health coverage. Nor did its efforts to elect Barack Obama resulted in a President whose highest economic priority is restoration and creation of jobs. The message to the union movement is clear: stick to your program and criticize President Obama whenever necessary; win at least once, and you won't have to come begging to President Obama. He will come to you.

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Reform Stymied

Big Tent Democrat at Talk Left goes right to the heart of the matter, posting a YouTube video (below) of what he says "remains the most prescient statement of the primaries."

What does he mean? This excerpt from CBS' Face The Nation (transcript in PDF), on which Connecticut Senator Lieberman and Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson appeared, suggests the wisdom of his reference:

SENATOR JOE LIEBERMAN: Bob, as I was saying there's a good basic bill in here and-- and the parts of it can be supported by sixty senators, including some Republicans, but we've got to stop adding to the bill. We got to start subtracting some controversial things. I think the only way to get this done before Christmas is to bring in some Republicans who are open-minded on this like Olympia Snowe. I'll tell you if--

BOB SCHIEFFER: Well, what do you have to do to do that?

SENATOR JOE LIEBERMAN: You got to take out the Medicare buy-in. You got to forget about the public option. You probably have to take out the CLASS Act, which was a whole new entitlement program that will in-- in future years put us further into deficit. And you got to adopt some of the cost containment provisions that will strengthen cost containment that all of us favor. If you did that, you'd have an enormous accomplishment. Thirty million Americans who can't afford insurance today would get it. Insurance companies out to be more aggressively regulated and costs would be bent down. So it’s time to get reasonable.

Joe Lieberman has now made it clear that he is against any kind of public option or near- public option at all- whether "robust," triggers, buy-in, buy-out, or increasing access to Medicare. As for Senator Nelson, he was only slightly less defiantly obstructionist:

BOB SCHIEFFER: --why do you think it's a bad idea to add this buy-in to Medicare, to let younger people buy into this program, Senator Nelson?

SENATOR BEN NELSON: Well, first of all, we don't know what the numbers are yet, Bob, and so that-- that’s-- that’s a (sic) important question.

BOB SCHIEFFER: You don't know what it's going to cost.

SENATOR BEN NELSON: We don't know what it's going to cost. The second thing is I'm concerned that it's-- it’s the forerunner of single-payer, the ultimate singer single-payer plan, maybe even more directly than the public option.

Talking Points Memo's Josh Marshall (12/13/09) comments:

What's most telling about Lieberman isn't his positions, which are not that much different from Sen. Nelson's and perhaps Sen. Lincoln's. It's more that he seems to keep upping the ante just when the rest of the caucus thinks they've got a deal.

If it happened once, a misunderstanding might be a credible explanation. But it's happened too many times. Sen. Nelson has driven Dems to distraction on this bill. But his demands have been fairly consistent over time. Lieberman just doesn't seem to be negotiating in good faith. He keeps pulling his caucus to some new compromise, waiting a few days and then saying he can't agree to that either.

Senator Lieberman's opposition to health care reform should come as no surprise. On October 29, Joe Conason explained in salon.com that

Hadassah Lieberman's employment as a "senior counselor" to Hill & Knowlton, one of the world’s biggest lobbying firms, briefly erupted as an issue, especially because the clients she served were in the controversial pharmaceutical and insurance sectors. Exactly what she did for those clients has never been disclosed.

At the time she joined the public relations and lobbying conglomerate in the spring of 2005, she expressed the touching hope that she would somehow be able to help those in need. "I have had a lifelong commitment to helping people gain better healthcare," she said in a press release. "I am excited about the opportunity to work with the talented team at Hill & Knowlton to counsel a terrific stable of clients toward that same goal." Less than a year later, having pocketed $77,000 in salary, she quit without explanation -- just as her husband was facing a tough primary that he would eventually lose. Throughout the campaign, Hadassah Lieberman, her husband and their spokespersons explicitly refused to discuss her professional activities, except to note that she had not been required to register as a lobbyist.

