I'M GLAD I WAS WRONG

Cyclo, What you say is true; the republicans essentially backed Lieberman because of his support for the Iraq war. I have personally found him to be untrustworthy, but as a blue-stripled independent, he won't be any worse than some other blue democrats when it gets down to voting on issues.

I still like the idea of a third party birth beginning with this election.

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ebrown_p wrote:

JPB wrote:
Lieberman and Sanders have both shown that an independent candidate can, in fact, be elected to national office. May the trend continue!!!

BLECHHHHH!!! How could you say this?

Lieberman and Sanders are nothing alike.

I don't equate them in any way philosphically but made the point that voters, in the northeast at least, are willing to cast ballots in sufficient numbers to elect candidates that are not supported and therefore 'owned' by a major party platform.

Jim Jeffords was/is my political hero, a man who was a lifelong Republican but couldn't stand the tactics of the early Bush administration and walked away from the party to become an independent and caucus with the Democrats. I believe that had Jeffords run a re-election campaign in Vt as an independent, the voters there would have voted for him the same way they did Sanders.

My pleasure in seeing American voters becoming more independent minded and votiing for the candidate of their choice, regardless of their party affiliation stands whether the vote was cast for Bernie Sanders, Joe Lieberman, or Fred Flinstone. I see nothing in my post that equates Sander's political stance to that of Lieberman's in any way.

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On the topic of the timing of the Shrub's decision to deep-six Rummy, i think it is possible that he assumed/hoped the Republicans could keep control of the House (he might have been ill-advised in that matter, as well), and only made the about-face on Rummy when he realized that the House was irretreivably lost, and that Rummy had become a major liability. With subpoena power, the various House committees which can justify digging into the administration's policies and policy-making processes could have seriously embarrassed the administration by calling a serving Defense Secretary before the television cameras, which would also have had the effect of hamstringing department business. This is not to say that Rummy can't be called and grilled as it is, but Clark's skirts will be clean, and he can delay, deny and obfuscate in a way that Rummy can't. Rummy can also claim that he no longer has the documents to candidly answer questions which might be asked of him.

This is typical of the ego-centric Bush--he doesn't give a rat's ass about anyone around him, and he dropped Rummy like a hot rock when it dawned on him just what a liability Rummy had become with the Democratic landslide.

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According to Blatham, you are a schmuck.

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I saw an interview this morning on CNN with one of the White House legal staff who said the decision was final on Sunday and would have been announced regardless of Tuesday's outcome. I'm not sure I believe it, but they're standing by the position of not wanting to have it appear politically motivated (as if anying in Washington is devoid of politics).

What I find amazing is the change in tone from slam-bam, take it or leave it politics to one of wanting to "work together" the way the American people have indicated. What the hell ever made him think the American people didn't want them all working together to begin with?

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Just hoping to throw a stink bomb in the thread, huh, McWhitey? That's always about as high as the level of your "contribution" ever rises to.

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JPB wrote:

What the hell ever made him think the American people didn't want them all working together to begin with?

Ziiiiiinnnnnggggg ! ! !

No sh!t ('scuse my French), that's a very good point.

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By the way, in my post about Rummy's hasty departure, i wrote Clark--i meant Gates, the new patsy-designate.

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I too thought the repubs would prevail set, and I too, am delighted to be wrong.

Happy belated. Have a belly rub.

Now, to see Cheney do the perp walk.......that would make everything perfect.

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Quote:

My pleasure in seeing American voters becoming more independent minded and votiing for the candidate of their choice, regardless of their party affiliation stands whether the vote was cast for Bernie Sanders, Joe Lieberman, or Fred Flinstone.

Lieberman's victory had nothing to do with voters becoming more independent.

Lieberman won because he was heavily supported by Republicans who love him for his support of Bush and had no viable alternative. He was running with incumbancy... in fact his campaign argument was based on his incumbancy. He was an incumbant who is going back to Washington to (in his words) "support the President".

If you want to get pleasure from Bernie Sanders or Fred Flinstone, fine.

But Lieberman's victory shouldn't give you pleasure unless you like entrenched power and incumbancy. But, this has nothing to do the voter's "independence".

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ebrown_p wrote:

... Lieberman's victory shouldn't give you pleasure unless you like entrenched power and incumbancy. But, this has nothing to do the voter's "independence".

What did the exit polls show as his main support base? Has he announced which party he will officially caucus with? I think everyone is assuming it's the Dems, but I haven't heard whether or not it's official.

