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Politics : Liberalism: Do You Agree We've Had Enough of It? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (3445)	7/13/2006 10:52:51 PM
From: PROLIFE	Respond to of 224714

you hit the nail on the head there.

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (3445)	7/14/2006 12:03:56 PM
From: Ann Corrigan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 224714

Why are Dems mum on Hillary's Iraq stance?:Lieberman's 'kiss' could seal his primary fate Rupert Cornwell-WashDC..Jul 14, 2006 In today's intense Democratic politics in Connecticut, "The Kiss" does not refer to great works of art. Speak of "The Kiss" and you conjure up an embrace immediately after the President's State of the Union address in January 2005. The embrace was between George Bush and the state's junior senator, Joe Lieberman. A better name for it would be the kiss of Judas - or the kiss of death. Mr Lieberman is one of the Democratic Party's grandees, a vice-presidential candidate in 2000 who, two years later, ran for President. Today, however, he is in the fight of his life; a senator of 18 years standing who must endure the ignominy of a primary against a dangerous challenger who has built his campaign on his opposition to the war in Iraq. The candidate himself remembers his brush with Bush slightly differently. " I don't think he kissed me," he told Time magazine. "He leaned over, gave me a hug, and said, 'Thank you for being a patriotic American.'" But in anti-Bush and anti-war Connecticut, the dispute is academic. Bush's alleged words only remind voters of Mr Leiberman's still unwavering support for the invasion of 2003. "He's the guy who goes on Fox News. He's the tame Democrat that even conservatives can stomach. "He's too much a part of the Washington establishment. We must have someone who's in touch with us." The setting for those forthright words is a an Indian restaurant in downtown Stamford, a booming town in the richest county of super affluent Connecticut, where representatives of the state's 50,000-strong Indian-origin community are hosting a 'get-to-know-you' event for Mr Lieberman's potential nemesis, a wealthy cable network executive called Ned Lamont. As a primary opponent, Mr Lamont is surely an incumbent's worst nightmare. He is articulate and charming, a boyish 52-year old who graduated from Harvard and built an impressive business career, yet who finds time for pro-bono work at local schools. His great grandfather was chairman of JP Morgan, bluest of Wall Street blueblood firms. His father served in the Nixon administration. Only last year, Mr Lamont was a Lieberman contributor. He has switched from friend into foe. On Iraq, he says: "We've distanced ourselves from our traditions, we've ignored our values and are the weaker for it." But he rejects the Lieberman camp's charges that he's a single-issue candidate. "Iraq is only a part of it, there's a whole range of areas where the country has made bad decisions." The Lamont-Lieberman struggle is a battlefield in the civil war within his party. The race will set the tone for the mid-term election campaign this autumn, and have a large bearing on the contest for the Democratic nomination for the White House in 2008. If all that sounds oddly familiar, it is. In 2004, a similar conflict played out, as the populist Howard Dean, a previously little known governor of Vermont became the darling of the activists. Propelled by internet-raised millions and the enthusiasm of his volunteer supporters from across the country, the governor briefly seemed a sure thing for his party's nomination. Moderates were horrified. A vote for Mr Dean, warned Mr Lieberman, would be " a ticket for nowhere", that could send the party "back to the political wilderness for a long time". Daily Kos, and organisations like Moveon.org, have thrown all their energies into toppling Mr Lieberman. In an extraordinary admission of weakness, Mr Lieberman has said he will run as an independent in the November general election if he loses the primary, and is already collecting signatures to that end. Even if he does lose the primary, the likelihood is still that the next Senator of Connecticut will be named Joseph Lieberman. As a centrist, he is well placed to scoop up independent, even moderate Republican voters. One poll gives him 44 per cent in a three way general election, as much as Lamont and the official Republican candidate combined.