SHOOTING FISH IN A BARREL?

JOE LIEBERMAN


Shorter Joe Lieberman to Glenn Beck: You're my hero!

...Sigh... Joe... I'm almost speechless. I... I just don't get what you're doing here. After your primary DEFEAT to Ned Lamont you've criss-crossed your state (which really isn't that big of a deal; c'mon it's Connecticut, not Montana) lamenting how "your opponent" unfairly painted you during the leadup to the primary. To paraphrase, "Waaaaagh, Ned keeps saying I'm Bush's lapdog. And just because I agree with him on the most important issue this election season does not make it so!" Okay, so you're trying to position yourself as a strong liberal, and your voting record, of which you continually inform us, is somewhere around 90%, which means that you're super awesome and all Dems should love you and not "your opponent." Except the latest ARG poll has Lamont with a 65% to 30% lead over you with Democrats.Then you go and pull a stunt like appearing on one of the most dreadful rightwing talk shows currently being broadcast through our smoggy air, The Glenn Beck Show. "But wait!" my faithful readers might exclaim, "maybe he's going on Beck's show to debate him and really put his liberal chops on display." To which I would be forced to reply, "Uh, no."
See, Joe spent the balance of his time with Beck looking strangely like a demented bobblehead doll, nodding up and down, regardless of what was actually said. For some excerpts, I gratefully acknowledge Election Central over at TPM Campaign for compiling them:

BECK: I am so afraid that we are going to see Lebanon fall into the hands totally of Hezbollah...that you're gonna start to see Iran come into Iraq. The entire Middle East is gonna be on fire. And we are going to find ourselves like Ray Nagin found himself with buses in a parking lot.LIEBERMAN: Yeah. BECK:Why is it there aren't more politicians saying, Guys, this is World War III. We are in deep trouble.LIEBERMAN: Yeah, I mean, I don't know the answer to that ...Everything you just said about the Middle East is right....If we walk away [from Iraq], then the Iranians will as sure as I'm talking to you surge into Iraq, certainly take over the south and all the oil that's there....We'll have 200-dollar barrel oil, we'll be paying six or seven bucks a gallon. And that'll just be the tip of it. I mean, there'll be instability and war throughout the Middle East. We've got to wake up to this....
BECK: I've been saying this before we even went into Iraq, that we're trying to change the face of the Middle East. The weapons of mass destruction was a nice side benefit. We were trying to go and pop the head of the snake in Iran. That's what we were trying to do. And I don't think anybody had the courage or could actually come out and say that with world politics the way they are.LIEBERMAN: Well, you're right. And I think if I fault the administration foranything before the war -- 'cause I think we did the right thing in going in to overthrow Saddam -- it's that they oversold the WMD part of the argument....
BECK: I have said before we went in that we are sitting at 1939, right before World War II, that some were engaged in this but most of the world was in denial in 1939. I think this Hezbollah peace treaty is our Chamberlain moment and 1941 is right around the corner.LIEBERMAN: Well, there are very, very severe echoes of all that. I agree...
BECK: I really truly believe the West is over if we do not win this conflict.LIEBERMAN: Yeah, yeah, I agree. And it's gonna be a long one...
LIEBERMAN: Thank you, Glenn. We are proud of you, friend. Keep on going.

I just don't get what he's trying to accomplish here, particularly with that last statement. Look, Lieberman is already polling strong with Republicans, as I again refer you to the aforementioned ARG poll. Lieberman leads Lamont 57% to 18%, which already shows that he's got a strong GOP base to pull votes from. So why the blatant pandering by showing up on Beck? The only thing an appearance like that will do is hurt him among Dems and, more importantly, among independents. Joe currently holds a 10 point lead over Lamont among these independent voters (48% to 38%), but I would expect that lead to evaporate if Joe keeps showing up on shows like Beck's and then spends the better part of 20 minutes fellating the him.
And what the hell is this "we are proud of you" crap? Personally, I'd just as soon spit on the guy than shake his hand. Beck after all is the amoeba who has referred to Katrina victims as "scumbags" and Cindy Sheehan as "one big prostitute." Oh, and he "hates" 9-11 families. Showing up on Beck plays directly into the Lamont campaign's hands. Examples of this scumbag's rhetoric can be found here and here, and of course, you can catch him every night on CNN Headline News! Thanks, CNN!
From the standpoint that I am a big Joe basher, this stuff is gold, but for a guy who's hanging on by a thread in an egotistical effort to hold onto his seat in the Senate, the move just makes no sense. Welcome to Joementum 2006.