For those keeping score at home, Sen. Joe [tag]Lieberman[/tag] (I) wanted Defense Secretary Donald [tag]Rumsfeld[/tag] to step aside, then he didn’t, and now he does again. It’s getting a little confusing.
Yesterday, Lieberman walked a fine line between supporting the war and criticizing the administration.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, attacked by fellow Democrats as being too close to the White House on the Iraq War, on Sunday called on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to [tag]resign[/tag] but said the United States cannot “walk away” from the Iraqis.
Lieberman, the one-time Democratic vice presidential candidate, is running as an independent in his bid for a fourth term since losing the Democratic nomination to newcomer Ned Lamont, who harnessed voters’ anger against the war in Iraq. Lieberman, an early supporter of the Iraq war, said he had called for Rumsfeld to step down in 2003.
“With all respect to Don Rumsfeld, who has done a grueling job for six years, we would benefit from new leadership to work with our military in Iraq,” he said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
To his credit, this wasn’t new. As he noted on the air, Lieberman did call for Rumsfeld’s ouster in 2003, saying, “If I were President, I’d get a new secretary of defense.”
It’s what he said in between 2003 and 2006 that’s the problem.
In May 2004, in the midst of the Abu Ghraib scandal, Lieberman wrote an item for the Wall Street Journal taking a far different position.
“Many argue that we can only rectify the wrongs done in the Iraqi prisons if Donald Rumsfeld resigns. I disagree. Unless there is clear evidence connecting him to the wrongdoing, it is neither sensible nor fair to force the resignation of the secretary of defense, who clearly retains the confidence of the commander in chief, in the midst of a war. I have yet to see such evidence. Secretary Rumsfeld’s removal would delight foreign and domestic opponents of America’s presence in Iraq.”
Indeed, it was Lieberman’s behavior during the Abu Ghraib affair that officially lost me. I was bothered by his constant tendency to undermine the Dems’ message, and his enthusiastic defense of the war in Iraq was inexplicable, but when he said the United States had no reason to apologize for the torture scandal because “those who were responsible for killing 3,000 Americans on September 11th, 2001, never apologized,” I was officially done with Joe Lieberman.
But back to the point on Rumsfeld, Lieberman was disappointed earlier this month when the media widely reported Sen. Hillary Clinton’s call for Rumsfeld’s resignation. “I had to laugh at — I don’t mean laugh, but be surprised at all the attention to Senator Clinton calling for Rumsfeld to resign,” he said, reminding everyone that he had already done so in 2003.
Yes, but Sen. Clinton never wrote an item for the Wall Street Journal saying, “Rumsfeld’s removal would delight foreign and domestic opponents of America’s presence in Iraq,” now did she, Joe?