Lieberman loses a primary, every pundit on the planet goes totally insane.

The normally calm and always pretentious William F. Buckley:

"The wires are heavy with the question of Iraq. The defeat of Sen. Joe Lieberman in the Democratic primary in Connecticut was a call to outright defiance by Democrats running for re-election. They have been warned now, by the unforgiving, that they must reject the war in Iraq and labor with the single end in mind of returning American troops and dissolving U.S. commitments."

Again, I can only think of one thing to say: wow. I mean, wow. I already posted a shredding of this on my blog, here. I'm still stunned--I can't get over the fact that people can't get over the CT primary. You can picture the sort of conversation Buckley has in mind:

Joe Lieberman: I'm running for re-election as a senator.
dailykos: I'm warning you: reject the war in Iraq and labor with the single end in mind of returning American troops and dissolving U.S. commitments.
Joe Lieberman: No.
dailykos: I'll never forgive you.

Someone explain this to me.

The ACLU strikes back

Take this, Bill O'Reilly.

Every year, the Frenchtown Elementary School in New Jersey presents an after-school talent show, open to kids from kindergarten through eighth grade. The performers can choose to play an instrument, dance, create a skit or select a song. This past school year, a second-grader decided to sing Awesome God. Principal Joyce Brennan explained in a letter to the child's mother that the song was "inappropriate for a school-run event with a captive audience of, in many cases, quite young children because of its religious content."

In the Frenchtown Elementary School's case, the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey is supporting the child plaintiff. Attorney Jennifer Klear, who took the case on behalf of the ACLU, filed a brief to the court. In it, she made the es sential - and to me, obvious - point that it was the child who chose the song, not the school.

Katherine Harris, R-Mars

There's almost too much wrong with this even to post about, but I'll link to the article, maybe in protest? Maybe. I'll also link to TPM's decoding of Katherine Harris's Starbucks drink of choice.

j. morgan remarked recently that public figures as well as citizens should be cautious of invoking traditions (such as ancient Greece's martial tradition/warrior culture) if they're not prepared to do so in a manner that does justice to it. It would be interesting to ask Harris to defend this statement:

The nation's founding fathers did not intend the country be "a nation of secular laws".

Unfortunately, we're probably more interested in her take on the JonBenet case, and her Starbucks drink, to do so.

I also wonder if she believes everything she's saying?

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's...CNN.com?!

This is the kind of thing at which CNN.com, Time and other “news” purveyors excel—something that’s neither an editorial, a polemic, or even really reporting.

(1) The headline is a question (A gathering anti-incumbent storm?), not a report (“Two wounded in shooting”) or a strong assertion (“Clinton’s health-care plan an utter debacle.”) So no matter what the author says, he can’t lose, because he was merely asking a question.

(2) The sub-headline (The Web is making it easier to challenge the establishment) is directly contradicted by facts given in the “article”:

“Since 1980, we've had only three incumbent senators lose primaries…Alaska's Frank Murkowski is only the fourth governor to lose a primary in the last 12 years.”

(3) The article’s body contradicts itself:

“For me, it lies in the emergence of the Internet as an organizing and money-raising tool.”

BUT

“The power of the Web may be easy to overanalyze.”

ALSO

“The trouble with extrapolating from these and other incumbent defeats, though, is that there seems to be no common explanation.”

BUT

“Sometimes it's a question of character or personality. The other key reason is policy or ideology.”

So, there are no common explanations, but there are four common explanations: character, personality, policy, and ideology, which together encompass… everything?

This guy’s like John Madden in the video games: the receiver can’t catch the ball when the defender knocks it down! Thanks for your “analysis.” I’ll stick with dailykos and National Review.

Twisting and turning

From the White House:

THE PRESIDENT:

"The main reason we went into Iraq at the time was we thought he had weapons of mass destruction. It turns out he didn't, but he had the capacity to make weapons of mass destruction. But I also talked about the human suffering in Iraq, and I also talked the need to advance a freedom agenda. And so my question -- my answer to your question is, is that, imagine a world in which Saddam Hussein was there, stirring up even more trouble in a part of the world that had so much resentment and so much hatred that people came and killed 3,000 of our citizens. You know, I've heard this theory about everything was just fine until we arrived, and kind of "we're going to stir up the hornet's nest" theory. It just doesn't hold water, as far as I'm concerned. The terrorists attacked us and killed 3,000 of our citizens before we started the freedom agenda in the Middle East.

