Nedheads' Motto When Challenged: Attack First, Answer Questions Never
Wanna know how you can tell if you've struck a nerve with the Lieberman-haters and exposed one of their many inconsistencies and hypocrisies? They won't respond directly to the challenge that's been made to them or Ned Lamont and instead will lash out with one of their sophomoric ad hominem attacks.
Case in point: today's typically bitter blogpost from Jane "Natural Born Fibber" Hamsher, in which she talks about Halliburton and Bill Clinton among other things.
The Lieberman campaign has pointed out that Ned Lamont owns between $15,000 to $50,000 in Halliburton stock. And the Lieberman folks have raised a quite legitimate question: Isn't it a bit hypocritical for Lamont to relentlessly criticize Lieberman for being close to George Bush when Lamont himself is profitting right along with Dick Cheney from Halliburton's no-bid contracts (contracts, by the way, which Lieberman has protested quite vocally)?
So how does Hamsher, the Lamont campaign's lead cheerblogger, respond? By completely ignoring the question, and lashing out at Lieberman for not attacking Cheney rabidly enough during the 2000 vice-presidential debate over Halliburton. To back up her lame claim, Hamsher quotes a point Lieberman sarcastically made about how well Cheney did in the 1990s under the Clinton-Gore Administration, showing that subtlety is clearly an art that is lost on her.
Let's give Jane and the other Lieberman-haters a test. Try to set aside your blinding hatred for a second and explain how you can reconcile Ned Lamont's real financial ties to Dick Cheney with his bogus attacks on Joe Lieberman for being too close to the Administration.
Maybe we should start off with something easier for Jane and company, such as how they reconcile their hatred for Joe Lieberman with their adoration for Bill Clinton, who is coming to campaign for Lieberman on Monday in Waterbury.
Lieberman and Clinton are ideological soulmates, worked together on most every major issue of the 1990s, supported the war in Iraq from the outset, and have opposed the kind of arbitrary timetables for troop withdrawal that Lamont has naively and inconsistently advocated. That helps explain why Clinton has strongly criticized the campaign to purge Lieberman from the party as "nutty."
So what's the best Hamsher can say about Clinton coming to Connecticut on Lieberman's behalf? She dredges up the old canard about Lieberman "stabbing Clinton in the back" during the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
That of course is a crock -- many political experts believe that Lieberman's famous Senate floor speech helped save Clinton's presidency, by saying what was on the minds of millions of Democrats around the country and separating the legitimate moral questions about his conduct from the illegitimate legal ones.
But setting aside that point, Hamsher's disingenous response does nothing to account for the Lieberman-haters hypocrisy here. If Joe Lieberman is such a bad Democrat, why is Bill Clinton openly supporting him? Does that make Bill Clinton a bad Democrat too?
The fact that Hamsher and others won't even try to answer these questions and desperately try to change the subject strongly suggests that they can't answer them. Which is to say, they can't defend the hypocrisy that is behind their hatred.
Case in point: today's typically bitter blogpost from Jane "Natural Born Fibber" Hamsher, in which she talks about Halliburton and Bill Clinton among other things.
The Lieberman campaign has pointed out that Ned Lamont owns between $15,000 to $50,000 in Halliburton stock. And the Lieberman folks have raised a quite legitimate question: Isn't it a bit hypocritical for Lamont to relentlessly criticize Lieberman for being close to George Bush when Lamont himself is profitting right along with Dick Cheney from Halliburton's no-bid contracts (contracts, by the way, which Lieberman has protested quite vocally)?
So how does Hamsher, the Lamont campaign's lead cheerblogger, respond? By completely ignoring the question, and lashing out at Lieberman for not attacking Cheney rabidly enough during the 2000 vice-presidential debate over Halliburton. To back up her lame claim, Hamsher quotes a point Lieberman sarcastically made about how well Cheney did in the 1990s under the Clinton-Gore Administration, showing that subtlety is clearly an art that is lost on her.
Let's give Jane and the other Lieberman-haters a test. Try to set aside your blinding hatred for a second and explain how you can reconcile Ned Lamont's real financial ties to Dick Cheney with his bogus attacks on Joe Lieberman for being too close to the Administration.
