Excellent.

But Vermonters are nutty, anyway, right?

As far as I read earlier this week, Sanders is NOT allowed to vote in leadership elections - are you sure of this Greg?

With Biden's Foreign Relations chair opening up and probably a few more as senior Senators are tapped for Cabinet positions, there will be a lot of maneuvering for chairmanships. A logical compromise would be to give Lieberman another chairmanship. There will be plenty to choose from. Indian affairs?

Go Bernie! Lieberman can have a chairmanship that has less potential to do damage.

As a lifelong resident of CT who has always wanted to be a lifelong resident of VT, I thank you, Sen. Sanders. To Borrow an old bumper sticker,

I LOVERMONT!

Not looking good for Joe. These guys are providing important cover for anyone who wants to vote against him. I'm guessing he's screwed. Fine with me either way.

OT (perhaps related as it's about Israel, LOL), but my oh my, whackjobs are copycats everywhere.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/15/world/middleeast/15bibi.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

When a parent tells a child to apologize to another child, it is not a true apology coming genuinely from the child. For the Dems to ask Lieberman to apologize as the price of keeping his committee chair is the same thing. It is more in the nature of a bribe than an apology.
Evan Bayh is an idiot for thinking that is a good idea.

At this stage of the game, is there anyone who doubts that Evan Bayh is a triangulating, DLC, "centrism means moving towards the Republicans" type? I am automatically suspicious of any advice or arguments that Bayh presents on Lieberman's behalf.

As I said in response to another article, he's a back-stabbing ass who did absolutely no good whatsoever as chair of his committee and votes against the caucus on what most Democrats consider "critical issues". Toss him. Toss him hard enough that he bounces twice. You don't need a double-dealing snake like this in the caucus.

Maybe Leahy and Sanders can convince Collins and Snow of the wisdom of switching parties, or even going independent. Stubborn New Englanders know how to talk to other stubborn New Englanders, after all.

NORPAC, a pro-Israel PAC is in the tank for Lieberman, putting pressure on Dems to keep Joe in committee chair.

http://blogs.jta.org/politics/article/2008/11/12/1000922/norpac-boosts-lieberman

We already lost respect for Lieberman years ago. Now we are losing respect for Bayh and Traitor Joe's apologists.

Bernie/Dennis 2012.

Great news from Alassssska!

As for Joe The Leiberman - out the caucus door and out to the fringe. It makes no sense at all that he gets away with what he did to bring down Pres. Elect O. He deserves nothing but what he doled out.

See ya Joe.

This is my first criticism to President-elect Obama: you don't build a governing coalition at all costs; there are other considerations and principles which you have to balance. If building a governing coalition is all Obama cares about, he should appoint more than a few Republicans to his cabinet and encourage his Democratic comrades in the Senate to award as many top committee leadership posts to Republican senators as possible.

There ARE other considerations: for the sake of party discipline, you don't want to send a signal to party membership that it's alright for them to keep sabotaging the party agenda; and for the sake of party development, you should set priorities in a way such that your own party senators who have worked hard to achieve this majority and who are at least as qualified as Lieberman will have a fair chance to acquire the important experiences associated with being a committee chair.

There is absolutely no reason for accommodating Lieberman's outrageous wish. It is both morally wrong and politically unnecessary to do so. He knows he has made some very serious mistakes. Any decent politician who has done what he has done should know they have to take responsibility for their mistakes. Politically he has no better option. He will be drowned in a sea of egos if he joins the Republican caucus.

Demanding that he apologize is no punishment at all. A more serious --- and politically sound --- punishment is to suspend his chairmanship and put him on probation. If he starts behaving again, he will be next in line for something big. (Hopefully by then CT folks will garner enough votes to kick him out of the Senate.)

I love Bernie. I listen to him every Friday on Thom Hartman's Brunch with Bernie.

Bernie is the man, Leahy cracked the ice, Bernie threw an anvil on it and busted a huge hole in the "but Joe votes with Dems so often" cover story.

Can we please get over our fear of alienating those that proudly vote for those who would lock-up without trial, wiretap, render, torture and pre-emptively invade?

Vermont is not crazy. None of our congressional delegation voted for war. Leiberman must be removed from power whenever possible. His ideas are unsucessful and unpopular. What are you people waiting for?

If Joe is as pricipalled as he claims to be, his votes wouldn't change whether he was incharge of commitees or not, right?

Remember when Jeffords quit the Republicans and became an independent, the right crucified him and torched every bridge to their club.

How about contacting the DSCC and telling them you will cancel your current monthly contribution, and won't give them another dime as long as Lieberman has that Chairmanship. No more money to Schumer (much though I think he's done a fabulous job), not another dime, as long as Joe the Collaborator keeps the Committee Chair.
I'm not just a grassroots volunteer, I'm also a donor. What do you bet the DSCC got more money from us this year than it got from Joe the Collaborator and his fans?

NO WAY should that JUDAS be allowed to chair an important committee. If for no other reason that he is CRAPPY at it. He never investigated Katrina or anything else of importance. And you know he will be the first "Democrat" to turn on Obama when it counts - just like he did with Clinton.

I understand the impulse to try and be more bi-partisan and let bygones be bygones. I understand the desire to get to 60 votes. But this guy is COMPLETELY unreliable and will do much more damage inside the Democratic caucus than out. All he'll do is parrot Republican talking points to the press, and scheme with his buddy McCain on how to screw over the Democratic agenda.

Lieberman is nothing but a Republican Trojan Horse, and to let him back inside the gates as if nothing happened, after he just got through attending the Republican convention and campaigning against Democratic candidates, is pure madness. It's the sort of thing that makes the Democratic party look weak, foolish, and completely undisciplined.

Typical of a leftist- they preach about diversity, being openminded and of course people thinking for themselves rather than being forced to march in lockstep but their actions always show the opposite. Joe is one of the few diehard liberals who is smart enough to know that none of his social beliefs mean a thing without national security. He understands that the freedoms Americans enjoy came at a price and still do. As a veteran I am proud of people like Joe that put their country rather than party first. The modern democrats use Nazi like tactics to force people to cowtow to their desires and there is nothing beneficial in that for our nation.
As a NATIVE Vermonter (yes there are a few of us left) I am deeply ashamed of what the influx of big city liberals has done to my state, their intolerance and hatefilled ways are a blight on society.

HURRAH for Bernie! His comment that this crap is unfair to Obama supporters (us!) is dead on.

OT, in my next post, I gallantly attempt to change my screen name, which is ripe and ready for the dustbin of history!

Yes! I'm from Vermont and I HEART my Senators.

Once Joe is stripped of his homeland security chairmanship, there is the next question of giving him something to do besides sharpening sticks. I feel that at least offering him the chairmanship of the special committee on aging remains a viable answer. One, the 66-year-old would have to deal with issues that are gaining importance in industrial societies (gets a little travel). Second, it would help him focus on his retirement years four years down the road. Current committee chair Herb Kohl, in turn, could be shifted in the judiciary committee to chairman of the subcommittee on terrorism, technology, and homeland security -- a great place for a budget hawk. Moreover, there has been some disfunctionality in the antitrust subcommittee Kohl now heads.