That is a very well thought out and reasonable position imo Mark... 

I have always had the utmost respect for Joe Lieberman as CT A.G. and as our US Senator.  He has been a loyal servant of the democratic party and CT.  Since the war in Iraq started he has strayed from the party and supported the Bush Administration policy on the war.  Actually it is more than just support...he seems to be a point man for the administration carrying their water.  That is very troubling and I can see why any liberal would have serious problems with that...I am sure not happy, as are 99% of the liberals. 

But it gets back to the big picture and his loyalty to party for me.  As much as I disagree with him not only on his positions on the war but the way he makes them known I still can't discount everything he has done for his party.  But I know most want to run his ass up a flag pole about it...and want to do it in good faith for the best interests of the party.

I would have no problem seeing Ned Lamont as the Junior Senator from Connecticut.  And I know I completely agree with his position on the war.  His voice on the issue would be music to my ears...I just have a problem with Joe Lieberman, after all he has done for the dems, take the personal beating he has endured.  Because if you know what Joe Lieberman is about you know he is sincere and fully believes in the positions he takes...even if unpopular or in this case wrong.

I think folks are being much too generous.

With the exception of a few Democratic Party values he learned in his youth, Lieberman is a Rockefeller Republican who supports big business and especially, Wall Street and the telecommunications industry with shady accounting practices and tax subsidies and who backs the appointment of pro-business conservative judges. It isn't that he is mistaken when he seeks alliances with Republicans; it's that he is truly -- and honestly(?) -- a DINO and believes what those Republicans believe.

In the end it's up to Connecticut Democrats. If they don't want a DINO representing them and believe Lamont can win in November, then, they should dump Joe.

Fair points Ellen...

He is on board for Net Neutrality and has been very supportive of a woman's right to choose, the environment and many core liberal causes, for example.  There are many democratic senators that tend to be fiscally or even socially conservative.  Biden and Nelson (NE) come to mind.  No one is seriously going after them on those issues but that is something that in part merits Lieberman's removal?

Just curious... 

I agree, excellent post. The criticism of Lieberman's position- which happens to be pretty close to mine- on the war is largely unjustified. I'll happily concede that the war was started for the wrong reasons, and since the fall of Saddam's government the Administration has exhibited incompetence bordering on criminal negligence. In hindsight, support of the war before it started was a bad mistake.

The fallacy in the anti-war Democrats' position is this: that since they opposed kicking over the applecart to begin with, they now think that they have no obligation to pick up the apples. They're wrong. Bush might have kicked over the applecart for all the wrong reasons, and done a particularly bad job of it, but when he did it he obligated all of us. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't agressively seek a new apple-picking strategy, or for that matter a new Apple-Picker-in-Chief, but to simply abandon the Iraqis at this point is morally unacceptable.

As for a firm deadline on withdrawl from Iraq, it's a publicity stunt, and an asinine one at that. Imagine Congress doing such a thing in 1863 or 1944. The obvious objection is that (regardless of what Hannity and Limbaugh would have you believe) Bush is not Roosevelt, nor is he Lincoln. Nevertheless, the vagaries of war are such that placing such a restriction on any Administration is stupid.

What it comes down to is this: Lieberman still wants to win. The anti-war position is that we've already lost.

Noel

Lieberman is a strong supporter of a woman's right to choose? Then why are many of the women's rights groups in Connecticut supporting Lamont instead? And what about these comments from Lieberman:

Lieberman said he believes hospitals that refuse to give contraceptives to rape victims for "principled reasons" shouldn't be forced to do so.

"In Connecticut, it shouldn't take more than a short ride to get to another hospital," he said.

Wow, he sounds like a real champion for women's rights there, doesn't he?

Noel,

Sadly, you seem to have bought into all the Repubican talking points with out bothering to look at the situation we actually face in Iraq.

First, we are not at war. The war is over, mission accomplished, just as Bush declared it was, we are in an occupation. One can not win an occupation, certainly not militarily, so the whole idea of "winning," whatever that might be at this point is simply absurd. Oh, what about a free, stable and democratic Iraq, you say. Forget about it. As Bush the elder might say, "ain't gonna happen." As much as some might wish it, that prospect disappeared several years ago. There is absolutely no parallel to 1863 or 1944. None. To make that comparison is not only stupid, it is close to historical ignorance bordering on the insane.

Now you write that when Bush kicked over the applecart he obligated all of us to help clean up the mess. What you don't seem to understand is that our continued presence in Iraq is not picking up the apples, it is just kicking them around further. Pretty soon there will be no apples left to pick up, just some mushy, vaguely apple-like detritus. We simply have no moral obligation to do that. In fact the moral obligation points in the opposite direction -- now that you've really screwed things up, stop making a bigger mess.

