The NYT reports today on the challenge to Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman from Democrat Ned Lamont. Party insiders have attacked Lamont. “It’s absolute Democratic cannibalism,” said John F. Droney, a former Democratic state chairman in Connecticut, according to the Times. The “Crashing the Gates” folks are solidly behind Lamont. These include Markos Moulitsas of DailyKos and Jim Dean, who was handed Democracy for America by his brother. Lieberman is leading Lamont 65-19 among registered Democrats according to a recent poll, and has $4.7 million to Lamont’s approximately $375,000, the newspaper reports.
The quotation that caught my eye was this one at the very end from Al From, the founder and chief executive of the Democratic Leadership Council: “There’s a group in our party that makes a lot of noise and I don’t think they’ve ever won an election. They’re trying to take out one of the great statesmen our party has and that’s wrong,” he said. (Lieberman is a past chairman of the DLC).
From is half-right and half-wrong. His first sentence is dead on: the “rebels” do not appear to appeal to a majority of Americans. They would do well to make their pitch less ideological and more pragmatic if they want to start governing rather than just posting. The polls and contributions, and I dare say future Nutmeg State election results, support this assessment. His second sentence, however, is dead wrong: it implies that Lieberman and the Democratic Party have some kind of entitlement to support. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Our society is more open than in the days when Party bosses were undisputed kingpins, and this trend is accelerating under the influence of forces like globalization and the internet, although there are important exceptions. Politicians ignore or deprecate this development at their peril — and what is radical today may, with judicious attention and effective leadership, be mainstream tomorrow.
I spend time in CT for work and family matters. I can’t cite any specifics, but recently CT passed some voluntary public-financed campaign funding measures.
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In the course of the Hartford Courant article, they reviewed the then-current capmpaign finance retrictions. I must say, they’re as bad as MA’s. To challenge an incumbant, you either have to be independently wealthy and self-fund your campaign, or you need many months, perhaps years, to build up an adequate war chest.
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That’s a shame. All challenges to incumbancy are good for the body politic, and it takes money to make a credible challenge. To raise enough of it seems difficult if not impossible these days, at the federal level as well as local level (at least in CT nad MA.)
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The public would be better served if restrictions on campaign contributions were eased or even removed. What’s wrong with 5 wealthy people funding Lamont’s challenge, if they believe in Lamont? As long as voters know where the money comes from — let’s restrict it to individuals only, and have instant reporting on the internet — what’s the problem? Let George Soros fund Lamont to the tune of $10 million. If adequate funds are that much easier to collect, politicians will be less beholden. Besides, Soros is just a single vote, and maybe not even that (does he live and vote in CT?)
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Our political system has no competition. Change is almost impossible and that’s not a good thing, for D’s or R’s.
This is a Senate race. It’s not subject to state-level campaign finance law, is it? For example, this year in Massachusetts, one could only give Deval Patrick $500, but could give Ted Kennedy $2100 for the primary and again for the general election. Why would it be different in Connecticut?
It’s not different in CT. US Senate elections are subject to federal contribution limits.
I unintentionally jumbled up federal campaign restrictions with state ones, but my point still stands; with US Senators amassing million and million of dollars over time, it’s quite difficult to unseat an incumbent … reelection rates are 88 percent for the Senate and 96 percent for the House.
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If that’s “success” for the rebels, whatâs failure look like?
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Maybe in a smaller state like CT it’s easier, but even there the cost to increase name recognition to a competitive level is enormous, more so if you need to buy in the NYC media market.
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Liberman also has a national pool of money to draw from making Lamont’s challenge even more daunting.
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How long does it take to raise $5 or $10 million dollars, $100 at a time? That’s what the $2,100 maximum does â it constrains political free speech.
Actually, the “rebels” have indeed won a number of elections, all over the country. Sometimes they’ve supported the same candidates as the party establishment (for example, Stephanie Herseth won a narrow election for US House from South Dakota, and got support and contributions from dailykos), sometimes they’ve been opposed (as you may recall from several elections here in MA in the past couple of years, especially when Carl Sciortino unseated Vinnie Ciampa).
