I've been thinking about Blanche Lincoln and Bill Halter for the past several days. It reminded me of 2006 and the campaign against an entrenched conservative incumbent and a sucessful liberal democrat.
Join me below for a trip down memory lane.
And America's mission is to pay any price, bear any burden, support any friend, and oppose any foe to assure the success and survival of liberty. In our time, the Democratic Party has been the great hope of people rising in our country, and it remains that way.
That's why I say he's running a single issue campaign. Every campaign, as President Clinton reminded us, is about the future. And what I'm saying to the people of Connecticut, I can do more for you and your families to get something done to make health care affordable, to get universal health insurance, to make America energy independent, to save your jobs and create new ones. That's what the Democratic Party is all about.
Who was this champion of liberal causes? Why that's Senator Joe Lieberman in the 2006 debate with Ned Lamont. This comes as no shock to anyone who was ardently paying attention. Most in the media would not blink an eye an the hypocritical nature of maintaining all these different positions.They would call it the evolution of his stances over the years. I call it for what it is. Self interest and pandering to your audience and your corporate insurance sponcers.
Then we have his stated position on the Medicare buy in.
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Fast forward to this past year and we have this odd defense as to why the public should not have universal healthcare or the public option. It boils down to debt! We've just got to get costs under control!
Well perhaps Lieberman skipped basic economics in college when he failed (as most modern day republicans do) to understand the need for spending during a recession. Keynesian economics!
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While Lieberman tried to make the point that we have a massive problem with debt he failed to mention one of the prominent reasons we have accrued this trillion dollar figure. Iraq. Interesting enough he was rebuked four years ago by Lamont.
Ned Lamont said in the 2006 debate.
It says so much about what type of a country we are. The tens of thousands of people who have died and been wounded, the hundreds of billions of dollars that have been spent and wasted and the values, the values about this country and our moral authority, and what it says about who we are. It's destabilized the Middle East, it was a mistake, and we should admit it.
Lamont was right then. He is right now. We've spent billions if not over a trillion dollars in Iraq. Yet suddenly when faced with the democrats ability to really deliver healthcare for its citizens we can't afford it.
I reject that.
I want a public option.
I want better democrats.
I want Democrats to be back in the majority in Washington and elect a Democratic president in 2008. This man and his supporters will frustrate and defeat our hopes of doing that.
By his supporters he meant us and others who worked on the Lamont campaign. Is that what you REALLY want Joe? You want a Democrat in the white house?
This might seem like I am merely rehashing the past but my point is simple. We can not afford in enable liars anymore. Our country can not suffer the conservative movement nor wolves in sheeps clothing. Where would we be in history if Ned Lamont had won? Well we'd have a public option to start. We still should get one and I'll continue to keep fighting for once.
That's why I'm supporting Bill Halter in the primary against Blanche Lincoln. We need someone in the senate that is going to champion progressive legislation and who isn't tainted with this horrid "pragmatic" third way centralism that drives policy but never wants to take any responsiblity for policy.
I'm sick of it.
I'm not under any illusions as to the type of democrat Bill Halter might be. I know for a fact I am not going to agree with him 100% of the time and I can't expect him to represent the wishes of a new yorker since I already have my own senator.
What I expect from him? A degree of intellectual honesty I've found lacking in Blanche Lincoln's positions. The same dishonesty while more evident and pronouced in Lieberman still resides within Lincoln. We do not need her to be speaking at the 2012 RNC convention. If we have learned anything over the past year (well WE knew this for years) is that you can not expect to engage in reasonable debate with these people. I feel myself listening to their words and find myself growing more stupid with each passing moment.
Facts are meaningless when you have your own version of reality. Lieberman clearly lives in his own. Does Blanche? I honestly think conservative dems are stuck in the year 2001 four days after Sept 11'th.
They have not moved past that point. The country has. We elected Obama to usher in change. Not to want hold hands and sing folks songs together around a campfire with republicans.
If it is the Senate that is broken then we need to fix it.
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I'm tired of being promised change.
Lets make some happen.
Support Bill Halter for Senate.
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