Hard To Take

Okay, I admit it, I am trying to listen to the Republican Convention. I just had to turn it off when Lieberman came on. The lies get to be too much. These people have brought about disaster, and if your only chance is selling out your country, I just wish you would pass that one up ... silly me.

Lieberman, who describes himself as an Independent Democrat, endorsed McCain for president on Dec. 17, 2007, when his friend was struggling for a comeback in the campaign for the Republican nomination. McCain called it "a courageous act."

At the time, Lieberman was asked whether he was concerned about Democratic punishment for his defection to the GOP candidate. "I'm the 51st vote," he said, smiling. In a tied Senate, Democrats would have been the minority because Vice President Dick Cheney would have had the decisive vote.

Now, 35 Senate seats are up for election, 23 of them currently held by Republicans. The Democrats are defending 12 seats. What's more, six Republican senators are retiring, leaving open seats that include prime targets for Democratic takeovers.

So the odds are that the Democrats will gain a clear, perhaps commanding majority.

After they do, it will be payback time for Lieberman unless McCain becomes president and he gets a Cabinet appointment. That would seem a likely reward from his old friend.

Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Tuesday: "Sen. Reid was very disappointed in Sen. Lieberman's speech tonight, especially when he appeared to go out of his way to distort Sen. Obama's record of bipartisan achievements in the Senate.

"He can give all the partisan speeches he wants, but as the American people have made very clear, the last thing this country needs is another four years of the same old failed Bush-McCain policies of the past."

Lieberman, the Democratic vice presidential nominee in 2000, sought the party's presidential nomination in 2004 but got nowhere. So he went back to the Senate, where his backing for President Bush's Iraq war policy made him enemies at home.

Challenged by an anti-war candidate, Lieberman sought help from national Democrats, and one who delivered it was Obama, then an emerging political star. Obama told Connecticut Democrats on March 31, 2006, that he knew Lieberman's coziness with the Bush administration was "the elephant in the room," but that they should nominate him for a fourth term anyhow, for his character, qualifications and abilities. He said Connecticut should "have the good sense to send Joe Lieberman back to the U.S. Senate."

That's what happened, but only after Lieberman was defeated in the primary and ran as an independent candidate. Obama endorsed the Democratic nominee, Ned Lamont, in the general election.

Senator Lamont, I hope, after the voters show they aren't buying this claptrap.

Right now I'm listening to Gerald Ford, as it's the lunch break. Remember who pardoned the Nixon criminals, so they could come back and steal more from the U.S. public. I am not sure,but it looks like the GoPervs think he qualifies as a hero. At least he wasn't indicted. That seems to be heroism by right wing standards.

There's an old western saying about 'putting them out of their misery' that I believe applies here.