As you may have heard by now, a Federal probe has concluded that Ned Lamont's campaign did not bring down Joe Lieberman's campaign Web site with a hack attack, as the Lieberman camp charged on Election Day 2006.

What really happened was that the Lieberman camp's server failed.

This is vindication for Lamont's Internet director, Tim Tagaris (his picture is here). So I checked in with Tagaris, who as you might expect had a few things to say about this.

"The sad thing is, Lieberman himself repeated the charge all day in an attempt to discredit his opponents and drive down Ned's primary vote," Tagaris instant messages to me. "It was broadcast on every cable news channel, and papers from The New York Times to the Hartford Courant wrote about it."

"And he got away with it -- who cares what's reported today," Tagaris continues. "He won the election based on a pattern of lies loudly repeated and dutifully stenographed."

"Now maybe someone will run an investigation into Joe Lieberman's repeated claim that no one wants to end the war more than he does," Tagaris concludes.

It'll be interesting to see if all the cable and print outlets that went nuts over the Lieberman campaign's accusations that day will take note of the fact that the Lamont campaign -- and Tagaris -- have now been cleared.

Late Update: Lieberman spokesperson Dan Gerstein, who also echoed the Election Day attack on the Lamont campaign, sends over this response:

“After the Lieberman campaign website went down the day before the 2006 Democratic primary, we were told by our website administrator that there was clear evidence of an outside effort to disrupt our site, and that the administrator was so certain that the site had been attacked that he was willing to swear to it in a legal affidavit. Based on his assessment, and the fact that there had been at least one prior attack on the campaign’s website, the campaign asked the Justice Department to investigate the incident to find out what happened and determine if a crime had been committed. The Justice Department has shared the results of their investigation with us, the Senator appreciates their diligence and accepts their findings, and we consider the matter closed.”

This is interesting: In a speech today to a Republican group, Joe Lieberman inadvertently admitted that he promised to caucus with Dems during his victorious reelection campaign as an Independent against Ned Lamont.

In the lead-up to that election, Lieberman repeatedly vowed to stay with the Dems as a way of reassuring voters that his Independent status wouldn't lead him to switch to the GOP. But in the months since being safely reelected, Lieberman did an about face, repeatedly refusing to rule out a change of parties — with no mention of his previous campaign promise.

But now look what Lieberman just said in a speech before the Republican Jewish Coalition, according to a transcript at National Review:

In all seriousness, many of you in this room stood with me last year through the long journey up a winding road that was my 2006 reelection campaign. You came to my side without regard for party affiliation, and you stayed there even after I ran as an Independent but said I would caucus with the Democrats. Your non-partisanship in my race is a model for what our politics should be. I thank you personally and deeply for it. I could not have won without it.

So does that mean that Lieberman himself would now acknowledge that his refusal to rule out a party switch constitutes a violation of a crucial campaign promise?

Three days ago, Joe Lieberman said on Meet the Press that he couldn't rule out the possibility of flipping to the GOP. From the MSNBC transcript:

MR. RUSSERT: If in fact they ask for discipline in the Democratic caucus, and you start to feel uncomfortable with it, would you consider crossing across the—going across the aisle, and joining the Republicans, if they gave you the same chairmanship that you had, and respected your seniority?

SEN. LIEBERMAN: Yeah. Well, that’s a hypothetical, which I’m, I’m not going to deal with here. I’m going to be an optimist...I’m not ruling it out, but I hope I don’t get to that point.

Today, Lieberman encountered some of his Democratic colleagues, and it certainly doesn't appear that they're holding his comments against him. From a report just posted on CNN:

Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, who bolted the Democratic party after losing a primary election this year to run as an independent, won a standing ovation at a closed meeting of all Senate Democrats Tuesday.

Lieberman was introduced by Democratic Leader Harry Reid who, according to Lieberman, told his colleagues that, "families go through crisis but we survived and I just want to welcome back Joe Lieberman."

What do you make of this? That Lieberman's veiled threat is working? That senior Dems don't take his threat seriously in the least and think it's just empty posturing designed to get attention? That senior Dems never took the challenge to Lieberman by Ned Lamont and Connecticut Dem primary voters seriously? My money's on the latter two. What do you readers make of this?

