Joe Loserman

Joseph Lieberman lost the Democratic primary in Connecticut in his bid for a fourth term to the Senate, but he plans to run as an independent Democratic candidate against primary winner Ned Lamont and Republican nominee Alan Schlesinger. This is bad news - for Schlesinger, as Lieberman will now split the Republican vote! :-D

Lamont says his ardent liberal agenda has inspired many people to join the Democratic Party in Connecticut, and he hopes to use his candidacy - and, if he can pull it off, his victory in November - to bring a more progressive stand on issues such as health care reform, immigration, energy, and especially Iraq to Washington. Lamont is actually expanding the party's liberal base and drawing a clear difference between himself and George W. Bush. Here, at last, is a Democrat as a Democrat ought to be.

Lieberman explains his independent candidacy as an effort to stop extreme ideological politics from both parties in the interest of getting things done for the country. Yeah, right. Lieberman can't accept the fact that he lost, and rather than accept his state party's choice of someone different to run for the right to represent Connecticut in the Senate, he prefers to reject the will of the state Democratic rank and file and doesn't want to give up his seat without a fight. Lieberman had the support of major mainstream Democrats, but the primary voters in Connecticut have spoken, and every major Democrat who supported Lieberman have accepted the results and thrown their support to Lamont, as they should. Unlike, of course, Lieberman himself.

This is far different from former Illinois liberal Republican congressman John Anderson's decision to run as an independent for President in 1980 against Ronald Reagan to protest the growing tide of conservatism in the Grand Old Party, because Anderson was given short shrift and disrespect in his bid for the Republican nomination in the 1980 primaries. Lieberman got all the support he could have hoped for in his race against Lamont, so why should he complain about the different direction Connecticut Democrats want to take the party in? He refuses to accept the fact that his time is over and it's time to bow out gracefully.

Thirty-two years ago today, Richard Nixon resigned the presidency because he no longer had support from the electorate and he knew it was time to step aside. Pity that Lieberman can't seem to do the same.