But her stint at Hill & Knowlton was merely one episode in a professional lifetime devoted to the corporate health sector. For most of the past three decades, Hadassah Lieberman has been employed by either pharmaceutical companies or the lobbying firms that represent them -- starting with nearly a decade in the "public affairs department" at Hoffman-LaRoche from 1972-81, followed by stints at Pfizer, where she spent four years as "director of policy, planning and communications," and APCO Associates, a major lobbying firm where she served as a "senior associate" in its large healthcare division before retiring in 1998.

She went back to work when she joined H&K, an outfit that became notorious for its billion-dollar defense of the tobacco industry. Not long after her contract began, Sen. Lieberman introduced legislation vastly extending patent protection for pharmaceutical companies -- notably including GlaxoSmithKline, a top client of his wife's firm.

A few days earlier, J. Taylor Rushing had noted in The Hill

Connecticut has the highest U.S. concentration of insurance jobs, with the industry accounting for about 64,000 jobs as of June 2009, according to the state’s labor department. That’s down 23 percent from the 83,000 jobs in 1990, although the state projects a slow growth of 4 percent through 2014. The state is home to 72 insurance headquarters, with three times the U.S. average of insurance jobs as a percent of total state employment.

The Lieberman family's direct conflict of interest because of its ties with the insurance industry appears to have ended in 1995 and although the Senator has collected nearly half a million dollars from the industry, he has not been the Senate's greatest beneficiary of its largesse. Still, it's hard to escape the conclusion that due to campaign funding and Hadassah's prior employment, Senator Lieberman believes he owes a debt of gratitude to the industry which dominates his home state.

Which brings us, finally, to the posted video, in which Hillary Clinton (who for reasons of her own went on to become President Obama's Secretary of State)in a campaign appearance in Rhode Island mocks the Illinois Senator:

Let's just get everybody together.
Let's get unified.
The sky will open.
The light will come down.
Celestial choirs will be singing
and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect.
Maybe I've just lived a little long but I have no illusions about how hard it's going to be.
You are not going to wave a magic wand and have the special interests disappear.

Barack Obama has waved his magic wand but Joe Lieberman and the special interests have not disappeared. Unless.... there was never any desire for the special intests to disappear, or be defeated, or even challenged. Unless-unless President Chief of Staff Emanuel was pushing triggers from the start.

It's increasingly difficult to determine whether this Administration ever was eager to achieve meaningful health care reform- and is extremely incompetent- or was pulling a fast one on the American left and center, which supports change, from the beginning. Clearly, though, President Obama has been unable, or unwilling, to turn "Si se puede" from a campaign slogan into a governing accomplishment.

A Public Plan, Not Quite As Promised

On Saturday, Senator Joe Lieberman (ID-Ct.) told reporters

This is a kind of 11th hour addition to a debate that's gone on for decades. Nobody's ever talked about a public option before. Not even in the presidential campaign last year.

It would be doing deceit a disservice by suggesting that Senator Lieberman was merely stretching the truth or trying to deceive the media. The idea of the public option is nothing new.

On May 29, 2007, as The New York Times reported, Senator Obama gave in Iowa City, Iowa a speech in which explained that he

would create a public plan for individuals who cannot obtain group coverage through their employers or the existing government programs, like Medicaid or the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. Children would be required to have health insurance. Subsidies would be available for those who need help with the cost of coverage.

On February 24, 2008 The Washington Post reported

There is a growing political consensus among Democrats that universal health care can be achieved by subsidizing coverage for low-income people, establishing new purchasing pools to help others buy affordable insurance, and requiring most businesses to offer health plans to their workers or pay a fee. Both the Obama and Clinton proposals contain these elements, as well as the option to buy into a public plan. Their most striking difference is on whether to require everyone to get a policy.

The platform adopted by the Democratic Party (transcript, in PDF) at its 2008 national convention asserted

Families and individuals should have the option of keeping the coverage they have or choosing from a wide array of health insurance plans, including many private health insurance options and a public plan. Coverage should be made affordable for all Americans with subsidies provided through tax credits and other means.