The Greater Danbury News Times has just reported that there's massive, massive, massive voter turnout in Connecticut:

Some 70 percent of the registered voters will go to the polls today, according to Connecticut Secretary Susan Bysiewicz.

By comparison, 56 percent of the state’s voters cast ballots four years ago, Bysiewicz said.

"We only had 5 hours of voting this morning and we’ve already at nearly 30 percent in some cities," she said.

All eyes, of course, are on not just how this will impact the Senate race, but also how it will affect efforts to dislodge GOP Reps. Chris Shays, Rob Simmons and Nancy Johnson. Some 86,000 new voters have been registered since May 1. Anybody have any idea what the party I.D. breakdown is?

Update: Possible record turnout in Virginia, too.

Late update: More on those new voters. According to the New Haven Register, of 74,000 of those new voters only 14.3% are Republican.

Later update: Here are some more numbers on those new voters. From the Associated Press:

More than 86,000 residents registered to vote between May 1 and Tuesday, the deadline. Of those new voters, 38 percent are Democrats, 15 percent are Republicans and 47 percent are unaffiliated, state officials said.

And the winner of the editorial sweepstakes in the Connecticut sweepstakes is...Joe Lieberman. Of 14 Connecticut newspaper endorsements tallied by Election Central, Lieberman got 10, while only 4 have gone to Lamont (though he did win the support of the New York Times twice):

Lieberman:

The Hartford Courtant
The Day
County Times (not online)
The Norwich Bulletin
The New Haven Register
The Connecticut Post
The Greenwich Time
Newtown Bee
Stamford Advocate
Republican-American

Lamont:

Danbury News Times
Lakeville Journal
Meridan Record-Journal
Westport News

This has gotten surprisingly little attention. From the New Haven Independent:

A group of New Haven Latino clergy known for virulently opposing gay rights measures threw their support behind U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman's reelection campaign Thursday in a speech that focused on family values and faith. The group said the senator’s opposition to gay marriage contributed to their endorsing him: "We will not support a candidate that will go against the values of the traditional family as we know it and the Bible teaches us."

This endorsement is being touted by the Lieberman campaign on its blog. More on this after the jump.

Read more »

Connecticut's three Democratic House challengers received good news from state officials today when they reported that 82 thousand new voters have registered in the state since May, including more than twice as many Democrats as Republicans. About 31 thousand new Democrats, 12 thousand new GOPpers and 39 thousand new independents brought the total number of registered voters in Connecticut to a record 1.9 million. The AP quotes a UCONN professor of public policy who says the implications are “huge”: “I think the new registrants, given the Democratic advantage, can serve to put the Democrats over the top in any one of the races given how close they are."

Recent polling has each of the three Connecticut House races extremely close, with the Democrats having a slight edge in at least two of the three races going into the final week.

Senator Joe Lieberman's lead over Dem Ned Lamont is down slightly, to 12 points, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll out this morning. The survey finds Lieberman leading Lamont 49%-37%, a drop from Lieberman's lead of 52%-35% in the same poll on Oct. 20. Two interesting tidbits: Despite his flamboyant debate performances, GOP candidate Alan Schlesinger remains mired at eight percent, which is bad news for Lamont. Meanwhile, Lieberman is pulling a surprising 73% of the GOP vote -- double the 37% he gets among Dem voters.

In this undeniably funny new ad from Ned Lamont, a car repeatedly drives straight into brick walls with graffiti labels such as "Iraq War" and "Dick Cheney's Energy Bill." After the car is wrecked and crumpled beyond recognition, an actor playing a dazed and confused Joe Lieberman stumbles out from the driver's seat. Lamont concludes: "If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result, why in the world would we send Joe Lieberman back to the U.S. Senate?" View it here.

The New York Times, which backed Ned Lamont in the Dem primary against Joe Lieberman, today gives the nod to Lamont again in strikingly glowing terms: "[Lieberman] and Mr. Bush are still on the very same page, encouraging the American people to believe that there is a happy ending for American involvement in Iraq, and that all it takes is the perseverance to keep marching toward the end of the rainbow. Ned Lamont has run a far less polished campaign than Mr. Lieberman, but the more we see of him, the more impressed we are by his intelligence and his growing sophistication about the issues facing the nation...his willingness to take on Mr. Lieberman when no one else dared to do it showed real courage and conviction." Full editorial after the jump.

