Do Not Give Him the Baby!

I intend to blob about Lieberman but (you may recall) we’re in New Orleans, so for a minute I’m going to bitch about not bringing my hair gel home. Now back to the Connecticut primary. The people voted. Lieberman does not intend to listen. Which is precisely why the people voted the way they voted. You remember that old verse we repeated as kids, “So he died and we buried him with sand and it tickled and he laughed so hard that he died and we buried him… It is how I feel about Mr. Lieberman. He still doesn’t get it. His inability to suffer a graceful loss is ongoing, unattractive and frustrating. Not surprisingly, the Vice President, never knowing when to sit down and shut up, intimated that an anti-war, would give comfort to the enemy – who ever they are.

What is there for the Democratic party to do about this guy? Nothing. Mr. Lieberman thinks he is more important than the Party. He believes the Democrats who voted in the primary simply did not know what they were doing. He believes that all the people in Connecticut need to have an opportunity to vote, so they can all tell him they don’t want him. Surely he cannot believe that since Democrats said “Hell No Joe Should Go!” the Republicans will rally behind him. Personally, I think he’s delusionary. He should be in therapy or at the very least, he needs counseling. But who counsels him?

There are two people I can think of. The first person he should talk to is to Joe Duffey. Joe is politically astute, wise and compassionate. He understands the consequences of Lieberman’s self indulgent decision. He ran as a Democrat for the Senate in 1970. That was the last time Connecticut had a race where there was an Independent in the race. It was a three way contest between the almost moderate Republican Lowell Weicker, Tom Dodd, the conservative Independent and Duffey, a liberal anti-war Democrat. The parallels are easily drawn and the results, I fear will be unfortunately similar. In 1970 Duffey lost to Weicker because Dodd cut into his vote. I believe the same thing will happen this time and the Republican candidate, (no one can remember who that is), will emerge victorious because Joe Lieberman will take votes from Lamont. Joe D. could certainly explain to Joe L .the importance of doing the right thing.

1970, which as you may know, followed soon after 1968, were both chaotic political years. Nixon was the President and while he didn’t get us into the war he decided, like this Administration, to stay the course. Baby Boomers, opposed to fighting a war that couldn’t be won, (or where they might get hurt), recognized that they had enormous power in their numbers and if they united they could make change. Nixon didn’t want to hear anything about change. (Does this sound familiar). In 1968 Eugene McCarthy was the first elected-official-adult, who articulated the anti-war sentiment and he announced that he intended to run for the Presidency. He had been courageous and vocal about withdrawing troops from Viet Nam and was successful in mustering energetic young anti-war activists to support him. Bobby Kennedy parleyed that sentiment into his own Presidential aspirations (with is own young people), and probably would have been the candidate and President if he had not been assassinated. It was a big year for assassinating great men who wanted to make things better for people whose voices could not been heard. Grown up people were just starting to articulate their opinions about getting out of the Viet Nam war, amongst them was Joe Lieberman who was one of the founders of the ADA.

The other person who should counsel Joe L is his Rabbi. Lieberman is an Orthodox Jew. He insists a great deal of his support comes from this community. I guess they are all registered Republicans or must have been very ill because they were not there in force for the Senator. Nevertheless, a Rabbi would impart Jewish wisdom to his confused Congregant. Maybe the story of King Solomon and two women who both claimed to the mother of the same child. The King asked for his sword and told the yentas that he would simply divide the child in half and then duke it out for which part went where. The fake mother thought that was fine. The real mother said that Solomon should give the baby to the other woman rather than kill him. This siuation is analagous. It doesn’t matter who the real Democrat is, Joe Lieberman is willing to kill the Party rather than let someone else have it. Why would anyone want to elect a person who is willing to sacrifice the life a child or in this case, a party in need of growing strong by being united, because of his ego or in order to satisfy some personal desire. Surely that is reason enough not to want to give him the baby. We’re Just Sayin…Iris