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Your comment about the rebels “not appealing to a majority of Americans” and about making “their pitch less ideological and more pragmatic” are your opinion, and don’t seem to have anything to do with From’s comment. Your comments don’t make enough sense to me to give you my opinion about whether you’re wrong or right, but either way, From didn’t say that.
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The poll you quoted doesn’t support your assessment, either. In fact, it’s nearly meaningless. Polls in the past couple of months in CT have show wildly fluctuating results (some have Lamont in the 30s), but one thing they all show is that Lieberman’s name recognition is near universal, while Lamont’s is very small but rising. In a situation like that, the “which candidate would you vote for” portion of a poll is entirely pointless. What matters are approve/disapprove numbers correlated with name recognitition. What the polls actually show is that Lieberman is surprisingly vulnerable, and as Lamont’s name recognition goes up, he will likely be a credible challenger with a reasonable shot.
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Lamont’s first TV ads just went on the air this week. Any Lieberman supporter trying to take comfort from the poll you quoted is counting their chickens before the eggs have even been fetilized.
Hot breaking news: Ned Lamont got 1/3 of the delegate vote at today’s CT Democratic State Convention. These were the people Lieberman had the most power over. He funds the local committees and their candidates. They still don’t like him. If Lamont can get 1/3 at the convention, he is definitely a credible challenger – and it will have a similar effect on press and fundraising as Deval Patrick’s unexpected caucus victory had here.
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From what I’ve heard, conventional wisdom was that Lamont likely wouldn’t get 15% at the convention (in CT, you can qualify for the ballot by signatures or convention, so conventional wisdom was he’d just do it with signatures).
that “in CT, you can qualify for the ballot by signatures or convention.” Is anyone aware of a breakdown of order or of an epidemic of impossibly long or difficult ballots in Connecticut? Maybe we should try their system – sounds like a big improvement over ours!
…are the result of a lawsuit a couple years back that ruled the previous system violated peoples voting rights.
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I believe that the previous system was simply getting 15% of the delegates at the convention.
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Connecticut has a long history of no primary challenges and I believe that played into the court case the resulted in the changed rules.
With no major general election opponent, a potential endorsement from the state GOP, and a very weak but potentially surging grassroots movement the chances that the DNC will need to waste resources on Lieberman or the chance that he could actually lose are very slim. What is nice about it is that it is not dangerous compared to challenging a swing state DINO or one who could lose an election. What Lamont serves is a nice protest vote and if Lieberman gets significant opposition percentages in the primary, say he wins 55-45 than it will send a message that he should not take his seat for granted and respond to progressives more.
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The only thing that is dangerous is the fact that the Kosite blogosphere are isolating themselves from a potential ally and the party insiders they so hope to change and influence. They are basically shutting themselves out of the process and helping to ruin that spirit of a big tent party that the national party needs to win.
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Personally I am as liberal as they come on nearly every issue, but there are some issues such as affirmitive action and abortion rights where I disagree with the party line and support alternative policies, and I am far more fiscally conservative and paleo conservative in my economic philosophy than most liberals, yet I also want to find a home in the Democratic party, but these litmus tests and one way thinking really do hurt at the grassroots level. But this DINO needs to see that he cant take us progressives for granted.
Full disclosure: I work for the Lamont campaign.
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“…the fact that the Kosite blogosphere are isolating themselves…”
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Actually, that is a very inaccurate portrayal of what has gone on here in Connecticut. My wife and I have been leading DFA groups since the days of the Dean campaign. We reached out to Sen. Lieberman. We invited him to our Meetups. He came to our house to talk about attending a Meetup, promised he would come, but never showed up.
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My wife told Sen. Lieberman at fundraiser, that she would bust her but working to help Connecticut get the most progressive Senator elected we can. She went on to tell him, “It would be great if it could be you.” He gave her a kiss, yet then went on with his bashing of Democrats. My wife is now busting her but trying to get the most progressive Senator we can elected in Connecticut. She is Ned Lamont’s scheduler.