Update: Lieberman picks up the endorsements of the Hartford Courant and the New Haven Register.

Read more »

New "stay the course" ad, special Joe Lieberman edition! It comes courtesy of the Ned Lamont campaign:

It's pretty good. Give it a watch.

Religious activists in Connecticut took their anti-torture message to the editorial pages of the Hartford Courant this morning. Rev. Kathleen McTigue and Rabbi Donna Berman, writing on behalf of the interfaith activist network “Reclaiming the Prophetic Voice,” argue in an OpEd that by voting for the Military Commissions Act, Senator Joe Lieberman and GOP Reps. Chris Shays, Nancy Johnson and Rob Simmons contributed to “undermining the moral values and legal traditions on which America was founded.”

Outlining the provisions and loopholes that allow for torture to continue, McTigue and Berman emphasize the need not to forget our collective moral standing because, while none of us may have individually tortured, kidnapped, or held others in secret, “our government has done all of these things in our names.” The group calls for voters to hold Lieberman, Shays, Johnson and Simmons “accountable for their lack of moral leadership on this issue” and concludes soberly: "Nothing less than the soul of our nation is at stake."

Election Central first reported on Reclaiming the Prophetic Voice when the group purchased a giant billboard to convey its message to drivers on the Connecticut interstate.

From today's Hartford Courant:

Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman collected millions of dollars in campaign cash since his Democratic primary loss by tapping a lengthy list of major contributors to President Bush, dozens of Washington special interest groups and a lot of loyal Democrats....

The effort to get Bush loyalists into Lieberman's camp was triggered by White House political guru Karl Rove's Aug. 8 phone call to the senator, just before Lieberman learned he would lose to Ned Lamont in the Connecticut Democratic Senate primary.

Rove did not promise any help, or offer any support...

That call, said Republican strategist Scott Reed, "was a signal to a lot of the Republican faithful to get engaged in the Lieberman race."...

[T]he Joe-needs-help message has been spreading for a while in Washington. Beginning with Rove's phone call, "a lot of Republicans around Washington who know [Lieberman] and like him spread the word," said Charles R. Black Jr., a longtime adviser to the Bush family.

Among the GOP donors who gave to Lieberman: Bush inner circle member Joseph Allbaugh, longtime Bush family friend Melvin Sembler, and "dozens of others from Texas" and other states. Lieberman campaign manager Sherry Brown told the paper that the campaign hadn't had contact with the White House, but she added of the GOP money: "We reached out and people reached out to us."

The "drive-by" media will get a kick out of this one. A group of religious activists has purchased a giant billboard on the interstate for a massive ad accusing four Connecticut incumbents of voting for torture. The Associated Press reports that the group, a self-described statewide group of religious leaders called Reclaiming the Prophetic Voice, bought the space to target Senator Joe Lieberman and GOP Reps. Chris Shays, Nancy Johnson and Rob Simmons. While each candidate disputed the ad, the AP notes that all four voted for the controversial Military Commissions Act of 2006, which allows the President to "authorize aggressive interrogation methods that might otherwise be seen as illegal by international courts." In other words, torture.

The Connecticut press today is buzzing with talk about the startling performance by GOP candidate Alan Schlesinger at yesterday's debate. So we thought we'd bring you a highlights video so you can see him for yourself. Schlesinger grabbed yesterday's opportunity to set himself apart in a big way — whether for good or for ill remains to be seen. Against the backdrop of his more calm and restrained frontrunners, Schlesinger directed nearly all his attacks at Joe Lieberman — his main competitor for GOP votes. Schlesinger played an almost Howard Beale-like role, speaking loudly and proudly on one point after another. View the video here. A rundown of Connecticut press reaction after the jump.

Read more »

Both Joe Lieberman and Ned Lamont scored heavy blows in today's debate. Lamont persuasively invoked the same attack line Lieberman used 18 years ago against then-Senator Lowell Weicker — that the incumbent had served too long with too few results. A key Lamont goal was to broaden the case against Lieberman beyond Iraq, and he successfully did that today, saying Lieberman had failed Connecticut on various fronts. Lieberman, meanwhile, continued successfully speaking to GOP voters in terms unlikely to alienate the Dems who still support him. And he came across as convincing when he made his oft-stated case that there's no reason strong enough to toss someone with his experience. Whose version of Lieberman's record will voters believe? View highlights here. (Editor's note: The video isn't a real-time exchange; it's a series of moments strung together.)