The idea that Lieberman still "wants to win" is precisely his major problem. I want to win as well. I also want a pony. Which do you think I'm likely to get first?

But Joe's stance on Iraq is the lesser of his problems. The most egregious is his willingness, nay, eagerness, to criticise fellow Dems at every opportunity and to act as the stalking horse for Bush, going so far as to state that disagreement with dear leader is somewhow unpatriotic and encourages "the enemy." Karl Rvoe couldn't frame it any better.

Mark,

You've really captured my own sentiments about Lieberman very closely. I know lots of Democrats that supported the war, but they certainly don't all bring out the same level of anger and frustration I reserve for Lieberman.

I live in New Hampshire, and actually admired the guy during the last new Hampshire primary season. Even though I had no intention of voting for him, he impressed me as a person of principle who avoided the political low road, articulated his unpopular positions with candor and good cheer, and was willing to work hard in a losing cause, so that his views would get a proper airing.

But the worst features of his personality - which once coexisted uneasily with the admirable parts - have taken over since then, and turned him into a cancer growing inside the Democratic party. Lieberman quite evidently detests the Democratic masses for their benighted refusal to nominate him, and for his laughably low vote totals.

The difference between Lieberman and people like you is captured nicely by this statement:

I voted twice in 2004 for Senators who had voted for the war, and I have no cosmic certainty at this point about what the right answer is.

Lieberman is now a veritable monster of cosmic certainty. His attitude toward his opponents is a supercillious mixture of contempt, irritation and pity. With every exasperated sigh and cranky lecture he appears to say "How budensome it is to be blessed with infallible moral insight! How difficult is is to be an annointed leader of this party of the cowardly and morally degenerate! Yet I must carry on with my divinely appointed chore."

It is one thing to defend positions that are opposed to so many in one's own party. And there are other Democrats who fall into that category. But in defending these positions, Lieberman does not try to heal rifts and strengthen the part overall, but articulates them in a way that seems calculated to do maximal political damage to the Democratic Party, to feed his own moral narcissism with the largest possible helpings, and to inflict the greatest possible degree of insult on antiwar Democrats. Lieberman is now driven largely by resentment and self-pity. Perhaps he envisions himself as someone who wants to "save" the Democratic Party from its extreme positions. But the ultimate effect is to inflict damage.

He is not just diplomatically bi-partisan, but seems to positively relish his new role as a Republican's Democrat - the one Democrat whom George Bush can trust. He has perfected the art of sucking up to Republicans by directing coy and not-so-coy insults toward Democrats. As far as I can tell, Lieberman now wishes he weren't a Democrat. His continued presence in the part is just a consequence of the physio-political law of the Conservation of Joementum.

So let's give him his freedom. I know many people think we can't afford to lose more of our "moderates" to the Republicans. But nothing would be more poisonous for Republicans than having to put of with Joe's sanctimonious and self-centered hectoring from inside their own Party. Why don't we encourage him to become a Republican , so he can go on the talk circuit and insult Republicans for a change?

As an anti-war democrat who opposed kicking over the apple cart to begin with, I believe we have an obligation to pick up the apples. This is how we begin to pick up the apples:
1) Get out of Iraq
2) Insist that Israel deal fairly with the Palestinians
3) Withhold military support for oppressive and authoritarian regimes in the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia and Egypt
4) Stop trying to prevent Hamas and other groups from implementing humanitarian and community development projects in the occupied territories
5) Repair our relations with our European allies
6) Work toward reducing our reliance on fossil fuels, whether they originate in the Middle East, Venezuela, Canada or ecologically fragile areas within our own borders.

That's just a start. You wanna help me pick up these apples, or would you prefer to kick me in the ass while I'm bending down to pick up an apple?

Excellent post, Mark. Well reasoned and articulates my far less articulate thoughts about this primary election.

I voted -- twice -- for Lieberman in 2000 (for Senate and VP), despite my disdain for the cocksure moral superiority he exhibited in going to the Senate floor to wag his finger at Clinton's adultery.

But that cocksuredness has grown too much now that he's taken to wagging his finger at his own constituents.

Besides, here in Conn., I heard a Lamont radio ad yesterday that refered to "the Cheney administration." Ya gotta love that attitude!