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I overestimated the American public, thinking that they didn't recognize the overwhelming need for immediate change. I guess it takes awhile, but it eventually sinks in with them.

Let the hearings begin! I suspect that there will be comprehensive hearings coming soon on Iraq, energy, the deficit, intelligence (or lack thereof), etc. I think it will be very difficult for the Dems to wring out any decent cooperation from the Republican hacks running our government.

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Dean states that they will not seek an impeachment (yes, I saw it on the Daily Show - I get all of my hard news from Jon Stewart ) Laughing

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I doubt that the democrats are going to push for impeachment of Bush. They may, however, investigate the intel and other issues related to Iraq.

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JPB wrote:

I saw an interview this morning on CNN with one of the White House legal staff who said the decision was final on Sunday and would have been announced regardless of Tuesday's outcome. I'm not sure I believe it, but they're standing by the position of not wanting to have it appear politically motivated (as if anying in Washington is devoid of politics).

I believe it -- I've been assuming that was the case. Firing Rumsfeld is an admission of failure, and this administration has long shown that (whether it's true or not) they see any admission of failure as poison. I think they may be right -- I think that firing Rumsfeld before the elections would have actually just fed the frustrations of the electorate, bolstered the idea that things are so fucked up that even Bush realizes something needs to change. It makes sense to me that Republicans would NOT want the change=good message out there just before the elections.

I do think that it's finally actually sunk in that Iraq is in shambles, and rather than changing course/ backtracking/ admitting that what's happened so far was idiocy, they're doing it this way. New guy, new ideas, what's that you say new guy?, hey good idea let's do that! Gosh, this new guy sure is smart. Etc.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

I doubt that the democrats are going to push for impeachment of Bush. They may, however, investigate the intel and other issues related to Iraq.

Any serious investigation may make it unavoidable.

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mesquite wrote:

cicerone imposter wrote:
I doubt that the democrats are going to push for impeachment of Bush. They may, however, investigate the intel and other issues related to Iraq.

Any serious investigation may make it unavoidable.

That's Cyclo's basic position--it will only be advisable, though, if it is undoubtedly clear that a significant majority (more than just 51%) of the electorate want an impeachment. Otherwise, i think it would be poison for the Democrats.

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I agree that impeachment is poison.

The Democrats basically have a little more than a year to show to the American people that they are better at governing than the Republicans.

This means they need to take real stands on real issues. They don't need to successfully put everything through-- especially if it is clear that the Republicans are blocking them. But, they damn well better be putting forward real solutions to things that Americans see as problems.

Impeachment is a big waste of time for everyone that will accomplish nothing. And, I say that as someone who has opposes Bush more strenuously, and for a longer time than most people have.

I want them to move to implement the 9/11 commission report. To develop a working plan for Iraq (with the Baker report), to work on minimum wage issues, and to hold hearings on things where they can make a differnce like torture and wiretapping.

The Democrats have an opportunity to be seen as the party of responsibility. Let's pray they don't blow it.

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ebrown_p wrote:

Lieberman's victory had nothing to do with voters becoming more independent.

Lieberman won because he was heavily supported by Republicans who love him for his support of Bush and had no viable alternative. [..]

Lieberman's victory [..] this has nothing to do the voter's "independence".

JPB wrote:

What did the exit polls show as his main support base?

One-third of the Democrats voted for Lieberman.

Over half of the Independents voted for Lieberman.

Over two-thirds of the Republicans voted for Lieberman.

See if this picture will paste in:

http://i.a.cnn.net/cnn/ELECTION/2006/data/states/CT/S/01/pie.0.1012.gif

(From CNN)

So what does that say about what Lieberman's main support base was?

One might jump to this assumption: he had the largest share of support among Republicans, so that means his main support base was Republicans. But that would ignore the fact that Republicans make up only a quarter of the voters in CT.

Ie, the 70% of the CT Republicans who voted for Lieberman still only makes for 18,2% of the CT voters. And since Lieberman got exactly half the vote, it's easy to calculate that Republicans thus made up only 36% of Lieberman's voters.

Independents, meanwhile, made up 39% of Lieberman's voters.

To get the clear image on this, we basically have to recalculate the exit poll numbers by partisan identity, in order to list them by candidate instead.

And, eh, make similar pie charts to go with it. ;-)

Here we go: Razz

http://img465.imageshack.us/img465/2597/ctvotebreakdownob0.gif

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I should probably repost that on the Connecticut thread, eh?

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I'M GLAD I WAS WRONG

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