Hey, all. I saw the diary about what needs to happen if Lamont wins tonight, and figured I would dust off my Devil's Advocate cap and say what I think should happen if Joementum pulls it out.
For the record, I've gone from being a Lieberman supporter until the past week to being genuinely undecided. My problems with the Lamont primary challenge are pragmatic and tactical, not ideological, but there are good points to both sides. I'm not rooting for one or the other; I'm just trying to figure out how to make the best of whatever result occurs for this November.
Recent polls have me, perpetually a Lamont skeptic, believing Lieberman will lose this race. However, this type of thing is, as you all know, extremely tough to predict, what with intensity and turnout and all those other intangibles. So, if Joe wins:
* Lamont and the entire netroots community should admit their loss, act mature, and endorse Lieberman for the fall. Yes, I know, he wouldn't do the same to you guys had he been the loser. But you have to be the bigger man (collectively) in this situation. Lamont has already said he'd abide by the results of the primary; good on him. Let's do likewise, even if noseclips are necessary for some of us.
* The netroots is gonna have to get over it in a relatively short amount of time. Now is not a time when we can afford to mope around, reliving the battle, going "if only we had pulled another thousand votes here, 500 there..." We're gonna have to snap out of it and get focused. Take 2 days to get your shit together, then we gotta start hammering Santorum again. There are plenty of good Democrats not named Lamont who will need all the help we can give them this fall.
* There are still 3 very winnable Republican-held House seats in CT this fall. Shays, Simmons, and Johnson are all "moderate" Republicans- which, as you all know, means they agree with us when we don't need them and stab us in the back when we do. Don't let a loss here cause you to give up on CT entirely- if you were a local Lamont volunteer, you still have three more ways to show your disapproval of this foolish administration.
* The 50-state strategy, which I have more than my share of problems with, does have one very good point- money raised to help weakened incumbents is money that doesn't go to support other, more highly contested races. In other words, don't ditch Lieberman out of disgust- if the GOP senses he's weak, my boy Charles Schumer will have to spend money bailing him out that could have gone to McCaskill, Brown, Tester, Casey, etc. If you've been following Political Wire, you'll know that the state's Republicans are smelling blood here and are trying to knock off their current nominee, Alan Schlesinger, for a more serious candidate.
Hopefully, all this goes without saying. I dunno. But I thought someone should say it in case the worst (best? I don't know) happens tonight.