This is hilarious.
The NRSC didn't want long to start rolling out their Lamont strategy. "Will [insert name of Democratic challenger or top NRSC target here] Support Fringe Candidate Ned Lamont Or The 2000 VP Nominee, Joe Lieberman?" read a series of emails that landed in our inboxes shortly after noon today.
Fringe candidate? But Ned Lamont voted with Republicans 80 percent of the time as a Greenwich selectman!
Republicans can't have a united Democratic Party. It has fed off divisions for so long, while feasting on Democrats afraid to offer distinctions between themselves and their Republican opponents. Think Jean Carnahan in Missouri or Max Cleland in Georgia.
During the Democratic Primary, leaks indicated Rove was relishing a Howard Dean candidacy. In reality, he feared an opponent that would offer a clear distinction to Bush.
"The good news for us is that Dean is not the nominee," Rove now argued to an associate in his second-floor West Wing office. Dean's unconditional opposition to the Iraq war could have been potent in a face-off with Bush. "One of Dean's strengths, though, was he could say, I'm not part of that crowd down there."
I can't find the cite now, but I've read how Rove exhulted after Kerry said, at the Grand Canyon, that knowing what he knew then, he still would have invaded Iraq. He knew at that point they were going to win because Kerry had failed to offer a clear distinction with Bush on one of the key issues of the day.
So now, Democrats are united in their desire to withdraw our troops from Iraq. We're offering a clear distinction to the Republican's "stay the course" to disaster spiel. The Connecticut primary last night booted one of the few Democrats off the reservation on the issue. And we're more united as a party than I ever recall this entire decade.
That's why Republicans are freaking out. They've put on their happy face for public consumption, but their actions don't lie. They're not happy to lose their useful idiot inside the Democratic caucus, and they don't really want to fight an election with the war front and center.
So they bluster. But from what I've gathered, Democrats have wisened up and aren't falling for the gambit.
It's game on. And we'll see in a few weeks just how much Republican candidates truly want to emphasize their war support in their campaigns.
I suspect it'll be like Lieberman -- smears, lies, and the complete avoidance of the white elephant in the room. Few Republicans will be eager to debate the war on its merits.