Noel

Democrats don't see kicking apples all over the road as the solution to the overturned cart. Anybody who has been paying attention to what's going on in Iraq instead of GOP spin knows staying the course is only facilitating the total dissolution of Iraqi society. Ned Lamont has an excellent shot at winning that election. Democrats should do everything we can to support him. It will not only give us a real Democrat in that seat, it will serve as a wakeup call to other Democrats like Biden and Clinton that pandering to the radical rightwing Republican party is a passe losing strategy.

Most of these I think we agree on, except the all-important 1)....though I have some problems with 4), also. Unfortunately, it's 1) that's the rub of the problem.

Noel

J. McCutchen "JmacSF"

San Francisco. CA

I have ZERO conflict about Lieberman. If we can't rid ourselves of him, then for heaven's sake put the fear of God into him. Loathsome Likudik moral cripple

It's interesting that Mark Schmitt has made the comparison with Paul Wellstone with regard to Lamont's competence to serve as a US Senator. In fact it is down right ironic, because at least part of Lamont's team cut its eye teeth on the 1990 Wellstone Campaign. Bill Hillsman did the Wellstone ads -- later he did the Jesse Ventura ads, and this year he is also doing Kiki Friedman's ads in the Texas Governor's race -- being run by Dean Barkley, who also ran Ventura's campaign, and ran against Wellstone as a 3rd Party in 1996. To take the irony even further -- the sitting Senator who was most upset with Wellstone defeating Republican, Rudy Boschwitz in 1990 was --- Joe Lieberman. Joe's call came in very early in the morning after the victory party, and I was in the office when it arrived. He needed details that I won't spell out here, but they were about money and how votes broke down. Had to put a volunteer to work making copies of all sorts of stuff to Satisfy Joe.

Wellstone got elected because for about 20 years he had been "organizing." If a union called a strike, Paul was there for the picket line, and there for the strategy meetings. He organized Welfare Mom's -- created a model in one county, and then trained organizers to take it state wide. He went to jail when the Reagan Administration closed the Farm Loan window, in the 1980's -- causing family farmers to loose the farm. He organized for environmentalists -- for civil rights and much much else. Headed the Freeze, and then co-chaired the Jesse Jackson 1988 effort. And he could deliver a stump speech just like Hubert Humphrey who won his senate seat on the basis of two terms as Mayor (big claim -- he got the mafia out of the police force) -- and a hell of a speech at the 1948 Democratic Convention. Paul actually was much better qualified in 1990 than was Hubert in 1948.

I've sent Lamont a little money, and I support what he is doing. It has to be done, but we also need to ask the question as to whether having and tending to deep roots in the State you represent isn't one of the critical qualifications for office? For this is where Lieberman is falling apart. He may early on have had such connections, but he has not tended them, and in his 1990 preference for Boschwitz over Wellstone, he was saying elite loyalities are more important than rooted connections or even party identity, and he was saying that two years into his first term in the Senate.

When you suddenly wake up and discover that big chunks of the Democratic Party -- the teachers' unions, the womens' groups, a former Party Chair and State Senate Majority Leader -- and others to come are part of the insurgency, you have to look at Lieberman's relationship with his own state as failed. Leadership isn't a situation where your folk all head one direction, and you persist in driving in the opposite direction. Hopefully our other Senators will take the right lesson from this.

I have despised Lieberman since the 2000 presidential election. There were days during that campaign when I began to wonder if he was a paid agent of the republican party - he certainly seemed to actively work against Gore and the party's interests. (alright, he might not have been a paid agent...) After the election, he was a disaster for Democrats. - I can't talk about it, I get too emotional...

Now, on reflection, I think that what we were seeing was Joe being Joe. Joe Lieberman is for himself. From his refusal to commit to the ticket in 2000 to the refusal to commit to any cause that doesn't directly benefit Joe Lieberman, he's his own cause. And it seems to have come as a shock to Joe, that everyone else isn't just as committed as he is.

It's interesting that in this orchestrated campaign to destroy liberal blogs, the paramount question is if "they come after Joe today, will they come after _______ tommorow?" (And we might ask "if they come after Kos today...) It doesn't occur to Joe to ask the more important question, "if I don't serve their interests, do I deserve their support?"

Noel, winning the war would require a massive escalation on our part that is inconceivable right now. We don't have enough troops over there to win, never did, and never will.

Bush lost the war when he invaded Iraq with 1/3 the troops needed to win. Gen. Batiste (who commanded the 1st ID in Iraq, then turned down a promotion so he could resign his commission and be free to speak out about against Rumsfeld) has said we needed 380,000 troops, plus the Iraqi security forces, to impose security and prevent the insurgency at the start of the war. We had less than a third of that.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/opinion/14793846.htm

I can't imagine that fewer troops would suffice now that we are facing a mature insurgency.