Once Senators Obama and Biden were nominated, they proposed a health care plan (transcript in PDF) which would

create a National Health Insurance Exchange to help individuals purchase new affordable health care options if they are uninsured or want new health insurance. Through the Exchange, any American will have the opportunity to enroll in the new public plan or an approved private plan, and income-based sliding scale tax credits will be provided for people and families who need it.

For a candidate profile compiled by The Washington Post, Mr. Obama wrote

My plan builds on and improves our current insurance system, which most Americans continue to rely upon, and creates a new public health plan for those currently without coverage.

Both Congress and the President, whether considering an opt-out, a trigger, a triggered opt-out, have come a long way since the Obama-Biden plan promised "through the Exchange, any American will have the opportunity to enroll in the new public plan...." It's not as if we weren't warned: in President Obama's health care speech to the joint session of Congress, he assured Americans

Let me be clear. It would only be an option for those who don't have insurance. No one would be forced to choose it, and it would not impact those of you who already have insurance. In fact, based on Congressional Budget Office estimates, we believe that less than 5 percent of Americans would sign up.

"Any" American being eligible for a public plan had become "less than 5 percent of Americans" signing on to the public option.

An exasperated Senator Sherrod Brown (D.-Ohio) explained the process to a New York Times reporter:

A large number of people in this country including many, many doctors wanted Medicare for all. That didn’t happen. Then we wanted a strong public option tied to Medicare rates. Then we wanted a public option building the Medicare network. That didn’t happen. Now we are saying public option coming out of the HELP Committee. And now we’re saying public option with the state opt-out. Where was the compromise coming from their side?

One would think, then, that Lieberman andd conservative Democratic senators would be satisfied that a bold candidate, promising a government option to all Americans, and overwhelming Democratic majorities in both houses of the legislature are now reduced to pleading that a vote be held on a health care bill far weaker than they had envisioned. Yet, as Brown understands, with every concession the goal posts keep getting moved, with liberal/moderate Democrats reduced to working to pass legislation they can only hope will improve the nation's health care system merelu at the margin.

Obama's Choice

Senator Claire McCaskill (D.-Mo.) was a very early supporter of, and constant surrogate for, Barack Obama, and fittingly, backed the bid of the Independent Senator from Connecticut, Joe Lieberman, to remain chairman of the Senate's Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. In an article in Salon, Mike Madden quotes the Missouri Senator as saying:

He has sent a very clear signal since his election -- one of humility and one of reconciliation and healing, and it's very clear to all of us that he doesn't want to play the old political games. Old politics would have been revenge and retribution. New politics would be, let's get to work.

In an ironic way, McCaskill is half right. Unlike the comments of some such as Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas ("what happened, happened in the Senate- not in the White House, in the Senate"), McCaskill seems to understand that the primary reason Lieberman (who lost his position as chairman of a subcommittee) was given an ineffectual slap on the wrist was Barack Obama. It was the President-elect's spokesperson, Stephanie Cutter, who, in an e-mail of November 11, wrote Greg Sargent of Talking Points Memo

We aren't going to referee decisions about who should or should not be a committee chair. President-elect Obama looks forward to working with anyone to move the country forward. We'd be happy to have Sen. Lieberman caucus with the Democrats. We don't hold any grudges.

If the leader of your party, recently elected in a near-landslide and currently enjoying great popularity, says (through a representative) a)"we'd be happy to have Sen. Lieberman caucus with the Democrats" (though evicting Lieberman from the caucus never was on the table); and b)"we don't hold any grudges" toward a politician who has said that you are "a talker" who hasn't always "put country first," the message is clear: I want that guy to remain in a position of influence. And another message: cross me, and I will reward you.

At some point during what he hopes will be an eight-year run, President Obama will be faltering in the polls with little support among the American people. And he will need the vote of a wavering member of Congress, who will then remember the message Barack Obama sent in his advocacy of another member of Congress who actively, and virulently, attacked him throughout the campaign. And that member will know that bucking President Obama carries no retribution and no consequence, except possibly reward.

Lieberman Triumphs

The vote is in, and the Senate Democratic caucus has voted 42-13 to condemn Senator Joseph Lieberman for statements made during the presidential campaign, remove him as chairman of the Environment and Public Works subcommittee, and allow him to remain as chairman of the Homeland Security Committee.

