A lengthy discussion on the Lieberman situation with Friend of the Razor Ryan had me looking at things in an ever so slightly different way, and I felt it was solid enough to pass on to everyone here.

By now everyone and their brother on Lieberman’s side has said something along the lines of “but if you ignore the foreign policy hawkishness he’s as liberal as they come!” That may be debatable, but we certainly do all agree that Joementum’s abrupt hard right turn in terms of the War on Terror stands in rather stark contrast to just about every other vote he’s placed. Like so many others, I was ready to condemn his actions without asking a simple question: why was he doing that?

Lieberman is not, historically, a foreign policy or national security hawk. If you look at his record at OnTheIssues, elsewhere he’s a pretty moderate Democrat with liberal leanings. To call him a far-left liberal who flipped a 180 isn’t exactly accurate, but he’s definitely always been on the blue side. So it’s time to look at who Joe Lieberman is.

I really do need to stop letting myself get all excited and think the Democrats are capable of actually doing things differently. Every time that happens, I end up monumentally depressed after they prove that they’re just going to fold like origami.

The soup du jour is the 42-13 vote to allow Lieberman to stay in the caucus as well as keep his chair on the Homeland Security Committee. Let me clarify something rather important: I do not care whether or not he caucuses with the Democrats. That’s Joe’s decision. What chuffs me is that he keeps his chair on the HSC. A second point: this is not about “punishment”, this is about the fact that we simply cannot trust Joe to do what’s best for the party or for the country. Just what’s best for Joe.

Then we have this BS:

Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he was very angry by Lieberman’s actions but that “we’re looking forward, we’re not looking back.”

Added Reid: “This was not a time for retribution, it was a time for moving forward on the problems of this country.”

…

“There are some (statements) that I made that I wish I had not,” Lieberman told reporters. “In the heat of campaigns, that happens to all of us, but I regret that. And now it’s time to move on.”

Why is it that whenever people in politics talk about “moving forward”, it means completely forgetting everything that happened yesterday? I don’t get to “move forward” when I seriously aggrieve my friends. If I were to crash my car while driving drunk, I couldn’t tell the judge I just want to “move on” and that “this is no time to look backward, I have to take care of my family.” Every time the Democrats talk about looking ahead and not looking behind, it means someone’s getting off scot free.

Expect now also to hear that the “influence” of the “liberal bloggers” has waned, or cheering that Democrats aren’t “beholden” to the “radical left”. It’s pure hogwash. This is proof that Democrats simply have no spine. When push comes to shove, they’re afraid at seeming too “liberal”. Whereas Republicans are now blaming McCain for not being far-right enough, Democrats are pushing away from the left, and the both of them are completely wrong in their assessments.

The reason people like Bill O’Reilly claim the United States is a center-right nation is because our politicians push that way. Our Democrats are terrified of being placed next to liberals like Markos and Michael Moore, but far-right screechers like Bill Kristol, Hannity, or Ann Coulter are downright exalted by Republicans who are happy to legitimize them and their radical ideologies. The very name “George Soros” is enough to have Democrats sputtering that they have no involvement with him, but do any Republicans care about being pictured with Rupert Murdoch or Richard Mellon Scaife? Not at all.

That’s the problem. Democrats won’t stand up to the conservatives. They’re more than happy to feed into the lie that us liberal bloggers are wackadoodles that are far outside the mainstream, at least unless there’s an election nearby. Then suddenly they loooove the John Aravosises and Atrioses of the world. But then when the smoke clears, they go back to scraping right under the false assumption that doing so will be the politically safe thing to do, regardless of what’s right.

Lieberman stays, will undoubtedly launch investigations on Obama, and the Democrats are calling it a victory. Hanlon is depressed, folks

This one hurts me, because I’ve always been a big fan of Chris Dodd. He was one of the few truly principled Senators during the primaries and an actual example of someone who damages his political career in the interest of doing what’s right. That’s why I can’t figure out why for the life of me he’s going so far out of his way to smack Obama around over the Lieberman situation.

“What does Barack Obama want?” Dodd rhetorically asked reporters Friday after speaking at a childhood nutrition forum at the state Capitol complex 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.”

Yes, yes, we all love reconciliation, but Joe Lieberman has not been a man who seems interested in unity. Joe is about Joe, and his actions have exhibited not a “willingness” to be in the Democratic caucus, but a decision to do so in order to gain leverage and keep a measure of power for himself. Hell with him.

So president-elect Barack Obama (man I love saying that) is staying out of the Lieberman situation. It’s a fairly hairy situation, but one we really do have to think about.

First off, I have a well-cured beef with Holy Joe. Pop the name “Lieberman” into the search box up there and you’ll find a pretty nice list of long tirades I’ve written about the guy and the big right-wing talking point about Democrats being “lockstep”. I’m going to quickly reiterate my central point on why I really cannot stand the man.