We are not entitled to win just because we had (arguably) good intentions, or because we are the US and we always win, or because losing would have horrible consequences. Bush lost the war, the only question is what is the least bad way to get out of the mess. I don't have the answers, but forget about winning.

Note: Comparing Nebraska with Connecticut is wonderfully naive.

LOL...naive Ellen?  I wasn't saying that they were the same.  You addressed the question I had.  I just wanted someone to come out and say "Joe Lieberman is being targeted and Nelson isn't/won't because we can get away with it in CT but this would never fly in Nebraska"...even though you didn't actually come out and say that, it is very clear to me.

Wellstone got elected because for about 20 years he had been "organizing." If a union called a strike, Paul was there for the picket line, and there for the strategy meetings. He organized Welfare Mom's -- created a model in one county, and then trained organizers to take it state wide.

And he wrote about it. It's a great book: How the Rural Poor Got Power: Narrative of a Grass-Roots Organizer. Everyone should read it.

Sara, your comment reminds me that my post was probably unfair to Wellstone, who was in a sense vastly more qualified by virtue of having spent his whole life working for social justice. In terms of what David Broder would call qualifications -- years in public office -- they are the same or Lamont has the edge, and both are/were capable of being good Senators.

One question for you, though: You've written about this story of the 1990 early morning call from Lieberman to find out how Wellstone did it on The Next Hurrah as well as here, and what I don't understand is how you know that Lieberman's motive in asking was sympathy to Boschwitz and hostility to Wellstone. Wouldn't he have called Boschwitz in that case? How do you know he wasn't asking simply because he was impressed by Wellstone's victory and wanted to know -- for himself or others -- how such grass-roots campaigns are done? After all, with the exception of my boss's near-defeat, the Wellstone victory was the single interesting political story of that night.

I'd just appreciate it if you said a little more about this footnote to the story. Thanks. /Mark

Nor do I accept the argument that if Lamont wins, it represents a “purge” or shows that “there’s no place in the Democratic Party” for Lieberman. I value competitive elections. Lieberman’s not guaranteed a fourth term in the Senate. Ned Lamont’s reasonably well qualified, certainly as qualified as, say, Paul Wellstone was. If Connecticut Democrats want a Senator who had the right position on the war, or at least doesn’t treat those who did have the right position with contempt, they are entitled to it.

I think this is an incredibly important paragraph that has not been touched on as much as it might have been due to the quality of the reset of the post.

I can say for one, that I do not approach political figures with ideological litmus tests of most any sort. The subtext of the campaign seems to be why are people upset with Lieberman, which is something Joe realizes quite well on account of that ridiculous cartoon ad.

But ask yourself this, if it is just about ideology, than why aren't Democrats who held similar policy positions in the same boat as Joe?

Perhaps you will want to argue either the insipid Weicker conspiracy theory, some sort of latent anti-Likud bias, or go metaphysical with the idea of Lieberman as the national metaphor for pro-war Democrats.

In the end, these are all untenable. Joe is where he is at because of his ideology, his actions, his attitude and his constant attacks against Democrats. No one else has done what he has done and no one else is in the same boat. Time to row or jump ship Joe. Lets see where your loyalties lie.

No good deed goes unpunished

This is absolutely right and very well said.

Noel,

I would characterize it more as an guerilla war

And your characterization would be wrong. There are two elements in Iraq, each of which reinforces the other. One, an insurgency against a foreign, occupying power (us) and two, a civil war among competing ethnic groups. Both use guerilla tactics, as they are the only ones available, but that does not make it a guerilla war.

Which is why I never suggested such a thing

Do you really think that if we pulled out of Iraq tomorrow things would get better?

Honestly, I don't know. They might. They might get worse. I do know they would get better for us and for our troops. I do know that we are an irritant at this point and are accomplishing no good there. Why in the world would we want to be stuck in the middle of someone else's civil war? If on humanitarian grounds it needs to be mitigated or prevented, then is this not the job for the community of nations, including Iraq's neighbors? And you can bet that that won't happen as long as we are there in force. Remember in Yugoslavia we were part of a true multi-national force which gave the effort real legitimacy. America lost not one soldier in the conflict.

Bush and the neocons screwed up, big time. There is no good solution. When you drive the car over the cliff and are half way down to a crash on the rocks at the bottom, maybe it's time to bail. It will still be painful, but maybe not fatal. At this point you can't put the car back on the road.

