E.J. Dionne weighs in on Lieberman's troubles.
The opposition to Lieberman is motivated by an effort to reverse the trend to the right. It's true that Lamont's campaign has been energized by widespread opposition to the Iraq war and the fact that Lieberman has been one of the most loyal Democratic defenders of President Bush's Middle East policies.
But Lieberman's troubles are, even more, about a new aggressiveness in the Democratic Party called forth by disgust with the Bush presidency -- an energy comparable to the vigor that a loathing for liberalism brought to the Republican right in the 1970s and '80s.
Now, I read some of the pundit "analysis" of Lieberman's problems, and many just don't get it. It's as if they don't understand why St. Paul Mayor Randy Kelly was voted out of office, or many Republicans will be running away from George Bush this November. They, and Joementum, have obviously not gotten the message. People want Change.
Some, in the elite media, believe that the Democrats should hold out their hands to the Republicans, in the name of some bipartianship fantasy that will never happen with this administration and it's core base. I pray the democrats do not listen to any such advice.
Ideologically based primary challenges to important incumbents almost always signal major changes in the political winds. That's as true of Lamont's strong campaign against Lieberman as it was of D'Amato's victory, following as it did the primary defeats of two other liberal Republican senators -- Clifford Case of New Jersey in 1978 and Thomas Kuchel of California 10 years earlier -- at the hands of conservatives.
Political winds are shifting fast. Where those winds will blow is yet unknown.