This was a total victory and complete vindication of the Connecticut Independent. (Thinkpprogress.org reported Monday that the Capitol Hill publication, Roll Call, had reported that Environment and Public Works Chairman Barbara Boxer plans to deal with climate change legislation at the full committee level next year and therefore Lieberman had little to lose from his colleagues stripping him of that assignment.)

The endorsement of Lieberman was not surprising, given the statement of November 11 by Obama spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter: "We aren't going to referee decisions about who should or should not be a committee chair. President-elect Obama looks forward to working with anyone to move the country forward. We'd be happy to have Sen. Lieberman caucus with the Democrats. We don't hold any grudges."

In a conference call with major liberal bloggers today, Democratic Party National Committee chairman Howard Dean appeared to acknowledge President-elect Obama's influence on the vote to appease Lieberman:

So what... if you run and get a mandate for reconciliation, is your first act to kick this guy out of the party?

Well, people of my generation think -- yeah, damn right we should. But in the new spirit of reconciliation, which is why I think Barack Obama got elected by 66% of the under 35 vote, maybe it's not the way.

I'm very willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the Senators and to Barack Obama on that one.

And that sounds a lot like Lieberman's Connecticut colleague in the United States, Chris Dodd, who on November 7 contended:

What does Barack Obama want? He's talked about reconciliation, healing, bringing people together. I don't think he'd necessarily want to spend the first month of this president-elect period, this transition period, talking about a Senate seat, particularly if someone is willing to come forward and is willing to be a member of your family in the caucus in that sense.

It is one thing for the President-elect to forgive, and condone, Joe Lieberman for questioning the patriotism of Obama's fellow Democrats, as when Lieberman on 12/6/05 declared "It is time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge that he will be Commander-in-Chief for three more critical years, and that in matters of war we undermine Presidential credibility at our nation's peril." Sometimes, however, Obama himself was the target of the virulent attacks. Dick Polman, national political columnist at The Philadelphia Inquirer, neatly sums it up:

When asked last April 14 whether Obama is "a Marxist, as (conservative commentator) Bill Kristol says might be the case," Lieberman replied: "Well, you know, I must say that's a good question." On Oct. 23, Lieberman said that Obama wants to practice "what used to be known as socialist theory." At another point in the campaign, Lieberman declared that, while McCain always put "country first," Obama did not.

And, during his GOP convention speech, Lieberman recited the standard GOP line about how the Democratic candidate is a military wimp who doesn't care about the troops. The key passage: "When others wanted to retreat in defeat from the field of battle, which would've been a disaster for the U.S.A. — when colleagues like Barack Obama were voting to cut off funding for our American troops on the battlefield — John McCain had the courage to stand against the tide of public opinion..." (Italics are mine.)

If it looks like Barack Obama lacks a spine, he's a lot like the former President who tried so hard to deny him the nomination . On October 18, 2005 President Clinton told a business group "I'll tell you the whole story about that budget. Probably there are people in this room still mad at me at that budget because you think I raised your taxes too much. It might surprise you to know that I think I raised them too much, too." Never mind that that the revenue boost contributed greatly to a balanced budget (which in turn helped stabilize the economy), arguably President Clinton's signature contribution to American government.

Bill Clinton always had a need to be liked and not to offend anyone. It could be that a similar instinct is behind the President-elect's yearning to be post-partisan, to cast partisan disagreements aside in order to find common ground, even with scoundrels and Republicans. That could, at least in the short term, prove popular- but it will not bring the "change we need."

Chairman Lieberman

Jane Hamsher of firedoglake.com argues persuasively, and thoroughly, that Senator Joseph Lieberman (I-D., Ct.) should be stripped by House Democrats of his position as chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee. The most interesting (though not most significant) point she makes might be the comments Lieberman made when he was seeking reelection in Connecticut to his Senate seat in 2006. Below view Lieberman arguing

I want Democrats to be back in the majority in Washington and elect a Democratic president in 2008. This man will frustrate and defeat our hopes of doing that.