I said I wanted a pony, not a unicorn. But you may have a point there. Unicorns do not exist.

As a peripheral issue, I am leaning more and more towards term limits. I'm at a loss to think of anything else that would kill this movement to bi-partisanship.

I'll take a stab at that: control Middle East oil flow???

This is actually an example of the Liebermantarian problem.

The fallacy in the anti-war Democrats' position is this: that since they opposed kicking over the applecart to begin with, they now think that they have no obligation to pick up the apples. They're wrong.

Exactly how are they wrong? Because you say so? Because you heard Sean Hannity say it? why?

Bush might have kicked over the applecart for all the wrong reasons, and done a particularly bad job of it, but when he did it he obligated all of us.

Actually, he obligated the Iraqis. After all it was their apple cart he tipped over.

That doesn't mean that we shouldn't agressively seek a new apple-picking strategy, or for that matter a new Apple-Picker-in-Chief, but to simply abandon the Iraqis at this point is morally unacceptable.

So it's more moral to take a paternalistic attitude that we know better than Iraqis how to govern Iraqis?

As for a firm deadline on withdrawl from Iraq, it's a publicity stunt, and an asinine one at that. Imagine Congress doing such a thing in 1863 or 1944.

Imagine the French doing it in 1783. Oh wait, they did. They helped us kick over the English apple cart, and then they got back in their ships and went home.

And what did we do?

We founded the United States of America.

Until you acknowledge that, that the Iraqis are responsible for Iraqis.

IT IS YOU WHO ARE WRONG.

Do you really think that if we pulled out of Iraq tomorrow things would get better? That the Sunnis and the Shi'a and would be so glad to be rid of us that they'd kiss and make up? I suggest the opposite- that they'd all start killing each other and it wouldn't end until hell wouldn't have it. It would make Yugoslavia look like a playground scuffle.

Ohwell.

NOBODY says it's going to get better if we leave. What we know for certain is if we stay it will definately not get better.

If the sunnis and the shiites want to shoot each other, then so be it. It'll be their choice. But if we stay there being a party to the negotiations it'll not get better because we won't be willing to compromise. Why? Because we suffer no consequences from lack of compromise. We don't have to live next to them.

maybe it will be like Yugoslovia, and they'll split up. Is that bad?

But again, that's THEIR choice.

Again, it's you who is WRONG. You and your know-it-all liebermentarian attitude.

There is no Lieberman equivalent in the republican party. Republican party would never tolerate a Joe Lieberman in their ranks. Yes, there is Chafee but Chafee is from the bluest of blue states. Republicans know a good thing when they see it. They know that Chafee is the best they can hope for from Rhode Island and they tolerate him.

A Lieberman equivalent in the GOP would be a liberal republican senator from a conservative state like Oklahoma or South Carolina who gleefully spits in the face of conservatives in his party and goes on the Randi Rhodes show to trash his republican colleagues. Republicans would never tolerate this. He would be challenged and defeated in the primary.

The problem that you have, Noel, is that your position does not hold up.

You seem prepared to admit the possibility that the war was based in lies and naked aggression, that the handling of the occupation has been consistently disastrous and incompetent, and that the situation has been damaged to an extreme point. You're pretty faint hearted, but I would grant you were open to these possibilities.

Your mistake is that you have this idea that now that the apple cart is upset, we have no better choice than to deal with it by supporting the persons and the decisions that have upset the apple cart and made matters worse and worse. Your notion that Lieberman's position of supporting the occupation no matter what is constructive or useful is simply bamboozlement.

You have some idea that America has a responsibility to keep dropping white phosphorous on Iraqi's until they wake up and get with the program. Sorry. It don't work that way.

Your characterization that Democrats or anti-War persons feel that the war is lost is an emotional and hysterical effort at polarizing views. Its more important for you to talk childishly of winning, and chide critics as defeatist 'losers' than it is to discuss the actual realities of what is going on over there.

I find that kind of cheap rhetorical positioning both dishonest and offensive.

If you look to American history, you will find that literally every war was the subject of strenuous political criticism as it was carried on. Neither the methods used, the actions taken, nor the figures involved were immune from criticism.

In that sense, it is perfectly legitimate to criticize Lieberman for his role as a spear carrier to a holocaust. The death toll among Iraqi's as a result of America's invasion and occupation ranges somewhere between 100,000 and 250,000. A country has literally been reduced back to sub-medieval levels of subsistence.

Facile cheerleading, from Lieberman, or from you, is not helpful in any way...

