Joe Lieberman is having a field day. Holy Joe's "above the fray" ruse is nothing more than playing both sides against the middle for his own gain. He doesn't get what he wants from Harry Reid? Fine. He'll jump to the Repugs.
That's way too much power for any one senator to have, let alone one who clearly has no loyalty other than to himself.
Sen. Reid has to start flipping some moderate Republicans, and he has plenty of leverage to do it.
It would be much more preferable to bring liberal-moderate Republicans into the fold, gaining their loyalty, and let go of DINOs who have absolutely no party loyalty.
Essentially we're only talking about two senators - and they're both from Maine. Sue Collins and Olympia Snowe are pro-choice, pro-stem cell, fiscal moderates. Over the last 12 years, the Republcians have largely abandoned Collins and Snowe. Now it's time for Snowe and Collins to abandon the Republicans.
Maine's party registration is essentially 1/3 each - Democrat, Republican and Independent.
Even if they don't become Democrats, Snowe and Collins could become indepdendents and caucus with the Democrats like Jim Jeffords did in 2001.
Snowe just won an easy reelection, but Collins is up in 2008. The DSCC should be working on a serious challenge here, and Collins must be freaking out after seeing what happened to her friend Lincoln Chafee in Rhode Island.
Snowe and Collins are two of the last Republicans in the Northeast. (John Sunnunu of New Hampshire is another - and he will face a serious challenge in a very blue state.)
And guess what committee Collins currently chairs? Homeland Security! That's the committee that Joe's expecting to get.
Snowe, meanwhile, chairs the Small Business Committee - the ranking Democrat on that committee is John Kerry. I don't think there will be any tears shed by dumping Kerry as punishment for nearly blowing yet another election.
Let's see how many Sunday talk shows Joe gets booked on after he loses all leverage!