Today, Rep. Robert Andrews of New Jersey entered the Democratic primary against 84 year-old NJ Sen. Frank Lautenberg for the latter's U.S. Senate seat. According to the Times, it's because Frank's too damn old:

"Opposition to Mr. Lautenberg stems not from any ideological differences but rather his advanced age."

"In a statement, Mr. Andrews said: '2008 is a year of great change in American politics. Millions of new voters have chosen to enter the political process as a means to make our country better. As New Jersey elects a United States senator this year, people from all over the state have expressed the desire to have real choices based on a positive, substantive campaign.'"

I'm not so sold on this "out with the old, in with the new" attack that Rep. Andrews may push in his primary battle against Lautenberg. For one thing, I truly respect Frank's 26 years of public service in the U.S. Senate (not to be confused with the 35 years of experience Hillary Clinton began accumulating her second year of law school).

For another, I remember how the shit went down in September, 2002—two short months before the crucial 2002 congressional midterm elections. At that time, New Jersey, and the Democrats of the U.S. Senate, were saddled with then-Senator Bob Torricelli as their candidate, a man so mired in corruption he made Jack Abramoff look like Coke Stevenson.

Due to the fact that Torricelli was the incumbent senator and a statewide cash machine—despite week after withering week of negative press, endlessly leaking scandal details, and debate after debate featuring Torricelli being raked over the coals on ethics by his Republican opponent Doug Forrester—the party was stuck with him. In a year where the Democrats held the U.S. Senate by one vote (hmm...), Bob Torricelli was the definitive albatross.

When Torricelli's poll numbers cratered in the wake of "severe admonishment" by the Senate Ethics Committee (in addition to the criminal indictment of several of his closest campaign aides), New Jersey's Democratic political establishment went into overdrive to locate a replacement candidate against Republican Doug Forrester.

It just so happened that Frank Lautenberg had retired from the Senate just one year before, and had already expressed the sentiment that retirement "was the worst mistake I ever made". Faced with taking to the voters either the New Jersey equivalent of Edwin Edwards, or a beloved former senator with a sterling reputation for integrity (who just happened to be a multi-millionaire with oodles to spend on his own race), the party bigwigs took the "high road" and went with Lautenberg, stripping Torricelli of his nomination.

The rest is history. Frank went on to cruise to victory over Forrester in a 54-44% rout on Election Day. The rest of the Senate Democrats fared quite differently that day, losing 3 incumbent seats and with them, their Senate majority.

Much of that loss can be attributed to many of those Democratic senators cowardly voting a month prior in favor of the Iraq War Resolution, in the hope that casting their lot with Bush would end the national security debate that had roiled the country since 9/11. Rather than ending it, of course, it only made the Dems look even more spineless than they already did, crushing the morale of the antiwar base of the party, and validating the GOP's false choices on national security.

While Lautenberg was not yet in the Senate for the war resolution, he has been a vocal critic of the Iraq war since its inception. A veteran of WWII, he famously defended attacks on John Kerry's patriotism in 2004 by labeling Dick Cheney as "lead chickenhawk", and rightly defined "chicken hawk" as "a person enthusiastic about war, provided someone else fights it."

He has the 6th most liberal voting record in the U.S. Senate, according to the National Journal. That's ahead of liberal stalwarts like Barbara Boxer, Russ Feingold, and another aging lion of the Senate, Ted Kennedy.

Since the Republican opposition in Jersey has yet to unify around a particular nominee, and none of the potentials are all that strong, the real fight for Lautenberg's Senate seat will likely be in the Democratic primary battle between himself and Andrews.

I've got enough reasons to like 'ole Frank. I like that he jumped in and saved a Democratic Senate seat when it sure looked lost to the GOP. I like that in the midst of attacks on his age during that race, he jumped up on a stage and danced a jig on live television, just to prove his vitality. I like him for being a broadly progressive guy, even though he's filthy rich.

But if I needed a more substantive reason to support Frank Lautenberg over his new, fresh-faced Democratic opponent, Bob Andrews, here's all the reason I need:

"On October 10, 2002, Rob Andrews was among the 81 House Democrats who voted in favor of authorizing the invasion of Iraq."

Done. Over. Next. Go Frank!