Lieberman could be Democrats' Schiavo

[yurbud]

Many here and elsewhere noticed the irony of Bush's non-response to warnings before 9/11 and his lackadaisical response to Hurricane Katrina compared to his drop-everything-and-fly-back-to-Washington response to the GOP's posturing bill on Terri Schiavo.

Now we are seeing something similarly disgusting with Democrats. Joe Lieberman is brain AND heart dead. He is essentially the corpse in Weekend at Bernie's, but it's the GOP that dances him around like he is still alive, pretending he is a Democrat. When the voters not just in Connecticut but across the country became sick of his enabling of Bush, the same Democratic pols who remained on their dead asses or even voted with the Republicans as Bush lied us into war, assaulted our civil rights, and appointed at least one openly fascist judge to the Supreme Court, have now sprung to life to defend someone who is a Democrat primarily because he says so.

Why aren't these same leaders in the Senate so eager to protect our rights, our jobs, and our constitution? Why do they leap to their feet to defend this corrupt, morally syphillitic dog turd, but it took unprecedented public pressure just to get them to vote against Alito--but whom they refused to filibuster. The Democrats in the Senate should be concerned about getting their shit together (Lieberman, Biden, Schumer, and their ilk), but them in a little plastic bag, and throw them away.

We want a party that represents us, not your corporate donors. If you act in this obviously craven, toadying way, you might need to go the way of Joe Lieberman too. Please leave. You will make more money on K Street anyway.

[saigon68]

1. Joementum Limpmann = Irrelevant

[Swamp Rat]

2. great pic!

:D

[saigon68]

4. Yours however are the GREATEST

Props to you :-) :-)

[Swamp Rat]

5. Thanks... did you see the Bushler B-Day card DA and I made together?

Leave a comment if you like. :D

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1576984&mesg_id=1576984

[bobbieinok]

15. get message that link is no longer available-- what happened??

[Swamp Rat]

16. It was deleted... It had run it's course anyway.

I guess they didn't want it on the front page more than 24 hours - it got 50 votes!!! :D



Edit: it was entered into the Huffington contest by DA. If you wish, go check it out and then send it to others via the email link at the bottom left - I may win a prize! ... which would be my first ever! :D

[yurbud]

3. he would be irrelevant if the Democrats would stop doing CPR on his

rotting political corpse.

[Rainbow gatherer]

6. Could backfire.

Lieberman may become a symbol for "moderate" Democrats and cause more centrists to go independent -- or worse.

[w4rma]

7. CT is not a "moderate" state. It's a progressive one. (nt)

[yurbud]

10. you are confusing moderate and sellout. In many respects, John Murtha is

a moderate, but he is clearly not the tool of corporate America and the GOP like Joe Lieberman is.

The division is not ideology, but public interests versus very, very narrow private interests, and the decision between the two being decided exactly the way a street-walking hooker decides to get in a car--someone has to flash the green.

The real test of this is in a quote by Upton Sinclair: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."

When Joe can go to Iraq and say things look great and we ought to stay despite the daily deaths of ours troops, countless Iraqis, polls of Iraqis that say again, and again, and the Iraqi president and vice president asking us for a timetable to leave, he is not just wrong, he is bought.

Further, Lieberman doesn't seem to have too many "moderate" fans leaping to his defense, unless you buy the DLC argument that they represent the apathetic, non-activists in the party.

Guys like Lieberman get as far as they do not because the people demand them, but because in many races we aren't offered a real choice. Big money backs a Lieberman on one side and an even more obvious sellout on the GOP side.

[Clark2008]

11. Exactly.

It is my repeated mantra that the DLC Dems are NOT moderate or centrist - they are corporatists.

And we shouldn't confuse the two.

[yurbud]

13. take the corporatists in fundamentalists' clothing out of the GOP....

and you'd be left with Fred Phelps and Ron Paul.

[sendero]

8. This is EXACTLY why..

... it is so important to get Lieberman out, at any cost. Not only will we rid ourselves of a useless Republican in Democrat's clothing, all of his moronic, traitorous supporters in the senate will get the message.

And that message is: "you're next".

[Bucky]

9. Your "corpse" is leading in the polls, by the way

Lieberman's not out, yet. He's still favored to win. Saying he's a corpse is picking the facts you like over the facts that everyone agrees on.

"Bush.... appointed at least one openly fascist judge to the Supreme Court"

Oh brudder! Where art thou? Bush has made two really bad Scotus appointments, no argument. But fascist? That sounds a bit hysterical.

