(cross-posted at Deny My Freedom and Daily Kos)
Today, for all intents and purposes, Joe Lieberman left the Democratic Party. For most of us, it is a day to savor the fact that within six months, Lieberman has gone from being a shoo-in for re-election to desperately fighting for his political life using any means possible. But for me, it’s a day of sad clarity. A familiar acquaintance of mine who I’ve worked with on other political causes happens to be working for Joe Lieberman’s campaign this summer. On a social networking site, the description of what they are doing with the summer is a simple phrase: “Saving the Democratic Party from itself”.
Watching clips of Lieberman’s press conference today and seeing this person holding a Lieberman sign, it became clear that the youngest generation of Democrats – of which I am a part – have not awakened to the political realities of today. It is not the Democratic Party insiders who will save us. It is the grassroots who will – and have started to – save our party.
The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the government.
Joe Lieberman has never been one to put the party ahead of his own interests. He’s made it clear that he prefers machine politics. In 2000, when Al Gore chose him as his running mate, Lieberman continued to run for re-election as a senator, even though if Gore had been rightfully placed in the White House, the balance of the Senate would have shifted to the GOP anyways because the GOP governor of Connecticut (John Rowland at the time) would have appointed a Republican to the seat. Time after time, Joe has undercut the Democratic Party position on important matters to all of us – the war in Iraq, energy policy, affordable health care, Social Security – the list can go on and on. He has been the epitome of the corrosive nature of money in politics. In the recent debate on the war on Iraq, no Democratic senator would stand by Lieberman as he was introduced by John Warner (R-VA) to once again buttress the GOP’s position with their talking points. It has been a long time since Joe Lieberman has represented anything remotely close to the core values of the Democratic Party.
For a lot of the D.C. crowd, the grassroots, armed with the Internet, represents an unruly band of gate-crashers who aren’t welcome. As we’ve become a louder voice for the activist base of our party, and as we’ve been racking up impressive fundraising numbers, people like Chuck Schumer and Christopher Dodd still think that what we think isn’t worth a damn. You have Schumer promising to support Lieberman regardless of the primary results. In addition, you have someone who is trying to lead the Democratic Party forward in Harry Reid having to deal with an utterly confounding situation that Lieberman has now forced onto his plate. In the past few years, whenever the Democratic Party has attempted to put a unified position forward, Joe Lieberman has invariably been there to cut our legs out from under us and give the far right political cover. He smiles when he hears that the blogosphere’s record at winning races has not been stellar to date.
In the end, though, you can only thumb your nose at your constituents for so long until they awaken to realize that everything is not as it seems. Lieberman has attempted to portray Ned Lamont as a radical leftist and a Republican at the same time. He’s put out ads that have been utterly panned. He’s been heartily endorsed by people like Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin, people who are as far away from Democratic values as possible. His former running mate, Al Gore, refused to endorse him. In the end, the grassroots have sent a resounding message that Lieberman does not – and has not – represented the Democratic Party for some time. And with each passing day, any support he has drops, leaving only his true friends on the right and the D.C. Democratic power brokers as his supporters.
This race, as I’ve noted before, is about the soul of the Democratic Party. For years, we have been a party of the people, not a party of the powerful. We’ve lost our way for some time, but we’ve finally begun to find ourselves again. It is we, the people, who are saving our party. Supporting the same backroom politics that has been eroding our party’s core is not saving our party from itself. It is causing the self-destruction of our party. In the end, that is the message I’d like to send to my friend at the Lieberman campaign – join us and do not continue to support politics as usual. We can save the Democratic Party together.
