Worth reading in its entirety. Excerpts below.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/20/AR2006062001439.htmlLieberman Vs. the Democrats
By Harold Meyerson
Wednesday, June 21, 2006; A21
Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman is as seasoned a pol as anyone can find,
but he seems to have forgotten the very purpose of elections.In a remarkable interview he recently gave to The Post's David S. Broder , the Democrats' 2000 vice presidential nominee sounded appalled that his fellow Democrats might, in his state's upcoming August primary, reject his reelection bid because he doesn't think his party should criticize the president on the conduct of the Iraq war. (By most indications, his primary opponent, businessman Ned Lamont, is mounting a strong challenge.)
<>Lieberman's problem is not that he faces expulsion from a sect but that he has chosen to stand outside what remains a big, messy tent of a party. Moreover, he seems to have reversed the roles that the two parties play when it comes to Iraq.
By criticizing the president on the war, he has said, the Democrats are playing partisan politics. His opponent, Lieberman told Broder, criticized him for breaking "Democratic unity. . . . Well, dammit, I wasn't thinking about Democratic unity. It was a moment to put the national interest above partisan interest."
How's that again? To criticize Bush on the war is partisan, while refusing to criticize Bush on the war affirms the national interest? That's taking a rather partisan -- a pro-Bush partisan -- view of the national interest. Lieberman is surely right that one party has exploited the war for partisan gain, but that party is the GOP. From forcing through a resolution authorizing the war on the eve of the 2002 elections to last week's vote in the House, the Republicans have continually used the war to play gotcha with any Democrats from swing states or districts with the guts to dissent from the administration's non-reality-based view of the conflict.