[yurbud]

12. Alito refused to repudiate the "unitary executive" theory which means

the president has absolute authority that cannot be checked by the judiciary or congress.

That checks and balances business is pretty central to our whole constitutional structure.

Which actions of Bush do you suppose someone like Alito will challenge?

Do you have a working definition of fascism? It is not just an insult but describes an actual political system of capitalism without democracy. The Bush branch of the Republican party is working toward a single party state and top GOP strategist Grover Norquist has said this openly.

The republican congress has spent the last five years doing essentially no oversight of the Bush administration. By contrast, I can remember Democratic majorities in Congress busting Clinton and Carter's balls when they were in office.

We have gotten into this mess because so many elected Democrats have either refused to see how extreme what the GOP is doing is or have been paid not to see.

[Bucky]

14. While I don't think much of the unitary executive theory, it's not fascism

We agree that fascism is a system of political thought, altho it's probably the least ideological of all the authoritarian ideologies (monarchy, communism, theocracy, etc). When one big guy runs the government because he's the boss, then you have an inherently flexible ideology on your hands.

I don't accept the definition of fascism as "capitalism without democracy." The only argument I've heard that supports this view is based on a misconstruction of a quote falsely attributed to Mussolini ("Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power."). Besides the fact that Mussolini never said this, people propagating this bogus quote tend not to understand what corporatism is, mostly suspecting that it means control of individual people's lives by large corporations. Actually, it refers to collective interest groups, not just businesses, binding together to work in concert for their social interest. It's typically manifested as a one-party state, but could also mean a church group, a social caste, an ideological collective, or some other group in society that thinks they have the right to boss their neighbors around. Think of it as a modern urban feudalism.

Fascism is a popular-culture-based anti-rational, anti-socialist, anti-democratic, pro-worker ideology that rejects the notion that there is a conflict between the rights of the individual and the rights of the state. Fascists believe in limiting property rights and see a duty of all individuals to sacrifice for the purposes state at the call of the state. While Bush & friends certainly love intruding on people's civil rights, exalt police power, and love to manipulate a crowd thru fear, they fail the litmus test of what is ideological fascism. Philosophically he comes closer to monarchism, not fascism, because he consistantly takes up the rights of the wealthy and the powerful and couches all of his power grabs in the terms of constitutionalism.

The unitary executive theory is a consistant body of thought that fits within the boundaries of constitutional republicanism. It's a bad theory, and a wrong theory, because it elevates the constitutional phrase "executive power solely vested in a chief executive" beyond what is meant while all but ignoring the constitutional phrase "faithfully execute the laws" that Congress passes. And I agree that he's carrying event that extreme governmental view to absurd and dangerous extremes. But it's clearly an argument from a republican ideology with authority derived from the popular will. The fact that he cheated to get elected alone tells you he's not an actual fascist. A real fascist wouldn't care if he was elected.

My argument with you was that you said Alito (and by implication, Bush) was "openly fascist." If that's hyperbole, so be it. But you seem to be saying that it is literally true. Literally speaking, it is not. I'll agree that Bush's administration shares some characteristics with fascism, but that's like calling me a communist because I believe in a graduated income tax. It takes more than a few common characteristics--there has to be an overall preponderance of fascistic behavior, not just the usual slippery slope stuff.

My real problem with calling Bush a fascist is that it's sloppy, hysterical, and shows a typically American naivity about what life is like for political opponents under genuine fascism. I'm interested in getting my country back and educating Republican-deceived voters into supporting Democrats because our policies make more sense. Inaccurate and divisive name calling coming from my side of the fence makes it tougher to coax a Diebold-proof majority back pver to the side of sanity.

[yurbud]

17. why would industrialists including prominent Americans back Hitler

if fascism in any way constained capital?

[Clarkie1]

18. I believe Lieberman will win the Democratic Primary.

Not because I agree with him on every issue, but based on the debate I watched with his opponent. Lamont really seemed out of his league and unsure of himself and his positions. Also, Lamont failed to answer several questions from Lieberman, while Lieberman answered all of Lamon't questions effectively, and held his ground.

If I were a Connecticut voter I'd have problems with Lieberman, but would be very uncomfortable voting for Lamont. I just can't see Lamont winning the primary if the majority of CT dems come out to vote. Of course, I don't live in CT, so maybe I'm wrong, but that's my gut feeling.