Reply #3: How about "Joe Lieberman needs to be played by someone else" in Slate.com? [View All]

http://slate.msn.com/id/2086592/

This is very uncomplementary:

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Today's speech at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., illustrates the conundrum. Essentially, Lieberman is here to declare war on Howard Dean and the left. He starts off with a boxing metaphor: "Today I'm in training for two bouts. The first is a fight for the future of the Democratic Party. The second, the main event," is against Bush. Since Bush "is covering up on his right, a left hook is not going to knock him out. We've got to go right up the middle," says Lieberman. He vows to stay in the fight for the full "15 rounds." He speaks more than a dozen times of "strength" and "fighting."

That's the message. The messenger, however, looks unconvinced. The first question he gets is whether he's aiming his remarks at Dean. Lieberman replies that he "respects" Dean's opposition to the Iraq war, "but I just plain disagree with it." Disagree? This isn't some Iowa town hall where candidates have to suck up to an anti-war crowd. This is the epicenter of Beltway moderation. Yet Lieberman can't pull the trigger.

Lieberman's body language is even more incongruous. He speaks of "strength" in a faint, creaky voice. He makes a fist but never clenches it and seldom raises it above the podium. When he does swing it forward in an attempt to look forceful, his head reclines away, as though he's the one getting punched. "My campaign has a lot of energy," he asserts in a voice trailing off. "I'm standing for something," he insists as he leans on the podium. In the flattest tone imaginable, he drones that he's "stunned" by Bush's lack of preparation for postwar Iraq. He accuses Bush of "tighten the noose around working families' necks" and tries to illustrate the noose, but somehow can't manage to close the distance between his hands to less than 18 inches. He threatens to hit Bush "right up the middle" but defuses the gesture with an avuncular grin.
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This is hilarious:

Half the time, he looks bored and tired. The rest of the time, he tries to be funny but ends up playing Shecky Lieberman, a smut-fighting, pro-invasion stand-up comic.

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