War stance in your pants

Now that Lieberman is facing the near-term end of his senate career, something the establishment still can't seem to wrap their heads around, the senator from Connecticut is offering some last minute defense of his positions and claiming that he actually has criticised Bush's Iraq debacle. Which is a bit conflicted considering that, in December, he said that criticsing the president during "wartime" would "undermine presidential credibilty." Leiberman was apparently unaware that, even then, Bush already had no credibility and certainly not with Democrats.

But even in the waning moments of his public career, he still can't relenquish the sanctimony and condenscension he has routinely mustered throughout his squeamish political life:

I not only respect your right to disagree or question the president or anyone else -- including me -- I value your right to disagree.

Really? Let us first ignore that brazen conceit that a senior senator in a so-called liberal democracy has to tell citizens that he "values" their right to disagree, while thinking that that disagreement should not result in any consequences for him. It seems doubtful, at best, that Leiberman, and the rest of the mainstream cabal that finds his impending dishcharge to be entirely unseemly, don't really understand why he is in this position right now. If Leiberman actually understood and appreciated a voters' right to disagree, he might at least be a little more accepting of the fate about to befall him.

Face it. Lieberman is the kind of mewling, Bush-apologist Democrat with which actual Democrats have finally grown disenchanted.

But don't look for the primary to be the end of Leiberman. If he does run as an independent, it can easily be expected that the Rove-machine will kick in to aid reliable Joe. The GOP doesn't want to loose a guaranteed Republican vote in the Senate, which is what they surely had with Leiberman in his seat.