Racism and Bigotry an Equal Opportunity Offense for both Parties
 

Funny, I didn't need to see any vitriol on the blogosphere to decide to vote against Lieberman. :shrug:

-Arrian

Perhaps it a matter of Lanny being closer to the political process than normal. It may simply be that the campaignis par for the course but this is Lanny's first brush with reality.

It's a shame. Lieberman is a good and decent man. But it looks like the Democrats are trying to enact the same purifying purge that the Republicans did. That would be fine if those "impure" politicians on both sides of the aisle formed an independent party, but I doubt that will happen.

I was until I decided I wanted to vote in the primary. I've always been an independent, but I find that I'm always *****ing about how the candidates in general elections suck. One small step to dealing with that is to vote in the primary. Given the way the Republican party has gone of late, I'm not going to be playing with them, which leaves the Dems.

Perhaps someday I'll decide to get even more involved, but for right now I'm taking baby steps.

-Arrian

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
Perhaps it a matter of Lanny being closer to the political process than normal. It may simply be that the campaignis par for the course but this is Lanny's first brush with reality. Funny too, how it's the "liberal" blogosphere - pretty much anyone can rant pretty much anywhere, so I'm sure that you could find a few Aryan Nations wannabe types who could agree with the treehuggers to the extent of not liking ol' Jewboy Lieberman.

There is certainly no shortage of ranting idiots of every conceivable political stripe among the peasantry, but comparing that to McCarthyism is so ignorant it is almost beyond belief. Some pseudo-anonymous ranter on one of a billion blogs hardly has the power that comes with a Senate subcommittee chairmanship, let alone a Senate subcommittee chartered to investigate virtually anyone or anything.

You mean he won't hire darkroom techs to create fake photos of Lieberman shaking hands with known commies, and call him "the pink lady?"

Or maybe Lamont could steal a page from Nixon's campaign against Jerry Voorhis, by hiring unemployed actors to wear traditional arab dress and go door to door with stolen campaign literature saying "ve're Arabs and ve vant you to vote for Mr. Lieberman."

Well it seems that Joe is considering running as an independent in the general election if he loses the primary, so that might line up nicely for you.

-Arrian

http://www.slate.com/id/2147255/nav/tap1/

Note the bit about Lieberman's campaign sending a lobbyist to disrupt a Lamont speech.

All's fair in love and war, and politics is war. Disgusting, isn't it?

-Arrian

Originally posted by Arrian
http://www.slate.com/id/2147255/nav/tap1/

Note the bit about Lieberman's campaign sending a lobbyist to disrupt a Lamont speech.

All's fair in love and war, and politics is war. Disgusting, isn't it?

-Arrian the source of the Slate story is MYDD, a notorious Kos affliated leftie blog. (The proprietor of which got a job with the Warner campaign, IIUC, after which Kos decided that Warner was a good guy, despite being all DLCish.) Im not even going to bother reading that.

The Lieberman web site was hacked today. Probably just some of those silly teens, I suppose.

LotM, by the way, what do you find appealing about Hillary? I'm curious, and I want to be open-minded. I've long had a rather unreasoning dislike of Hillary. Even now I'm not entirely sure why I don't like her.

Oh, eek, time to leave the office (yay) and cast my oh-so-important vote. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ilies/cute.gif http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ilies/wink.gif

-Arrian

Originally posted by Arrian
LotM, by the way, what do you find appealing about Hillary? I'm curious, and I want to be open-minded. I've long had a rather unreasoning dislike of Hillary. Even now I'm not entirely sure why I don't like her.

Oh, eek, time to leave the office (yay) and cast my oh-so-important vote. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ilies/cute.gif http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ilies/wink.gif

-Arrian I think shes progressive on economic issues, but with a thirdwayish sense of the value of markets and free trade. She is a firm internationalist, and has the courage to stand behind her guns on Iraq, both criticizing the execution of the war, and refusing to call for a dangerous pullout, DESPITE the political expediency of doing so . Shes not going to let the party be taken over by the left, but she can appeal to many liberal activists in the party. She is broadly progressive on social issues that matter to me, but she also recognizes the importance of community and family, and isnt locked into a knee jerk libertarianism on social issues. Basically I find her appealing on economic, social and foreign policy grounds, and I think she can win. Yes, I know shes pretty power hungry and can be devious - but quite frankly I think a heck of lot of other people are too, including her "purist" critics. Shes scrappy, and tough. And a helluva lot of her enemies, on both left and right, are folks I despise.

Originally posted by Odin
Loserman: http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ons/icon13.gif
DINOs: http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ons/icon13.gif
Ironic, that youre using a name invented by the right.

Y'know, ODIN is an anagram of DINO. Suspicious...

Exploiting religious divisions for political gain

Whatever the outcome is Tuesday night in the Lamont-Lieberman race, this contest should be remembered for the clear emergence of an ugly and alarming development -- namely, the unabashed and undiluted use of anti-Semitism accusations as a partisan tool to win elections. And that tactic is clearly part of a growing right-wing reliance upon the basest and most divisive tactics of identity politics and religious tribalism.