Here's the hell of it. "netroots" don't vote in Conneticut. I think it's laughable that "DailyKos" or something is going to have an effect. I fear that bloggers are getting delusions of granduer.

Reading your first paragraph, I was going to say Arlen Specter, but then your second paragraph was a slam dunk. And speaking of Leiberman hurting the party, he would never appear on right wing shows badmouthing his own party if the Dems were in the majority, since they could punish him. It's literally bashing your own...but only when their down.

Yet again it's always...

"Lieberman for Lieberman"

If we're going to have a king who rules by divine right, we might as well have a House of Lords.

That doesn't actually amount to a point anywhere.

So, Ben Nelson who has some views inconsistent with other Democrats is tolerated because he's from Nebraska... And Lieberman is not tolerated because he's from Connecticut and completely out of touch with his voters?

Perhaps one difference between Lieberman and Nelson is that Nelson isn't shitting on other Democrats every chance he gets?

Perhaps Lieberman is the bottom of the barrel, the worst of the worst. Perhaps because he's dishonest and hectoring...

Yes. I admired Mark's post but disagreed with it. It darn well is about ideology. I agree that there should be few litmus tests for Democrats. But Social Security is one of them. And Lieberman, with his waffle on the issue at a time of maximum peril, flunked it.

Ovid

I still can't discount everything he has done for his party.

Can you name one thing that Joe has accomplished for Connecticut or his party.

ONE thing.

I have lived through Joe's entire career and this bastard has done zero - ZERO- for this state.

For the party he has degraded a sitting democratic president and has been complicit in convincing our country to wage a war [and I'm not talking about the war on terror] that has no substance or consequence for this nation except to enrich the interests of the oil industry.

Oh, wait. Joe has helped Connecticut's rich get filthy, drunken, slovenly richer at the expense of the people who live here, democrats.

Well, if you're a Connecticut democrat and watch fellow Democrats being shot down by friendly fire often enough you begin to triangulate that particular phenomenon.

Joe's act has stopped being compelling. And for a holy roller he has never had a single hint of discomfort in villifying Liberals or compassionate Christians who might be mistaken as Liberals. In fact, Joe is an expert sniper.

Listen to his diatribes on IMUS, MSNBC, and Fox. Joe's had his kicks kicking Democrats long enough.

Joe ain't Mother Teresa.

But assuming those two acquiescences, I think *you*, and the other war supporters, still need to do two things: 1) propose some concrete changes in our policy of how we're prosecuting this war.

To start with, I'd fire Rumsfeld and clean out the senior leadership at the Pentagon, then turn over both the political control as well as military control to the Central Command. I think the military leadership, and this includes people like Gen. Batiste, are much less blinded by arrogance and vanity and much more likely to get us to a least-bad solution. Better yet, turn it over to competent Democrats, but that can't happen for at least another 2.5 years.

Second of all, I'd think seriously about splitting Iraq up into three parts....this has some serious problems, but again, it might be the least-bad solution.

2) in the absence of a timetable for withdrawal, agree to a timetable for reconsideration. Agree that at some point in the near future, certainly before 2009, if we haven't made any progress against the insurgency we need to reassess our strategy, including the option of withdrawal even if Iraq is still a mess.

I don't have a problem with this in principle. I would say, let someone competent make a serious attempt and solving the problem. That hasn't happened yet. If a genuine non-political and well-executed effort still leads to chaos, then, much as I would hate to admit it, we will have lost.

Noel

To those who have downrated Noel's comments, you might want to take a look at this intro to the culture at TPMC.  It can take some getting used to, 'cause unlike at some other sites, ratings here are not based on whether we agree or disagree with a comment -- in fact there's a lot of emphasis here on not downrating based on disagreement...

Bush lost the war when he invaded Iraq with 1/3 the troops needed to win. Gen. Batiste (who commanded the 1st ID in Iraq, then turned down a promotion so he could resign his commission and be free to speak out about against Rumsfeld) has said we needed 380,000 troops, plus the Iraqi security forces, to impose security and prevent the insurgency at the start of the war. We had less than a third of that.

I agree almost completey. I do think things would've been better even with the troop levels we had if we had left the Iraqi Army largely intact...but that's neither here nor there.

Bush lost the war, the only question is what is the least bad way to get out of the mess. I don't have the answers, but forget about winning.

I would amend that to "Bush is losing the war." And that the least bad way to get out is not to abandon the Iraqis to their fate.

Noel

Thanks for replying, Noel. To respond briefly:

[quote]Your characterization that Democrats or anti-War persons feel that the war is lost is an emotional and hysterical effort at polarizing views.