It’s not that he broke ranks. We’ve seen that a thousand times, neither party is perfectly unified (though the GOP comes close for political reasons). It’s not even that he supported McCain (though that doesn’t help). The problem is that he has absolutely torn into Democrats on all things national security. He’s fostered a persona of “I’m just sorry that my fellow Democrats do not want America to be safe” and gone beyond supporting McCain into the land of lambasting Obama for lack of security and weakness. At least the Republicans who supported Obama were magnanimous about it.

Right now, even if Franken takes Minnesota, that’s a 59-41 majority in the Senate, not enough to prevent filibusters unless we can snag someone like Hagel. With three seats (last I checked) on the fence, if any one of them doesn’t come through for the Dems and we’re down to a 58-42 majority counting Lieberman, hell with ‘im. Let him go to the Republicans. The only reason he was tolerated until now was that without him the Democrats lost the majority.

It was his choice to piss on his own party and his colleagues. His choice to campaign against the man to whom he owes his victory over Ned Lamont. Coddling him and saying that it’s all “water under the bridge” just tells the country that Democrats have no principles.

Watch this ad and see if you can guess why this pisses me off.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5AsdYWtKLY[/youtube]

I’ve frequently expressed my dissatisfaction with the rather massive tilt in Washington against people who just plain don’t believe in any god. At this point the only one we’ve got Pete Stark out of 535 people on the hill. Given that in 2003 roughly 10% of Americans didn’t believe in any god, the 0.18% in Congress just doesn’t match up well. So yes, I’m happy a Kay Hagan is able to break into the Senate.

What really chaps my ass is that the fact that some people don’t believe in God is used as a bludgeon to beat people over the head with, complete with dramatic music. Apparently forgetting that the Constitution explicitly states that there shall be no test of religion required to hold public office, the NRSC wants its voters to think that not believing in God is, by itself, proof that this woman cannot be worthy of holding public office. The shadowy video bits to make her look extra demonic are a nice touch too.

EDIT: Yes, I put in the wrong video. Harumph!

74-25. More later.

One might be tempted to give John McCain credit for his keen interest in dropping politics to face the issues confronting America. That is, until one remembers that McCain has, thus far, been the Senate’s most absent member, skipping all kinds of crucial votes in order to campaign.

Some fun facts about John McCain: Of all Senators, John McCain has been the most absent. There have been 643 votes taken in the current Senate session: McCain has missed 412 of them.

McCain has not voted in the Senate since April 8th. Since March, he has missed 109 of the last 110 votes.

He missed votes on the GI Bill, energy policy, and in 2007 he missed “all 15 critical environmental votes in the Senate” — giving him a 2007 rating of 0% from the League of Conservation Voters. Zero percent? I don’t think that’s fair. I think they should have given him an “incomplete”, and told him that he had to stay for summer session if he wants to graduate from the Senate.

Not one single vote since April 8th. Not one. And now he’s out there squawking that the campaigns need to drop what they’re doing and get to Washington. Of course, as we saw on Letterman, he might be saying that he’s going to run right back to Washington, but in reality he’s giving interviews and politicking.

So maybe that’s the real plan. Get Obama to drop his campaign and use the time to send out surrogates to campaign twice as hard. Or maybe McCain’s just gone off his rocker.

Yeah boy! Take that President Bush! You think you can get away with that crap? No way. The Senate’s gonna show you what’s up. You try and lie to us, you bet your ass there’s gonna be an investigation, and a WAY comprehensive report!

…six years later.

The 170-page report accuses Mr. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other top officials of repeatedly overstating the Iraqi threat in the emotional aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. Its findings were endorsed by all eight committee Democrats and two Republicans, Senators Olympia Snowe of Maine and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska.

In a statement accompanying the report, Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, the West Virginia Democrat who is chairman of the Intelligence Committee, said: “The president and his advisers undertook a relentless public campaign in the aftermath of the attacks to use the war against Al Qaeda as a justification for overthrowing Saddam Hussein.”

Sweet. Maybe by 2012 or so they might start looking into whether or not it would have been a good idea to impeach him. That’s our Democrats: laying down the law way long after it’s useful.

Bleh.

I’ve pointedly ignored Joe Lieberman for a while now. The man just grates on me for obvious reasons. If there’s one thing that grinds my gears, it’s anyone who throws both party and supporters under the bus in power grabs and Holy Joe has provided me with so much gear-grinding all I’ve got left is cylinders.

Awful analogy aside, I was downright gleeful to read that Barack Obama may have delivered a little ultimatum to Joementum, telling him to shape up or ship out. At least that’s an assumption, for all I know he could have told Joe to stop bringing Pepsi to the party get-togethers and actually contribute something that requires effort. I don’t know.