In recent weeks, as Lieberman supporters became more fearful that their candidate could actually lose, accusations that Lieberman opponents are motivated by anti-Semitism have become commonplace. Bill Kristol's latest column is titled "Anti-war, Anti-Israel, Anti-Joe," and Kristol claims that "Democrats have adopted a 'European' attitude toward Israel. And toward the United States. That is the meaning of Connecticut Democrats' likely repudiation of Joe Lieberman." A column on Hugh Hewitt's blog, promoted today by Glenn "Instapundit" Reynolds, alleges that there has "been a disquieting whiff of anti-Semitism in the anti-Lieberman campaign." Dean Barnett wrote in the Weekly Standard: "Some Americans believe that Israel should not exist. And these are the Americans that Lamont and other Democrats have so eagerly embraced."

Marshall Whittman Monday insinuated darkly that "the degree of left hatred (sic) toward Joe sometimes betrays something deeper," and then came right out with it: "Anti-Semitism will often not speak its name directly, but there is a distinct undercurrent that may explain some of the irrational venom." The Lieberman camp itself has blamed what it claims is a "growing strain of anti-Semitism" for opposition to the senator. As the New York Times put it in a recent article: "Some of Mr. Lieberman's supporters say there is a strain of anti-Semitism in the antiwar left that could make Jewish voters uneasy about supporting Mr. Lamont."

This increasingly aggressive use of anti-Semitism accusations as a political weapon is visible beyond Connecticut. Indeed, it appears to be a prominent weapon in the Republican arsenal as the GOP battles to maintain control of Congress this year. Within the last several weeks, the Weekly Standard has been publishing articles suggesting that Jews ought to feel obligated to vote Republican because of President Bush's support for Israel and the supposedly substantial anti-Semitism on "the left."

One such article, by David Gelernter and titled "When Will They Ever Learn?" (referring to Jewish support for Democrats), argued that Jews "who continue to insist on voting Democratic" provide a "lesson in self-destructive nihilism," and that Jewish support for Democrats is part of the "tragic history of [Jewish Americans] acting against their own professed interests." Writing about that article, Scott Johnson of the Powerline blog argued that the reason "why so may American Jews hate the president who stands by Israel" is because they are not true adherents to Judaism; instead, "the true religion of the American Jews within Professor Gelernter's sights is liberalism."

This number of examples, within such a short period of time, constitutes a clear trend. And it is an ugly and divisive trend, where accusations of anti-Semitism become just another partisan plaything designed to sow yet more tribalistic divisions among Americans for domestic political gain. Accusing those who oppose Jewish candidates of anti-Semitism, or instructing American Jews that they must vote Republican, is to descend to the lowest levels of political manipulation.

The anti-Semitism accusations themselves are too frivolous to merit much discussion. These same accusers will be the first to claim, with no intended irony, that the favored candidate of the "far left" is Jewish Sen. Russell Feingold -- the candidate who has had a massive lead among Daily Kos readers in its last several presidential straw polls. Beyond that, the notion that the Bush administration's foreign policy is better for Israel is highly debatable, and, in any event, the suggestion that Jewish Americans must vote in American political elections based upon dual loyalty to Israel is offensive and indescribably divisive.

In one sense, there is nothing new about these efforts to create religious divisions for partisan gain. Republicans spent 2004 attacking the authenticity of John Kerry's Roman Catholicism, insisting that good Catholics were compelled to vote for Bush and that Kerry -- to use the GOP's phrase -- was "wrong for Catholics." These religious smears reached their low point with the crusade by certain prominent Republican Catholics to deny Communion to Kerry. As Reason magazine documented, dividing the electorate based on religious lines was central to the GOP strategy: "Throughout the 2004 campaign, [Karl] Rove maintained that, if Bush won the Catholic vote, he would be reelected. Rove was right."

But the naked and widespread political exploitation of anti-Semitism on a national level is new. And it is, in equal parts, reprehensible and dangerous. The Lieberman race leaves no doubt that dividing Americans along religious lines to try to win elections is becoming a more widely used and acceptable tactic.

-- Glenn Greenwald

Lieberman's site wasn't hacked. He invested jack into his net infrastructure, and the server that he's using went down due to traffic. And he's making bald assertions about dirty tricks because, well, that sort of thing is commensurate with the quality of his career and campaign.

BTW, Lieberman has been quite critical of Bush, just not in the approved ways. Not really. Folks like Joe and Hillary might say that the war is poorly run, but they've done very little in terms of either getting it run properly or articulating exactly what needs to be done to fix things. I don't really know at this point what we could do to help the situation (besides stopping the legitimization of Israeli terrorism in Lebanaon - but no need to discuss that right now), but neither, apparantly, do Lieberman and company. And while I don't know if some sort of withdrawal would help things, at least it's an actual suggestion. And just as importantly, when things could've been done - even a year or two back, Lieberman criticized dissent as tantamount to hurting the war effort.

Nor has he been critical of Bush's trampling of our civil liberties. He's consistently come down on the wrong side - the Patriot Act, the Alito filibuster, the Gonzales vote. When Feingold proposed censure to rebuke Dear Leader for rejecting the very idea of rule of law on the NSA domestic spying matter, Lieberman was up front in stamping it down.

Then there are meat and potato issues like his corporate giveaways in his support for the Bankruptcy Bill or the Energy Bill. His waffling on social security, his lack of substantive support for universal (i.e. single payer) healthcare.

That's why Joe needs to go.

Looks like Lieberman's about to lose! Byebye Joe!

I thought it was a fairly accurate description. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...milies/lol.gif

It's going to be funny if/when he wins as an independent.

How is pointing out that Kerry' values was not in line with most Catholics beliefs a dirty trick?

Is it a dirty trick when Kerry trys to tell blacks that Bush's values are not in line with their beliefs?

Weird.