Sen. [tag]Joe Lieberman[/tag] looked disappointed but content when he told supporters, “The judgment of the voters is now clear…. It is now time to make a difficult but realistic decision. After looking at the returns and speaking with my family, I have decided tonight to end my quest.”
No, not last night — that was Lieberman on February 3, 2004, after he ended his presidential campaign. Lieberman sought the support of Democratic voters, he came up short, and he accepted their decision.
This year, [tag]Lieberman[/tag] will follow a slightly different path.
“As I see it, in this campaign, we’ve just finished the first half and the Lamont team is ahead — but in the second half, our team, Team Connecticut, is going to surge forward to victory in November,” Mr. Lieberman told cheering supporters.
The senator said he was staying in the race because Mr. Lamont had run a primary campaign of “insults” and “partisan polarizing” that relentlessly blamed Mr. Lieberman for President Bush’s wartime policies, which the senator has supported and defended but also criticized at various points.
“For the sake of our state, our country and my party, I cannot, I will not let this result stand,” Mr. Lieberman said of the Lamont victory.
The funny thing is, everyone who loses a primary feels they were unfairly snubbed. Their primary rival was mean to them, the real issues were obscured, the party made a mistake — these are the thoughts that invariably go through the mind of any candidate who loses a primary race they really wanted to win. But in the end, candidates lick their wounds and respect the will of the voters. Lieberman won’t.
At least, not yet.
To say that Lieberman will face considerable pressure to forgo his third-party bid is an understatement.
Mr. Lieberman’s determination to remain in the race may soon collide with the will of many Democratic leaders in Washington and Connecticut, however. The Senate minority leader, Harry Reid, and Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, who is leading the effort to elect more Democrats in November, planned to announce this morning that they were supporting Mr. Lamont and that the party should unite around the nominee, according to Democrats close to both men. […]
Senator Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, Mr. Lieberman’s Democratic ally, privately congratulated Mr. Lamont last night and was expected to appear at a “unity press conference” with Mr. Lamont and other candidates at state party headquarters this morning. Two Lamont advisers said that they expected Mr. Dodd to help smooth Mr. Lieberman’s exit from the race; a spokeswoman for Mr. Dodd, however, said he would not play a go-between role to broker the senator’s exit.
Word leaked out last night that Hillary Clinton’s HILLPAC will cut a $5,000 check for [tag]Ned Lamont[/tag] this morning. Current colleagues like Evan Bayh, former colleagues like John Edwards, and House leaders like Rahm Emanuel also stepped up to throw their support behind Lamont — a list that will no doubt grow today.
And a quick word about Lamont’s margin of victory. Clearly, a four-point win is closer than a lot of us, including me, expected, but let’s not overlook the significance of the success here. Six months ago, [tag]Lamont[/tag] was an unknown candidate making his campaign flyers on a copying machine. With support from blogs, the netroots, progressive activists, and [tag]Connecticut[/tag] [tag]Democrats[/tag] ready for a change, he pulled off what most experts thought was impossible — he beat a three-term incumbent senator in a [tag]primary[/tag] fight. It’s a remarkable achievement, whether Lamont won by one vote or 100,001 votes.