The point is that the last two years have been torturous in all things Lieberman. With the Democrats barely holding onto a majority in the Senate, Joe has been the potential tipping point, and as an independent he could at any time choose to nominally or de facto throw the majority to the Republicans if so inclined.

Thanks to this, he’s been able to basically pull down his pants and waggle his shriveled old genitals at the Democrats and the moment they start to get mad and tell him to pull up his damn pants, pretends like he’s going to “accidentally” fall onto the red side of the fence. So the Democrats have been forced to tolerate him because, as it stands, he’s needed.

So you know what? Let me make this simple: fuck Joe Lieberman.

Y’hear that? Fuck ‘im. Lieberman’s gambit was incredibly shortsighted this time around. He created a little situation that worked to his advantage in the near term but offered nothing in the long haul. Let me explain.

Dick Morris is a flaming douchebag. That has nothing to do with what I’m about to say, but I felt like saying it. Anyway, the man was on FOX recently saying that the Democrats are “the party that cannot lose” this November. It was in the interest of making a stupid point about why Obama needs Hillary Clinton as his running mate, but let’s just stick with the first sentence: the Democrats are the party that cannot lose.

On that point, I agree. Come November we’re going to see something amazing. The Democrats are going to find an even larger majority in both houses. You heard it, potentially a filibuster-proof one in the Senate. In every single poll, Democrats are doing better than Republicans in the abstract by wide margins, so while person-to-person Obama may not run away with the win by a country mile, in the Congressional races where fewer people know what the hell’s going on we can expect an even bluer Legislative branch.

This is where Lieberman’s little master plan begins to unravel. The right, let’s face it, loves Lieberman the traitorous Democrat. He’s fantastic from their perspective. A “principled” Democrat who isn’t afraid to go against his party, coincidentally in a way that the right really agrees with. He’s on their side in a way that lets them claim him as an ally and accuse everyone else of being ideological and party-lockstep.

As a brief tangent, Lieberman going against the Democrats on the war doesn’t take balls. What does is to be a Kucinich or Russ Feingold. To stand up and take the “crazy” position that everyone wants privately but is too scared of being called a “radical” to say out loud. Russ Feingold was the only senator, the only Senator to vote against the PATRIOT Act. That’s being courageous. Siding with the opposition knowing they’ll be your best friend isn’t being strong and principled, it’s cowardice.

Here’s the dirty little secret though. The right loves Joe Lieberman the Democrat, they do not want Joe Lieberman the Republican. When he stands up and stumps for McCain and trashes Obama, he’s their ace in the hole: a Democrat defying his party to show just how gosh darn much he supports John McCain or wants us to win in Iraq or whatever. He’s being used by the GOP simply because of his willingness to do the aforementioned genital-waggling at his own party.

Look at Joe Lieberman’s track record: the man is a liberal and a damn good one. Pro-choice, pro-gay-rights, big on energy independence, 0% from the Christian Coalition, the works. If you just went by that, he should the left’s darling. The Iraq War has seen him, and frankly everyone else, ignore 95% of his political positions and define him as the Democrat that hates Democrats and stumps for Republicans. Nevermind that he agrees with the Dems on almost everything, he’s out there pumping Bush and knocking Obama.

Endearing himself to the right while caucusing with the Democrats has enabled him to be needed by both sides. All that goes away as soon as the Democratic majority breaks over 50. Suddenly Lieberman isn’t needed to keep majority. The Democrats have no reason to give a shit who he caucuses with and won’t need to try and keep in his good graces.

That leaves him in an awkward position because no one’s going to want him. The Democrats have proven he’s unwanted as he lost his primary bid in Connecticut, and the Republicans have no reason to want a flaming liberal who just happens to agree with them on Iraq in their party. Holy Joe is going to be burning his bridge at both ends (and yes, I’m aware that I combined two idioms).

So, once again, fuck Joe Lieberman. If he wants to deliver the key note speech at the Republican Convention, let him. In fact, let him break from the Democrats entirely. He’s been kissing asses on the right side of the aisle like mad these past three years, why not let him hop over entirely? Let him see how well that goes.

Hot on the heels of yesterday’s “wait, they’re doing something about that NOW?” article, now we’ve got this. The Senate is going to put up a bill that would require contractors in Iraq to report sex crimes committed either against or by their employees. Before you read on, just read that again and realize that, yes, it’s exactly what it sounds like.

Weeks after hearing graphic testimony from women who said they were raped and assaulted while working in Iraq, the Senate Armed Services Committee Wednesday night approved language in a bill which would require military contractors, like KBR Inc., to report sex crimes committed by or against their employees, and provide employee victims with assistance and protection.

Okay, so let’s reflect. This means that, until now, contractors were not required to report sex crimes.

Contractors…

…were not required…

…to report…

…sex crimes.

And no one can seem to imagine why us loony moonbats keep saying the contractors in Iraq have too few rules to keep them in check.