Maybe we should start off with something easier for Jane and company, such as how they reconcile their hatred for Joe Lieberman with their adoration for Bill Clinton, who is coming to campaign for Lieberman on Monday in Waterbury.
Lieberman and Clinton are ideological soulmates, worked together on most every major issue of the 1990s, supported the war in Iraq from the outset, and have opposed the kind of arbitrary timetables for troop withdrawal that Lamont has naively and inconsistently advocated. That helps explain why Clinton has strongly criticized the campaign to purge Lieberman from the party as "nutty."
So what's the best Hamsher can say about Clinton coming to Connecticut on Lieberman's behalf? She dredges up the old canard about Lieberman "stabbing Clinton in the back" during the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
That of course is a crock -- many political experts believe that Lieberman's famous Senate floor speech helped save Clinton's presidency, by saying what was on the minds of millions of Democrats around the country and separating the legitimate moral questions about his conduct from the illegitimate legal ones.
But setting aside that point, Hamsher's disingenous response does nothing to account for the Lieberman-haters hypocrisy here. If Joe Lieberman is such a bad Democrat, why is Bill Clinton openly supporting him? Does that make Bill Clinton a bad Democrat too?
The fact that Hamsher and others won't even try to answer these questions and desperately try to change the subject strongly suggests that they can't answer them. Which is to say, they can't defend the hypocrisy that is behind their hatred.
posted by Gotham Ghostwriters at 3:38 PM
14 Comments:
Isn't it great news that Bill Clinton's going to campaign with Lamont after the primary?
I'm thrilled.
Isn't it great news that he's endorsed Lieberman, who's going to win the primary and send Ned Lamont back to his whites-only country club?
I'm thrilled.
Lieberman never should have gone into Lamont's financial statements... A lot of the mutual funds Lieberman owns have big stakes in the defense industry, including owning stock in Lockheed Martin and Halliburton. Neither candidate is, or claims to be, a socially conscious investor. Heck, Lieberman has most of his accounts at Merrill Lynch, an investment bank complicit in the Enron collapse. Stuff happens.
As for Bill - hey, the Clintons don't feel like Lieberman betrayed them so, I guess that ends that discussion. Rereading Lieberman's speech, though -- it did strike me as prudish.
Great Lieberman parody site - thanks!
Lord Lieberman is the Dean Scream of 2006
Doesn't Lieberman have a financial interest in Halliburton as well? I don't really care that much, but since Joe brought it up...Isn't it a little hypocritical of Joe Lieberman to criticize a candidate for owning Halliburton stock when he owns that stock as well?
If Joe Lieberman is such a bad Democrat, why is Bill Clinton openly supporting him?
I don't know, why don't you ask him?
Does that make Bill Clinton a bad Democrat too?
It makes him a politically involved Democrat. Bill Clinton is entitled to support Joe Lieberman, and the voters of Connecticut are entitled to vote for Ned Lamont. It's called democracy.
AMONG LIEBERMAN SUPPORTERS:
Against Lamont 4 5 11
AMONG LAMONT SUPPORTERS
Against Lieberman 77 78 63
Does this look like a trend to anyone else? In the span of 2 1/2 months, Lieberman supporters who are voting against Lamont grew from 4% to 11%. In that same time, however, Lamont supporters who are voting against Lieberman went down from 77% to 63%.
Considering that there's been a 40% swing in this race in about 4 months (from 65% Lieberman 19% Lamont in April to 47% Lieberman 51% Lamont now), I think the trends should matter a lot.
It's also called democracy that Lieberman is beating Lamont 2-1 among all CT voters. And whether he wins in August or November, you all won't be able to use the excuse that Lieberman hates democracy.
Actually, it just shows that they are capable of independent thought and action. Maybe you should try it sometime, Sundog.