I don't think the characterization is inaccurate, as seen by some of the comments below, like "Bush lost the war," "Bush drove the car over the cliff," "A military solution has not worked," and so on." A better way to put it might be that anti-war persons think the war is unwinnable.[/quote]

If you read what I wrote, I wasn't taking issue with whether your characterization was accurate. I'm not getting into whether it is or it isn't, that's a total red herring.

I called it an emotional and hysterical effort at polarization. It's game playing, dude, pure and simple. You're avoiding discussing the issues by pasting emotionally charged terms like 'winners' and 'losers', and I've caught you out on it. The fact that you've deliberately avoided dealing with that fact tells us you're deliberately playing a game.

[quote]If you look to American history, you will find that literally every war was the subject of strenuous political criticism as it was carried on. Neither the methods used, the actions taken, nor the figures involved were immune from criticism.

And such criticism is perfectly legitimate. But once the war started it's rare for a large group of people to question whether the war should be fought through to the end. Vietnam is the obvious exception, but we didn't create the situation in Vietnam to the extent we did in Iraq.[/quote]

I have to call bullshit on you there too. The Spanish American war was extremely controversial with accusations of imperialism flying like brickbats. The controversy was so bad that special legislation was passed to give Cuba its independence, rather than establishing it like the Phillipines and Puerto Rico as an American possession.

Similarly, the subsequent Phillipine Insurrection was quite controversial, and many publicly spoke out against it, including Mark Twain.

WWI was problematic because Wilson passed the sedition act to jail dissidents. Something I hope you are not advocating.

There were major controversies ongoing during the Korean War. The Civil War was also politically messy, even in the Union side.

Even in WWII, while America closed ranks, there were several politically motivated investigations into Pearl Harbour aimed at toasting FDR's hide.

I don't know what the politics attending the Mexican American war, and don't care too much. The point is that your assertion as to history doesn't hold up.

And truthfully, I find your point somewhat disturbing. Is America at war? There is no risk to American territory, no Iraqi's attacking American soil. You have chosen to occupy a country which simply does not want you there. Does this qualify as a war in the sense and of the magnitude that you seem to rely upon? I'm not at all persuaded.

And more disturbingly, if this is a war, then it is a war of choice. Isn't your position a 'one stop shopping' channel for Presidential Dictatorial powers. The excuse 'we are at war' answers every question. Moreover, the President can 'choose' to be at war at will. And any old shitty military or paramilitary conflict will do the trick. Which means that America is a dead letter.

Directed at all commenters who participated in this thread as this comment appears to be, the charge is unwarranted and a bit snarky.

With the exception of noelenergy's off-topic sub-thread, commenters raised the question of Iraq not to discuss the reasons for or the conduct of the war but to look at the unfair (dishonest?) way Lieberman has defended his position and at the Senator's disloyalty to the party which his attitude has made manifest.

If you read what I wrote, I wasn't taking issue with whether your characterization was accurate. I'm not getting into whether it is or it isn't, that's a total red herring.

I called it an emotional and hysterical effort at polarization. It's game playing, dude, pure and simple. You're avoiding discussing the issues by pasting emotionally charged terms like 'winners' and 'losers', and I've caught you out on it. The fact that you've deliberately avoided dealing with that fact tells us you're deliberately playing a game.

Psychoanalysis aside, if you read what I wrote, I never called anyone "winners" and "losers." For that matter, I wasn't trying to polarize anything. If you don't want to use the terms "win" and "lose" we can use different, less wieldy terms like "withdrawl after stabilization" and "withdrawl regardless of stabilization."

Your brief history of American military history was interesting, but gets away from the point. Criticism has always been there. My point was that regardless of (for example) Republican conspiracy theories about Roosevelt, even the Roosevelt-haters denied that winning the war was important.

And truthfully, I find your point somewhat disturbing. Is America at war? There is no risk to American territory, no Iraqi's attacking American soil. You have chosen to occupy a country which simply does not want you there. Does this qualify as a war in the sense and of the magnitude that you seem to rely upon? I'm not at all persuaded.

Yes, it's a war. One that we never should have started, maybe. But you can't unboil the egg. As for magnitude- in historical terms, this is a pretty small war. But just because Iraq is not existential threat to the US doesn't mean that the consequences aren't important.

Noel

My thoughts as someone whose state is next door to CT.. CT is not that democratic leaning a state. It might have been more of one in the '70s, but it's been shifting more conservative ever since. Insurance and other industries, mainly financial have a big hold there, and under the present campaign financing system, if you do not at least appease those interests to a certain extent you can't afford to get re-elected.

