According to Jeffrey’s Goldberg’s new article in the New Yorker Joe Lieberman is fascinated with Mark Steyn’s new book, America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It. Here’s a description:
In this, his first major book, Mark Steyn–probably the most widely read, and wittiest, columnist in the English-speaking world–takes on the great poison of the twenty-first century: the anti-Americanism that fuels both Old Europe and radical Islam. America, Steyn argues, will have to stand alone. The world will be divided between America and the rest; and for our sake America had better win.
Here’s what Lieberman has to say about the book:
“The thing I quote most from it is the power of demographics, in Europe particularly,” Lieberman said. “That’s what struck me the most. But the other part is a kind of confirmation of what I know and what I’ve read elsewhere, which is that Islamist extremism has an ideology, and it’s expansionist, it’s an aggressive ideology. And the title I took to mean that we Americans will have ultimate responsibility for stopping this expansionism.”
Here’s how his colleague Chris Dodd explains Joe Lieberman’s myopia:
Christopher Dodd offered another perspective. A popular figure in the Senate who has the buoyancy of a natural politician, Dodd portrayed Lieberman as the last of the uncomplicated neoconservatives.
“I think there was this assumption that democracy was just waiting to blossom,” Dodd said of Iraq. “Let’s assume the President believed this, that it wouldn’t take much to produce a democratic society in Iraq. I’m not opposed to that, and I think that may happen, but the idea that you could go from where they were was a leap of faith, and many took that leap. Joe took that leap. He thought this was one way to bring stability in the region.”
An ‘uncomplicated neo-conservative’ that thinks it is America’s mission to fight alone against the rest of the world, including Europe, against the threat of Islam; that is Joe Lieberman, and if we follow his advice the whole world is doomed.
Let’s look at Lieberman’s dedication to the Democratic Party.
In the campaign, Lieberman said that he would join the Democratic caucus if elected, and his victory was the deciding one that gave the Democrats control of the Senate. But he told me recently that his attachment to the Party is based in some measure on sentiment, and should not necessarily be thought of as eternal.
And what might make Lieberman bolt the party?
Lieberman was not willing to say whether he would remain a Democrat if the Party cut off funding for the war. “That would be stunning to me,” he said. “And very hurtful. And I’d be deeply affected by it. Let’s put it that way.”
So, basically, he won’t remain a Democrat if the Democrats actually prevail over the neo-conservative agenda of permanent solo war against the will of the rest of the world combined. He’s already said that he may not support the Democratic nominee for President in 2008.
Let’s face it. Lieberman is bordering on insane in his irrational fear of Muslims. We should consider having him committed. And this is what Chris Dodd has to say about Lieberman’s detachment from reality.
I asked Dodd if he has spoken to any other senators who are as optimistic as Lieberman is about Iraq. “I’ll tell you, I bet this has happened fifteen times in the last few days—conservative Republicans have said to me that they’ve told the White House that this is the last vote you’re going to get out of them, a vote against the Iraq resolution,” Dodd said. “They’re angry, and they sure don’t believe the new plan is going to work.”
You’re out there all alone, Joe. Your grasp of reality is slipping by the day. And the people back home are beginning to notice.
Later, a leader of the local Strafford County Democrats, Tim Ashwell, said, “This is a very antiwar community.” I asked him about Lieberman, and his hapless 2004 campaign for the Democratic Presidential nomination; Lieberman placed fifth in the New Hampshire primary, and dropped out of the race soon after. Ashwell didn’t find that surprising. “People don’t think of Lieberman as a Democrat,” he said.
More and more, people don’t think he has a handle on reality either.