It's not the rank hypocrisy or dishonest of Lieberman, perhaps the most active surrogate and spokesman for the McCain-Palin ticket, claiming that he wants to "elect a Democratic president in 2008." Rather, it's the realization that Lieberman, engaged in a tough re-election battle, found it politically advantageous in Connecticut to align himself with the Democratic Party and its efforts at capturing a Congressional majority and the White House.

Connecticut. Two Democratic Senators. Five Democratic, 0 Republican U.S. Representatives. A 10-11% margin for the Democratic nominee in 2004; a 22-23% margin for the Democratic nominee in 2008. (O.K., a Republican governor, but we'll try to rectify that in 2010.) Joe Lieberman, if stripped of his chairmanship of Homeland Security, might bolt to the Repub Party. But if he does (and maybe even if he doesn't), he'll continue to vote issue-by-issue in the United States Senate- and be defeated if he runs for re-election in 2012.

An Easy Call

Loyalty is a virtue, but extremism in the defense of one's colleague may not be.

And so it goes that the Hartford Courant reported yesterday of the Democratic Senator from Connecticut commenting on the Democrat-Independent (elected as an Independent) Senator from Connecticut:

What does Barack Obama want?" Dodd rhetorically asked reporters Friday in Hartford. "He's talked about reconciliation, healing, bringing people together. I don't think he'd necessarily want to spend the first month of this president-elect period, this transition period, talking about a Senate seat, particularly if someone is willing to come forward and is willing to be a member of your family in the caucus in that sense."

After Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid met with Connecticut's junior senator, he issued the following statement:

Today Senator Lieberman and I had the first of what I expect to be several conversations. No decisions have been made. While I understand that Senator Lieberman has voted with Democrats a majority of the time, his comments and actions have raised serious concerns among many in our caucus. I expect there to be additional discussions in the days to come, and Senator Lieberman and I will speak to our caucus in two weeks to discuss further steps.

It seems a bit incongrous or disloyal- no, appaling- for a Senator who was assigned the chairmanship of a Congressional committee- in this case, the Homeland Security Committee- to have been an active supporter of the opposition party's presidential candidate. Yet, we all remember Joe Lieberman at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul this summer endorsing John McCain's candidacy for President:



He didn't stop there. Here he is in Ohio pushing for election of the Repub nominee



And Lieberman by John (and Cindy) McCain's side at Florida International University on October 17:




Even before the general election campaign, Lieberman attacked the Democratic Party, as when he told Bill Bennett on the latter's "Morning In America" (what would Reagan do?) radio program by claiming "the party seemed invested in a narrative of retreat and defeat in Iraq."



And he criticized specifically the junior senator from Illinois, who was soon to become officially the Democratic nominee for president:



Imagine what the GOP would do if one of its senators, defeated in a primary, were to run against a Republican senatorial nominee (then run against that nominee and win re-election); attack the Republican Party on what was then the biggest issue in the nation; criticize the presumptive nominee of the Party; and then aggresssively campaign for the Democratic nominee for President, as a surrogate, confidante, and frequent campaigner. At the very least, that Senator would be stripped of his/her role of chairman of a committee, thereby giving way for a loyal, or reasonably loyal, or not extremely disloyal, member of the party to head the committee. And that is how it should be in the case of Senator Joseph Lieberman, lest the Democratic Party strengthen its image as a party without strength and lacking the courage of its convictions, with the backbone of an invertebrate.

Palin As Vice-President

Late in last night's vice-presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin, the latter was asked by moderator Gwen Ifill:

Governor, you mentioned a moment ago the constitution might give the vice president more power than it has in the past. Do you believe as Vice President Cheney does, that the Executive Branch does not hold complete sway over the office of the vice presidency, that it it is also a member of the Legislative Branch?

Palin responded

Of course, we know what a vice president does. And that's not only to preside over the Senate and will take that position very seriously also. I'm thankful the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the vice president if that vice president so chose to exert it in working with the Senate and making sure that we are supportive of the president's policies and making sure too that our president understands what our strengths are.