Even the Green candidates in CT are hawkish fiscal conservatives (at least when they're among themselves in the sanctity of their private mailing lists and meetings. One green candidate who used to trash Al Gore on the bartcop.com forum (where Atrios got his start) presented a false front of being a social justice candidate, he among other greens there who were running for various city/state offices jumped on the religion bandwagon because they believed it gave them an entre into poor communities and provided them a Christ-like aura) but when campaigning in New Haven he was pushing an agenda that stated that the poor should be forced out of the city because they used up otherwise valuable property that could be put to better use. Other so called progressives there are as disconnected from the less affluent citizens as their republican peers there.

I tend to think Lieberman felt he had to compromise over the years to maintain a balance and get elected.. and quite honestly the affluent and those nearly there are a shifting tide who tend to vote for what lines their purses the most. I believe that even were Lamont elected, he'd be finding himself making the same compromises. As it stands I doubt he will beat Lieberman, my concern is that he might weaken Lieberman enough for a republican challenger to end up in the senate seat.

Sorry, there was an accidental duplication of the original post up above and so I deleted the text.

Again, I will say it, don't make assumptions. RI is still pretty darned blue.. but don't confuse that with the populace being in tolerance for the my way or the highway extremist neo-prog's.

The Iraq war is probably a bigger issue here in RI, but higher up on the scale is the deficit/economy/jobs, health care, education and then there's a plethora of other issues they rank still higher than Iraq. More people here live in the real world, they are hurting and as much as they care about our troops and want us out of Iraq, they aren't going to ignore the very real pain that is going on, on the domestic front.

There's been a growing conservative movement here, that's facilitated by the right wing and republican posing as moderate talk show hosts at the local level who are exploiting the economic woes and placing the blame on democrats at the state and local level to get more republicans elected. It's probably causing some democratic erosion.. I can't say for sure.

Quite frankly, Chafee isn't a moderate, his father was, but Lincoln is nothing more than a political opportunist. Unlike his father he has no compassion for the poor, or even for the environment. Chafee only won office because of the idiocy of single issue politics, namely lobbies like NOW, NARAL and Planned Parenthood endorsed him, even though his support for choice was limitted to the type of choice we had prior to Roe vs Wade, for those who can afford it. Chafee votes with the republican party on virtually every issue with a select few rare exceptions.. he voted for Judge Roberts and only voted against Alito when he'd fence sat for so long he decided he shouldn't risk it.. and he faced no criticism by the choice lobby.

NOW, NARAL and PP allied with the republicans in electing republicans like Chafee because they refuse to recognize anything other than their own status quo, they are not part of any movement. Even now which is supposed to be in advocacy for women's rights, refuse to care about the rights of women who live below the glass ceiling.. If choice is lost, it will be because single issue politics helped it to happen. Quite frankly alot of even liberal women across the country are refusing to decide to vote for any candidate on merely choice alone any longer... they can't afford that ridiculous luxury any longer.

The grasstop's insistence on being the end all of everything will be it's downfall.. they might hold some power on the 'net but they don't hold any in real life when it comes to a significant political movement that could shift a balance of power. Like the Naderites, the most they could achieve is helping the republicans.

Valdron, you're absolutely right about Nelson. I probably agree with Lieberman more than I do with Nelson, but Nelson never, ever pulls that "we can't criticize the commander in chief" and "anti-war folks want to lose" crap. USMC's allusion to Zell Miller is very apt - like Miller, Lieberman has become an enabler of the GOP - he legitimizes their more nauseating tactics by parroting them from within the party.

One thing that several Dem Senators to Lieberman's right have over him is that they won elections in 2002, and they know that as much as they worked with Bush for the previous two years, when the chips were down the GOP machine had no hesitation about trying to crush them. I'm thinking of, say, Landrieu, Baucus and Pryor - not to mention Cleland and Carnahan, who learned the hard way that enabling the GOP is not going to win you any mercy or consideration. Lieberman doesn't get that, and he's clearly enjoying being the go-to guy for "I wish my party wasn't so driven to let the terrorists win" quotes.

Nelson, Landrieu, etc. may make decisions that I disagree with but they never do the GOP the favor of repeating their talking points.

In short: a Democratic party with Ben Nelson in it is a stronger one for being diverse; a Democratic party with Zell Miller is a much weaker one for being self-defeating. Lieberman has opted to pick the Miller route over the Liberman route, and Democrats in Connecticut who don't like seeing the party undermined are entitled to pick somebody they like better.