Lieberman's Problem

There's a tight Democratic primary race going on in Connecticut this year. Bush's "favorite Democrat" Joe Lieberman is getting his ass kicked by a political newcomer, Ned Lamont. A lot of blogs are commenting on it - and I finally feel provoked to quote an article in the Hartford Courant because it says specifically why I agree that Lieberman should not be re-elected:

"...on the two biggest issues of our times, he [Lieberman] is dead wrong.

His blind support of the Iraq war, begun illegally and a continuing catastrophe, is monstrous.

And his defense of an incompetent president, a vice president who fits the dictionary definition of fascism and an extremist administration that has perpetrated torture, illegal eavesdropping and a general shredding of the Constitution is insulting to the people who elected him in the first place.

Joe's constituency is not Bush and Cheney; it is the progressives and moderates, the blacks and Hispanics who gave him his start in politics. We feel he has betrayed us by becoming "Bush's favorite Democrat."

His announcement that he will not support the winner of the Democratic primary but will seek election as an independent if he loses the primary seems to put self above principle. I thank Ned Lamont, a good and decent man, for giving the people of Connecticut a real choice. We need someone who will confront the Bush-Cheney evils of lies, manipulation and incompetence, which have done us so much harm at home and abroad."

And this specific op-ed piece was from a longtime friend of Joe's.