You all seem to be missing the two key ingredients in the Kososphere's intense dislike of Lieberman:
a) he's awfully sanctimonious about everything he does, from making outlandish statements on abortion in Connecticut to giving cover to the GOP on Clinton's conduct to suggesting that criticizing the President was undermining the war. None of those are the same as disagreement, and they hang in the news for far longer the way Joe does it. When was the last time you heard Harry Reid make peep about being pro-life? The guy knows that if he's going to be a Dem he has to put that particular issue on the back burner. Lieberman has had time to follow suit and shut up. He's chosen instead to take his media spotlight and criticize Democrats.
b) He has used this "I'm a different kind of Democrat" nonsense for at least 3 years too long. Bush and the GOP a running a scorched-earth political operation, and they have been since they first kneecapped McCain. Liberman should have taken a cue from the rest of the Dems that it was time to circle the wagons. That's been the thrust of Reid and Pelosi's efforts: circle the wagons, make the Dems a cohesive bloc in message and in votes and stand strong together. There are no "different kind" of Dems in this climate - that time is over. Either you're a Democrat or you ain't. That leaves no room to burnish one's centrist bonafides by comparison to others in the party.
Kos' main goal is to marshall the lefty blogosphere to be a cohesive attack force against Republicans. His style is understandably a turn-off for many. You may not agree with all his policy views (though frankly I don't think the community in general has that clear a policy line), but be clear that it's not policy, it's Lieberman stepping out to distinguish himself for so-called "centrism" or "comity" in a way that's destructive to Democratic unity that gets the goat of the man and the community. Lieberman can disagree without criticizing.
If it's true that Lieberman scolded Clinton on the floor in order to blunt any further attacks, he could have made good with the public and the Kossacks by saying this. Reach out to doubters and convince them that he is in fact a Democrat, not just that he says he is. There are few things worse than stonewalling critics and letting them come to their own conclusions. That's something John Kerry should have known, and it's something Joe Lieberman should know.
I guess you could call me a lieberhater if you want. I'm not one, but I wouldn't vote for the man, and I'm a bit appaled that he'd run against the democratic nominee.
I think that owning HAL is a generally bad thing. Lamont shouldn't get a pass just because his advisor put him in it. Lamont needs to explain this, but the issue strikes me as hypocritical by both candidates.
Lamont making money off Haliburton is bad. I think it is worse that Lieberman would not see fit to INVESTIGATE the no bid contracts from his choice spot on the governmental affairs committee with its subcommittee on investigations. And then maybe the $9 billion missing from the CPA. Then Dick Cheney's office and its role of securing those no-bids for HAL. Then maybe war profiteering in general.
No one is in a better position to nail the administration on their poorly-run, wasteful war that has made our country so much less secure. If Joe would do this, I would even almost forgive him for saying that we'll lose the war unless we clap louder.
Maybe Joe has spoken out against no bid contracts, but I haven't heard him. Maybe it gets lost when he accuses democrats of endangeing our national security by questioning dear leader's honesty, though his dishonesty is obvious to everyone but Joe. For some reason, that seems to get the big headlines. Big headlines, and the statement gets a few rounds in the right wing echo chamber. And a few hoorays from Hannity, Rush, Kristol, and the other Lieberlovers.
Silly Ken. Mainstream Democrats aren't "people powered" (whatever that means) so they have to be taken down.
Let's give Jane and the other Lieberman-haters a test. Try to set aside your blinding hatred for a second and explain how you can reconcile Ned Lamont's real financial ties to Dick Cheney with his bogus attacks on Joe Lieberman for being too close to the Administration.
Are you serious? That's the best you can come up with? "Ned Lamont's real financial ties to Dick Cheney"
Are you for real, or just a parody site? This is about as silly as the bear ad claiming that Lamont is running because Lowell Weicker told him to. Or was it Kos who told him to?
Give me a break. 15K-50K in stock in not much at all in a giant corporation like Halliburton. Its a small holding and as such Lamont has no ability to influence the company. Cheney, OTOH, was a major shareholder AND the CEO AND a Director. You guys really think there is ANY similarity to this? Also, the point that seems to elude you guys is that Lamont espouses action which would be determental to his interest in Halliburton. Cheney, as VP, has taken actions which helped enrich him to the tune of millions.
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