TPM Reader MM responds to DO’s comments below …
I do not spend as much time tracking blogs as it seems DO does; no doubt there is some validity to his point that there is unwarranted venom out there. But I find it hard to believe that mean-spirited blogging alone would account for Lieberman’s ongoing slippage in the polls. There must be some other reason. It’s buried in DO’s post:
“And with the exception of Lieberman’s enthusiastic support of the Iraq war, it’s hard to see how Lieberman’s policy preferences are markedly different than his Democratic colleagues.”
That’s a pretty quick way of disposing of the issue. DO makes it sound like differing on the Iraq disaster is akin to differing on button subsidies, or the ball-point pen tariff. Iraq is bigger than that. Much bigger. No doubt Lieberman has a good voting record on all sorts of other things, but what we’ve done in Iraq, with his “enthusiastic support” is so bad for the country that it’s not unreasonable for Democrats in CT to consider replacing him as their senator.
TPM Reader RP chimes in too …
I am a frequent reader and poster at DKos. I have read a lot there about Lieberman. Not a single comment that I have seen as either wished him an untimely death nor been anti-semitic.
The core problem that Kos has with Lieberman is that he gives cover to Republicans. ‘Look,’ they can say. ‘Even a Democrat says what we’re saying.’ There are far more conservative Democrats, none of whom raise the ire of the left. Why? Because, while they may not vote with Democrats all the time, they do not go on Fox news to trash other Democrats. Remember Ronald Reagan’s famous 11th commandment? That goes for Democrats, too.
As DO points out, Lieberman is more liberal than almost all Republicans – a fact that does not go unnoticed at dKos. However, in contrast to Ben Nelson, he’s from a deep blue state. Connecticut deserves a Senator more attuned to their leanings. And Lieberman isn’t attuned to anything except his own selfish interests.
Thanks for letting me vent.
Then again, there’s TPM Reader JC …
I wish to concur with “DO”. He says everything I’ve been feeling (and says it very well) about the attacks on Lieberman. You can see the venom – I read it just now at the TPM Cafe – about Israel and see the same venom (watered down) about Lieberman.
I’m on record comparing the attacks on Lieberman to the immolation of the Democrats in 1968. It will be ironic if the same group of people who voted for Nader in 2000, driving Gore-Lieberman out of history, will destroy our chances to take the Senate in 2006.
But TPM Reader JM takes a different tack …
I just read the e-mail from DO about how anti-Semitic we in the anti-Lieberman crazy blogger Left are. Seems to me what’s missing from his very long message is, say, an example of that anti-Semitism? I frequently read through the comments sections of Eschaton and FireDogLake, and I’ll admit there are a lot of comments about Lieberman’s support of Israel and AIPAC’s support of Lieberman. Are those, in and of themselves, anti-Semitic? Are they untrue? I honestly don’t know. My objection to Lieberman is that he supports Bush and his plan-less war more than most sensible Repulicans (and Social Security, Alito, defending Rumsfeld after Abu Grahib, voting for Alberto “Quaint” Gonzalez–Digby has a post of Lieberman actually defending the word ‘quaint’–and Condi Rice) such as Hagel (and isn’t Hagel, who would be the blogosphere’s favorite Republican if he ever followed through on any of his lip-service to the Constitution, Jewish?). Even the vastly over-rated McCain would have cashiered Rumsfeld by now.
How do you (or DO) square these charges of anti-Semitism with the blogofascists’ almost fanatical support of Russ Feingold and (at least before she announced she’d be campaigning for Lieberman) Barbara Boxer? There are also, especially at Eschcaton, ‘trolls’ who take the names of regular posters and write “I hate Lieberman the Jew” or some such. Maybe this is what DO is referring to, maybe DO is one of those ‘trolls’. The only thing missing from his email is “I’ve been a proud member of the Democrat party all my life, but Sean Hannity is right…”
Frankly, it’s less than admirable of you to publish this nonsense without any kind of comment or context.
PS- Just listening to the anti-Semite Sam Seder on the Majority Report. They played a clip of Lieberman saying that the United States is a creationist nation. Yup. No reason to oppose him other than anti-Semitism.
For the record, I’m pretty certain Chuck Hagel is not Jewish.
And finally, TPM Reader MB …
Josh, are you actually sufficiently naive to print such nonsense as though it made a point? Just so that it’s clear, we don’t have to apologize for extremists on our side of the fence. Republicans don’t, even though their extremists are both more extreme and more prominent.
I don’t appreciate being blamed for the fact that some wild-eyed leftist, possibly fictitious, verges on anti-Semitism in his disapproval of Joe Lieberman. And I don’t appreciate that you give such views credibility by publishing them.
Come to think of it, this grievance actually encapsulates our problem with Lieberman himself.
Actually, one more, from TPM Reader CB …
The criticism DO has of the far left blogosphere has considerable merit, although I can’t say it quite equals in venality of the right’s eight years of smearing Clinton (after all, I haven’t seen any claims that Lieberman was a murderer or drug smuggler, as was alleged by Scaife-backed projects). I reckon all it goes to show is that extremism doesn’t sit well with many, if not most, Americans — at least when it’s blatant. [Rachel Maddow had an interesting take Thursday morning when she referred to it as the right wing’s “Boiling the Frog” tactic — admitting that the metaphor itself is a myth — of graduality, incrementally pursuing a policy course of which most voters would object if they recognized the ultimate goal (i.e. Social Security privatization)].
The main complaints about Lieberman among more moderately liberal Democrats is his unwillingness to reconsider his position on the war and, more critically, his completely lack of loyalty to the party. The latter is the kind of thing than can get an entrenched incumbent beat in the primary, where he has to sell himself to fellow Democrats who believe he has sold out to the other side.
More to come.