Q What did Iraq have to do with that?

THE PRESIDENT: What did Iraq have to do with what?

Q The attack on the World Trade Center?

THE PRESIDENT: Nothing, except for it's part of -- and nobody has ever suggested in this administration that Saddam Hussein ordered the attack. Iraq was a -- the lesson of September the 11th is, take threats before they fully materialize, Ken. Nobody has ever suggested that the attacks of September the 11th were ordered by Iraq. I have suggested, however, that resentment and the lack of hope create the breeding grounds for terrorists who are willing to use suiciders to kill to achieve an objective. I have made that case.

Michael Tomasky punches the MSM in the face. (Possible victory for terrorists.)

From Slate:

Many commentators, including Slate's Jacob Weisberg, have looked at Ned Lamont's victory over Lieberman and concluded much too hastily that the Democratic Party is galloping recklessly leftward...But there aren't even two Democratic senators facing more than nominal primary opposition. Four of the seven (Clinton, Feinstein, Carper, and Kohl) represent blue states where anti-war fever is running high. Why aren't they fighting for their political lives?

Because the Connecticut primary was about one man and one state. It was about Lieberman's excessive fawning over the president. It was about Lieberman's voting not only against the showboating withdrawal resolution introduced by Sen. John Kerry, but also against the moderate and reasonable resolution introduced by Michigan Democrat Carl Levin, which merely urged the president to "expedite the transition of United States forces in Iraq to a limited presence and mission." (Lieberman was the only blue-state Democrat, except inexplicable retiring weirdo Mark Dayton, to vote against Levin.)

It was about anger—fully justified anger, and from a far larger constituency than Z Magazine readers—at the notion, widespread among the commentariat, that national-security "toughness" demands support for the mendacious and ruinous policies of the Bush administration in Iraq and elsewhere. And, of course, it was about other things besides Iraq, too.

Business as usual?

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

I think the cappuccino I just bought was a victory for the terrorists.

Lieberman exits reality, becomes Karl Rove:

'Mr. Lamont’s goals for ending the war in Iraq would constitute a "victory" for the extremists who are accused of plotting to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the United States.'

Contrast that talking point with the facts:

--British and Pakistani authorities joined forces to block the plot to bomb the airliners.
--British police acted urgently overnight, arresting 24 people in what U.S. government officials said privately could have been the biggest terrorist attack since September 11, 2001.
--Among those arrested were a Muslim charity worker and a Heathrow Airport employee with an all-area access pass, according to Britain's Channel 4.
--Information gathered after recent arrests in Pakistan convinced British investigators they had to act urgently to stop the plot, sources told CNN.
--Pakistani authorities also made arrests in coordination with Britain, said a spokesman for the Pakistani Foreign Ministry.

So, Pakistani British nationals have been empowered by Lamont's victory over Lieberman in the Connecticut Democratic primary, because Lamont wants to bring the troops home from Iraq. MAYBE THE TROOPS SHOULD GO TO HEATHROW OR PAKISTAN.

I hate everything.

Liberalism is alive and well!

Not really. Not really at all. Ned Lamont just happened narrowly to defeat Joe Lieberman in the Connecticut Democratic primary, which I was closely watching, having grown up there. (I went to school in quite a conservative school district for blue Connecticut, which canceled out redhurt's absurdly liberal district in Colorado, where his teachers were Noam Chomsky and Susan Sontag and he did Aztec math for 18 years.)

Lamont on the race:

"I want to thank Sen. Lieberman for his campaign. I want to thank him for the dignity and decency in which he has represented our state and our country, for many, many years. I'm hoping that over the next few days that he will come to the conclusion that the party is going to stick together and go forward united."

And Lieberman:

"The old politics of partisan polarization won today. For the sake of our state, our country and my party, I cannot, I will not let this result stand."

The old politics of partisan polarization? I mean, I'll give him +10 for the alliteration, but who's the partisan? The guy who won fair and square, or the guy who refuses to support the winner? Phrases like that are total BS that don't mean anything. It's almost like Lieberman is saying that the simple fact that Lamont would run against him in the primary is an affront to him personally, and not a challenge to his office. "Old politics of partisan polarization" belongs in the mouth of Karl Rove, not in the mouth of a Connecticut Democrat. Our blood runs blue, we can't make up our minds about anything, our views are nuanced, and we lose elections.

Vote Aztec.