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"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
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Joe's fall from grace
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Race
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| Contributor | RP |
| Last Edited | RP Aug 09, 2006 03:13pm |
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| Category | Commentary |
| News Date | Wednesday, August 9, 2006 09:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | Lieberman was once the most attractive and promising Democrat in his state, his grasp of political realities subtle and sinuous. But he became scornful of disagreement, parading himself as a moral paragon to whom voters should be privileged to pay deference. The elevation of his sanctimony was accompanied by the loss of his political sense.
Over time, Lieberman, an Orthodox Jew, became more observant and culturally conservative. His speech denouncing President Clinton as "immoral" during the impeachment spectacle was as unsurprising as it was unctuous. His links to neoconservatives and the religious right proliferated. He became close to Dick and Lynne Cheney and helped found a group with Lynne to criticize liberal professors. Last year, at the 50th anniversary dinner of Buckley's National Review, the leading conservative magazine, Lieberman sat at the head table.
Al Gore chose Lieberman as a symbol of his separation from Clinton, and it was symptomatic of the strategic misdirection that landed Gore in the Florida swamp. Lieberman's main contributions were an unusually gentle debate with Cheney and a unilateral concession to count illegal ballots in Florida that favored Bush.
Believing that he had turned into a sacrosanct institution beyond reproach, the acolyte of Democratic leader Bailey neglected political organization. Disdainful of New England Democrats for daring to criticize the Southern conservative president, Lieberman was stunned by the emergence of an intraparty opponent, Ned Lamont, a liberal patrician banker. |
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