As this video (at the reference to 10:49 of the site's live blogging) from thinkprogress.org indicates, Chris Matthews, fearing another Dick Cheney. was (appropriately) disturbed about Palin's intent to expand the powers of the vice-presidency. He commented, accurately and as an under-statement, "not too much humility here."

He need not be concerned, however. Sarah Palin cannot have increased powers unless each of two events occurs: 1) John McCain is elected; and 2) President McCain chooses to give Vice-President Palin the increased authority she seeks.

Even if scenario #1 occurs (despite Palin's presence on the ticket), scenario #2 isn't likely. Article 1, Section 3 of the United States Constitution lays out the authority of the Vice-President: "The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no vote, unless they be equally divided. " And it's improbable that Mr. McCain has a different view of the role of the vice-president. As this website reminds us, "even John McCain has joked that a Vice President has two main jobs: checking on the health of the President and attending funerals of foreign leaders." Although that regarded speculation that he would be selected as George W. Bush's running mate in 2000, the Arizona senator as recently as April of this year, "joked" that the main function of a vice-president is to check daily on the health of the president.

No, if John McCain wanted a vice-president whose advice he could rely on, he probably would have selected Joe Lieberman. If he wanted a vice-president he could assign important duties to, he probably would have selected Tom Ridge. And if he wanted a vice-president with proven management experience, he probably would have selected Mitt Romney. Instead, he chose as his mate an individual who, in a performance widely hailed as far superior to her recent interviews, declared "it's a toxic mess, really, on Main Street that's affecting Wall Street."

Distortion, Again

As Anne Kornblut of The Washington Post reports today, "the idea that the Iraqi government under Saddam Hussein helped al-Qaeda plan the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, a view once promoted by Bush administration officials, has since been rejected even by the president himself."

But no matter. It survives as propaganda in the McCain-Palin campaign.

Alaska governor and Repub vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin spoke yesterday before an Iraq-bound brigade of soldiers and hundreds of families who had walked from the post to a deployment service at Fort Wainwright, Alaska. Conflating the Iraq war and the 9/11 attacks, she told the soldiers, who included her son, they would "defend the innocent from the enemies who planned and carried out and rejoiced in the death of thousands of Americans."

A day earlier, on September 10, Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-I, Connecticut) introduced Senate Amendment 5368 to Senate Bill 3001, the fiscal year 2009 Defense Authorization bill. The main passage is:

[It is the sense of the Senate to] recognize the success of the troop surge in Iraq and its strategic significance in advancing the vital national interests of the United States in Iraq, the Middle East, and the world, in particular as a strategic victory in a central front of the war on terrorism.

Think Progress notes the Congressional Record as recording Lieberman's statement as including:

If there is anyone in this Chamber who doubts the strategic stakes in Iraq, I urge them to listen to General Petraeus. Listen to General Petraeus who warned us in an interview published today in the Washington Post that “Iraq is still viewed as the central front for al-Qaida.” Let me repeat that: “Iraq is still viewed as the central front for al-Qaida,” which is to say by al-Qaida. Not Afghanistan, Iraq; not Pakistan, Iraq.
This is not the opinion of a Member of Congress. It is not the opinion of a politician running for office. It is the judgment of America’s most successful battlefield commander in the war on terror which began 7 years ago tomorrow when America was brutally attacked on 9/11/2001.

This measure, as a sense of the Senate resolution, is not binding and thus has no practical effect. But it can a) reinforce the McCain campaign's (ludicrous) implicit argument that the (overrated) success of the surge justifies launch of the Iraq war; b)serve as the basis of attack ads on Senator Obama, who will either vote for it or against it, or miss the vote while on the campaign trail; and c) conflate this war with the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

Lieberman, of course, is merely trying to score political points. But it is conceivable that Governor Palin really believes that we were attacked on September 11, 2001 by terrorists based in Iraq, funded by Iraq, or trained in Iraq. Will the media note that the V.P. nominee, on a mission to prove that she really, really does understand some if the issues facing the country, is ignorant on this vital point? Or will the media instead suggest that she intends to mislead the country for political gain? Here is a safe bet- they will do neither, and so continue to aid and abet the Republican ticket.