From the
lead WaPo editorial:
If there is a candidate in the Democratic presidential field whose views align most closely with those of this page, it is Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.).
No big surprise there. Lieberman is Fred Hiatt's ideological twin. The WaPo goes on to state:
Mr. Lieberman is progressive on most issues (abortion, the environment, gay rights) without being a captive of the party's orthodoxy. During three terms in the Senate, he has defied the teachers unions to support experiments with school vouchers and efforts to hold schools accountable for their performance, infuriated trial lawyers by supporting reasonable steps to rein in abusive lawsuits, and confronted Hollywood over gratuitous sex and violence. He's moderate on fiscal matters, combining one of the most progressively structured tax plans of the Democratic field with a pledge to limit the growth of most federal spending to the rate of inflation. He brings a deep commitment to civil rights, nurtured in marches in Mississippi while a college student. His assertive approach to national security contemplates U.S. intervention on behalf of democracy and human rights, not only in Iraq but throughout the globe. All this is a mixture that would serve him well in the Oval Office, even if it may be turning off some Democratic primary voters.
Are there any Congressional Democrats from the Northeast or Left Coast who aren't progressive on abortion, the environment, gay/civil rights? In other words, Lieberman is as conservative as possible for a non-Southern Democrat. Naturally the Post doesn't bother to suggest why Lieberman's "assertive approach to national security" would serve him well in the Oval Office.
But in a year in which it seems that anger sells, Mr. Lieberman's wry, measured demeanor may fail to inspire some primary voters.
Ah, yes, Holy Joe is too calm and reasonable for the irrational base. It couldn't be that he's simply an uninspiring speaker with a whiny voice? Perhaps it also might help if the issues that Lieberman is most "assertive" weren't making pre-emptive war and defending Israel's oppression. Lieberman would be trailing Kucinich if Gore hadn't plucked the sanctimonious one from the Senate in a lame attempt to innoculate the Dem ticket against the Clenis factor.
Mr. Lieberman is offering himself to voters as the rightful heir to Mr. Clinton's Democratic Party
Yeah, right. I wonder what the Big Dog would have to say about that. In style, they couldn't be any more different. Yeah, they're DLC brothers, but I suspect that Bill Clinton would prefer either Clark or Edwards to Lieberman.
The conclusion is a real zinger:
"I don't think we should have to choose between abandoning the middle class and raising taxes on them," he told New Hampshire voters last week. "I don't think we should have to choose between making enemies around the world and failing to understand that we have enemies all around the world. I don't think we have to choose between leaving our workers defenseless and building walls around America." It may say more about the current state of the Democratic Party than it does about Mr. Lieberman that he is having a difficult time making this message sell.
@#*% you, Fred Hiatt! Dean and his fellow irrational zealots want to abandon the middle class and build [protectionist] walls around America?
Will it come as a shock to anyone when the Post endorses Bush?
For comparison, here is the New Republic's defense of their endorsement of Lieberman.