Dems in Connecticut are divided between [tag]Ned Lamont[/tag] and [tag]Joe Lieberman[/tag], but it’s also worth noting that [tag]Republican[/tag]s are struggling badly in the same race — and may be open to “creative” alternatives.
In the latest bizarre twist in an already odd race, the lone Republican candidate, Alan Schlesinger, is now facing pressure from his own party to quit the race because he used an assumed name to gamble at Connecticut’s Foxwoods Resort Casino in the 1990s. The revelations have prompted Gov. M. Jodi Rell (R) and GOP Chairman George Gallo to urge Schlesinger to drop out.
If Schlesinger is forced out, who’ll be the GOP nominee? Greg Sargent raised the possibility yesterday that it could be Joe Lieberman.
At least two prominent Republicans think that if Schlesinger can be nixed from his spot on the ballot, it should be given to Senator Joseph Lieberman if he loses the August 8th primary to challenger Ned Lamont. Schmata mogul and former Michael Kors fashion company partner Jack Orchulli, who ran against Chris Dodd in 2004, has also had his name floated as a replacement.
I’d add also that, in March, Rep. Chris Shays (R-Conn.) said he would not only vote for Lieberman in November, but he’d also encourage other Republicans in Connecticut to do the same.
I sincerely doubt Lieberman would even consider the possibility, but at this point, I also get the impression that he’d do just about anything to keep his job.
And speaking of Lieberman, I’m pleased to see that Jonathan Chait seems to be slowly coming around.
As much as I enjoy Chait’s work, and he’s usually one of my favorites, his efforts to defend Lieberman have been unpersuasive and borderline incoherent. Chait described his own recent column on the campaign as a “tortured” piece that “generated as much critical email from friends and acquaintances” as anything he’s ever written.
Today, however, Chait is apparently beginning to better understand what makes Lieberman so unique. It all appears to come down to what the meaning of “pro-war” is.
[T]he idea that Lieberman is in trouble for being “pro-war” is an oversimplification, because “pro-war” means several different overlapping things:
1. The war was a good idea given what we knew in early 2003.
2. The war may have been a mistake, but now that we’re there, withdrawal would be worse.
3. Even knowing what we know today, the war was a good idea.
There are plenty of liberals who believe 1 and 2, myself included. Lieberman is nearly alone in believing 3. And that’s the real catch. To argue that the Iraq war made sense even given what we know about the lack of WMDs, the bungled occupation, and so on is extremely hard to defend. A related point is that almost everybody who believes 3 is a partisan Republican. And so, while Democrats disagree on how to make the best of the Iraq fiasco, Lieberman is left as basically the only Democrat who doesn’t think the Iraq war has been a fiasco.
Yep.
Of course, we all know that the war isn’t the only issue that matters here, but Chait is finally right about what makes Lieberman so uniquely offensive when it comes to Iraq.