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My wife went with DFA people around the State to deliever petitions to his office. Friends are town committee chairs who have invited Sen. Lieberman to address their town committees. Sen. Lieberman has not responded.
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No, it isn’t people from the Kosite blogosphere that have been isolating themselves. It is Sen. Lieberman.
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“They are basically… helping to ruin that spirit of a big tent party.” We want a big tent, but as one person put it, the tent isn’t big enough for an elephant. The tent isn’t big enough to include Bush, Cheney, or Rumsfeld.
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Even if Lamont only gets 45% of the vote in August, he will have done more to help Democrats than Senator Lieberman has done in years. First, he will hold Senator Lieberman’s feet to the fire. Senator Lieberman will not be able to spend time trashing Democrats on the conservative media outlets while he is facing a strong challenge.
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The incumbent Republicans in Connecticut will find it harder to hide behind Senator Lieberman. Already Chris Shays, Republican from the 4th CD has endorsed Sen. Lieberman and when challenged to a debate, he responds that Diane Farrell should debate Sen. Lieberman, since Shays and Lieberman share the same views.
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Then, there is the excitement that the Lamont campaign is generating. Unaffliated voters are becoming members of the Democratic Party again, because they like to see a candidate, like Ned Lamont, who will listen to them and then stand up for Democratic values. People are getting involved in campaigns, and this energy is spilling over to the congressional races.
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So, you are right. Challenging Lieberman isn’t dangerous. In fact, it is very good for Democrats. If Ned Lamont doesn’t get elected, he will at least have made a very important impact on Democratic politics in Connecticut and across the country. However, we are working to make sure he wins so he can have an even greater impact.
We need more of that, even right here in the Cradle of Liberal–oops Liberty. There are plenty of DINOs here in the Bay State, and I’d dearly love to see them replaced with true Democrats.
First of all, almost nobody has been a bigger failure when it comes to undertsanding the US electorate than Al From. He is squarely in the camp of the triagulating “Weathervane Democrats” who presided over the dismantling of the Democratic majority over the past two decades.
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Secondly, there have been a handful of exceptionally historic, high-profile Congessional votes during the past century on matters of war and domestic issues like Civil Rights and women’s suffrage. In each case, their were politicians who flatly advocated the historically or morally wrong position –such as Strom Thurmond on Civil Rights, Jeannette Rankin against both world wars, or the 25 US Senators who voted against women’s suffrage in 1919.
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Joe Lieberman not only advocated and voted for the US invasion and occuption of Iraq, he has since defended the Bush administration’s decision as “the right thing to do” without qualification. Like Bush, he expresses no regret, no apologies, no criticism, and proffers an arraogant dismissiveness toward anyone who thinks otherwise –including top Generals and decorated combat veterans.
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For good reason, a lot of Democrats and independents find this morally offensive, not least those people who served in the military and/or lost loved ones in Iraq.
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Even Republicans have said that they now believe invading Iraq was a mistake, and that Congress erred in giving Bush a blank check to wage war.
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But not Joe Lieberman.
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He’ll sooner defend Bush’s Iraq deceptions and attack fellow-Democrats.
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Let’s not be politically correct here: Senators and US Rep’s who were on the wrong side of the Big Issues by definition don’t qualify for the title “statesman.” Unless you are a moral relativist, a Senator or Rep who still defends the Iraq invasion and occupation lacks the requisiste good judgement to serve in elected office. Period.
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By a strong majority, CT residents oppose Lieberman’s position on Iraq. Perhaps they will decide to keep him in the Senate anayway because of his seniority, his views on other issues and what he delivers for his constituents.
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But for you to side with a hack like From and dismiss Lamont supporters as fringe “rebels” is flatly uniinformed; the overwhelming majority of Americans believe that the Iraq War was a mistake not worth the cost in lives and treasure.