Never want to be

Never want to be a member of a group that would have me as a member?

Roll Call (sub.req.) this morning brings us the borderline parodic story of Sen. Joe Lieberman’s defection from the Senate Centrist Coalition in favor of former a new bipartisan group with Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) …

Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) has relinquished his position as co-chairman of the Senate Centrist Coalition, halting talks with co-chairwoman Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) over the future of the organization in favor of creating his own bipartisan group with Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.).

Snowe, meanwhile, has begun working with Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) to refashion the Centrist Coalition into a group that includes more than just ideological centrists and which they hope will appeal to Senators from all over the political spectrum.

As recently as early December, Snowe and Lieberman had said that they and their staffs were in talks over how to refashion the Centrist Coalition into a broader alliance of Republicans and Democrats who would work to end the vitriolic partisanship that has characterized Capitol Hill the past few years.

More recently, Lieberman suggested to Snowe that she work instead with Landrieu, Snowe spokeswoman Antonia Ferrier confirmed.

Lieberman spokesman Marshall Wittmann disputed the notion that Lieberman had cut off talks with Snowe about the Centrist Coalition.

“You can continue working with one group while [creating] another,” he said. However, he did confirm that Lieberman would no longer co-chair the centrist group or its new incarnation.

Lurking in the background appears to be a question of whether some senators may be put off by the word ‘centrist’ thus creating an inhospitable environment for conservatives. No mention of liberals, but presumably they wouldn’t be comfortable either.

As for the Lieberman-Alexander group …

While still in the preliminary stages of development, the goal for Lieberman and Alexander is to create a group of Republicans and Democrats that primarily get together to socialize. However, Wittmann said legislative issues would likely be discussed as well. They plan to call it the Bipartisan Members Group.

Wittmann said the “important difference” between the two groups is that people attending the Lieberman-Alexander gathering “would not necessarily come into the group to come to agreement on issues.”

Okay then.