Connecticut: Deep Down, It's Shallow

U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman’s narrow loss in last week’s Democratic primary in Connecticut has political and media circles in a semi-tizzy. The 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee came back from a big deficit just a week before the primary match with super-rich anti-war cable TV mogul Ned Lamont, but fell short on election day. He lost by  10,000 votes. Does this [margin at this moment] mark a sea change in the Democratic Party> Does it herald a political new media with the rise of the bloggers? Well, maybe.

Folks at the Daily Kos and other hyperpartisan blogs  —  many of whom seem under the impression that American political history began with the 2000 Florida recount  (which ironically also robbed Lieberman as well as Gore) — did a great job in stirring up resentment of Lieberman. They also provided an armature of organization for the political neophyte Lamont.

At the same time, they had tremendous help in having, 1) a self-funding candidate in the form of Ned Lamont and 2) a target, in the form of Joe Lieberman, who has a brass-plated tin ear for Democratic politics. A notably sanctimonious figure, Lieberman continued to champion the Iraq War and its aftermath long after it became apparent that enormous mistakes were not only made, but repeated. Over and over. Then there was his friendship with the quite unpopular George W. Bush, who has pursued hard-core policies and become something of an Antichrist figure to many in America, especially among left of center Democrats and some independents. 

Put it all together and the Lamont win may not be an easily replicable scenario. What it does show is that Democrats have turned definitively against the war and, more to the point, its frequently disastrous aftermath. But that’s not new information.

Lieberman just announced that he will run in the general election as “an independent Democrat.” As there is no serious Republican and he nearly won the Democratic primary, he certainly has a chance. In fact, one public and one private poll taken after his primary defeat show Lieberman in the lead. 

Still he may play out as a sore loser, out of touch with his state on what may be the central issue of concern to it. On the other hand, Lamont, in his victory speech, was not impressive. Flanked by Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, the very wealthy businessman spoke in a reedy voice and seemed like a single issue candidate. As critical as Iraq is, it’s hardly the only issue.

“Who is Lamont?” is what a lot of voters will now be asking. Well, the American left’s latest darling, Connecticut’s new Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate, lives in a $30 million home. He is the great-grandson of robber baron J.P. Morgan’s business partner, with a fortune estimated as high between $100 million and $300 million. Can’t you feel those grassroots growing?

What will this mean for politics beyond the relatively narrow confines of the Nutmeg State? If Lieberman wins, probably not much. 

However, there are already predictions of major repercussions, of emboldened activists and bloggers enforcing a greater liberal orthodoxy on a party which already has a liberal orthodoxy. There are murmurs of an enormous impact on the 2008 presidential race.

Emboldened by the Connecticut primary, Kos enthusiasts are targeting prominent Democrats backing the re-election of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger over trailing Democratic candidate Phil Angelides. Especially incurring their wrath is Angela Bradstreet, a San Francisco lawyer and co-chair of Senator Dianne Feinstein’s re-election campaign. Feinstein is no fave of theirs, either. Many had wanted anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan to challenge California’s senior senator in the June Democratic primary. Me, too (not that she’d have a snowball’s chance). I just love a colorful story.

But that’s just the point. The Kos crowd would have no chance against a Feinstein, even in a closed Democratic primary. After a lot of huffing and puffing, they did succeed in getting a Feinstein staffer to say that Bradstreet is speaking for herself in supporting Schwarzenegger, and not for the senator. 

Well, we figured. Since Feinstein is a co-chair of the Angelides campaign. 

Feinstein also has a de facto alliance with Schwarzenegger, as do quite a few major Democratic politicians in California. But she is a deft politician. She certainly wouldn’t be caught dead being buddies with Bush, as Lieberman was, or defending policies that obviously are ineffective, as Lieberman did with respect to the occupation of Iraq. 

So Feinstein is safe in resolutely anti-Bush California. So is Hillary Clinton, about whom there have been many blog murmurings, in anti-Bush New York.

Clinton will have to be critical of the Iraq policy in 2008, of course, but so will every Democratic candidate. If it is going badly. If there is a turnaround, the opposite will be true, no matter what hyperpartisan activists think.

Connecticut looks like a one-off. Lamont won the primary because he could self-fund his campaign and because Lieberman made a very obliging target for Lamont and his activist allies. Fun as it would be to herald a new day, those are fairly unique circumstances.