Joe Lieberman is declining to say whether he thinks it would be a good thing if Dems win control of the House of Representatives. Lieberman -- who needs GOP votes as an independent -- was asked in an interview published today in the Hartford Courant whether America would be better off if his lifelong party took back the House. The Courant reports that Lieberman responded: "Uh, I haven't thought about that enough to give an answer." Lieberman also wouldn't say whether he'd vote for Dem John DeStefano, Jr., for governor, who, as the Courant noted wryly, is "mayor of the city where Lieberman has lived since the 1960s." Lieberman also observed that there's "not enough patriotism" in Washington. More from the Courant interview after the jump.

Read more »

A new poll released this morning by the Hartford Courant shows that Ned Lamont is trailing the incumbent Senator by eight points -- a slightly smaller gap than recent polls have shown, but still a significant margin. Today's Courant poll finds Lieberman leading Lamont 48%-40% among likely voters. A key footnote: The poll also finds that eight percent of respondents are undecided, and around 15% of supporters on each side could still change their minds between now and election day.

Ned Lamont has just released a new ad attacking Joe Lieberman in his own words -- in Lieberman's words, that is. The screen shows a youngish Lieberman 18 years ago, during the campaign in which he unseated then-Senator Lowell Weicker in 1988, and quotes him making promises about attendance and voting which the Lamont campaign contends he's broken. It concludes by quoting the young Lieberman as follows: "After 18 years, it’s time for somebody new. It’s time for a change." The narrator rejoins: "Finally he’s telling the truth!" View it here.

I just got off the phone with Rev. Al Sharpton, and in an interview he blasted the Joe Lieberman campaign as "ugly," saying one of its tactics "borders on racism." Sharpton was referring to a comment made by Lieberman spokesperson Tammy Sun in today's Daily News, where she described Sharpton as "one of Ned Lamont's closest advisers." Sharpton claims that characterization is false. "I’ve given more advice to Joe Lieberman than I've given to Ned Lamont," Sharpton told Election Central, referring to his 2000 endorsement of the Gore-Lieberman ticket. More after the jump.

Read more »

Yesterday, Joe Lieberman campaign manager Sherry Brown said this about Lieberman's reaction to Dem calls for the resignation of Speaker Dennis Hastert over Foleygate:

Brown said that when Lieberman spoke to reporters Wednesday, he "never suggested" that calling for Hastert's resignation was too partisan. She said he "simply urged both sides not to turn this awful incident into a partisan food-fight."

But here's what Lieberman said on Wednesday:

"The Foley case bothers people," he added. "If anyone thinks they can make this into another partisan flap, it's not. It's very real and human. The House Republican leaders and, frankly, the Democratic leadership, should not make it partisan."

So, yes, Lieberman did fault the Dem leadership for being too partisan.

Joe Lieberman likes to say he's from the "Kennedy wing" of the Democratic Party. One Kennedy, however, disagrees. Yesterday, Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts blasted Lieberman for saying: "I come from the Truman/J.F. Kennedy wing of the Democratic Party. We're socially progressive at home and we're strong in foreign and defense policy." According to the Hartford Courant, Kennedy retorted: "He doesn't have it right." More from Kennedy after the jump.

Read more »

Ned Lamont has just written a check for $500,000 to his own campaign, the Associated Press reports:

The Lamont camp said it needs the money to blunt Lieberman's aggressive television ad campaign; both sides are spending heavily on commercials. Lieberman has run ads recently suggesting that political newcomer Lamont lacks the experience to be an effective senator.

"Ned is not going to let Senator Lieberman's negative allegations go unanswered," said Lamont spokeswoman Liz Dupont-Diehl. "We've said all along we're not going to take this lying down."

AP notes that Lamont chipped in $4 million of his own money for the primary, and has added $2.75 million in personal checks to his campaign since then. Grand total shelled out by Lamont as of now: $7.25 million.