Submitted via his Senate website:
Dear Senator Lieberman,
I am writing to express my sincere admiration for all the good you have done in your 18-year Senate career, and my overwhelming disappointment with the decision by Connecticut’s Democratic voters to choose a political neophyte — a combative, single-issue cardboard candidate with a hefty checkbook — over a proven leader like yourself, simply because they disagreed with you on an issue of conscience. It is a sad day when a committed progressive is no longer welcome in the Democratic Party because he was unwilling to put blind party loyalty ahead of his honest opinions. You deserve better; Connecticut deserves better; America deserves better.
I have been a Democrat since I was 10 years old, but last night I renounced my affiliation with the party because I no longer see any hope for moderates like you and I to win the battle for its soul. I believe a third-party movement is probably our best hope at this point, and once you have been re-elected as an independent, I hope you will seriously consider joining forces with like-minded centrists on both sides of the aisle, such as Senator McCain, to pursue on a national level the “new politics of unity and purpose” that you mentioned in your stirring speech last night. I have never been much of a political activist, but I promise you that I would gladly devote whatever time, energy and money that I can spare to such an effort.
I suspect that you are getting quite a few letters today from Lamont supporters urging you to drop out of the race. I am writing you in hopes of doing my small part to help counterbalance their efforts. Don’t listen to those fools. Most of them are well-meaning and genuine, but they are also angry and vicious and radical, and they will run this party and this country into the ground. If they tell you to withdraw for “the good of the party,” don’t listen. For one thing, you owe the Democrats nothing at this point; they have basically told you to get lost. For another thing, given the weakness of the Republican candidate, they have nothing to fear from your continued candidacy — except, of course, that you will win and they will lose. As for the notion that your candidacy will distract the netroots’ attention and energy from other races involving vulnerable Republicans: that’s their problem, not yours. If they can’t prioritize well enough to understand that defeating Republicans is more important than defeating you, they bear the blame for that, not you.
Although I grew up in Connecticut, I am now an Indiana voter (I attend law school at Notre Dame), so unfortunately I will not be able to vote for you in November. But I will definitely send you a campaign contribution once your website is back up and running, and if there is anything else I can do from afar to assist in your campaign, please let me know.
Sincerely,
Brendan Loy
Honorary member of the “Indiana for Lieberman” Party
P.S. Meanwhile, in comment #132 on my “I am no longer a Democrat” post, we learn that a Republican in Michigan is also divorcing his party today:
I had the same reaction as you did to yesterday’s results. I left my party to become an Independent due to the extremists who leave no room for principled moderates. However, I was a Republican before today. In Michigan’s 7th primary, our representative Joe Schwarz was defeated yesterday because he is too soft on immigration and estate taxes for the modern GOP. It’s sad that there is no room for me anymore there, since I do agree with the foundations of modern conservatism and could never have seen myself voting Democrat before today. Like you, this was not a quick or easy decision. It started in 2000, when I saw Bush using his evangelical base and pandering to them with policies clearly contradictory to modern Republicans. Terri Schiavo, stem cells, gay marriage… slowly I came to realize that despite my more libertarian leanings that have traditionally been more comfortable on the right, the Republicans have left me. I am truly sad today, but it is a new beginning for me.
I’m telling you, Peggy Noonan is right: there is a real opportunity for a serious third-party movement in this political climate. Someone just needs to pick up the ball. I’m looking at you, Joe and John! (Or perhaps Rudy!)
P.P.S. Here are a couple of Democrats who aren’t quite ready to jump ship yet…
Even after years of watching my party decline, I have refused to abandon it, even if it means remaining as an example of what being a Democrat used to mean, and the difference between Classical Liberal politics versus today’s stink of leftist tripe. I would expect Joe to remain a Democrat, but a win for him on November as an Independent will mean this entire nation wins. All in all, the November election is shaping up to be even more important than we could have imagined.
And Dustbury:
Those who have been waiting for me to make such an announcement [of abandoning the Democratic Party] will have to wait a while longer. While I agree with Loy that “the Democrats have jumped off the cliff, and are in free fall,” I’m not at all horrified by the prospect: if they right themselves before they hit bottom, that’s good, and if the party’s current crop of Super Geniuses wind up flat on their faces like Wile E. Coyote, well, I wield a pretty mean spatula. …
Sanity eventually will return to the Democrats, even if Brendan Loy doesn’t. I can wait.
If there was a viable third-party alternative, I bet they’d both be on board.
P.P.P.S. Another Democrat jumps ship.
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Categories: Joe Lieberman, Election 2006
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August 9th, 2006 at 1:15:12 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger’s_law
Or, in other words, your “third party movement” serves nothing more than to elect Republicans.
Although this is probably Joe’s intention.
August 9th, 2006 at 1:19:11 pm
A (hypothetical) third-party movement involving John McCain or Rudy Giuliani would elect Republicans?
Are you even paying attention?
Clearly not, if you think “Joe’s intention” is to elect Republicans. Give me a freakin’ break.
August 9th, 2006 at 1:22:09 pm
P.S. I realize there is no way we can have a lasting three-party system.
My goal in a third-party movement would be for the third party to eventually become one of the two major parties, with the far-left Kos Crowd going down with the sinking Democratic ship into Whig-like oblivion. It may not seem plausible right now, but just wait until the war in Iraq is over, the mood in the country changes, we’re attacked by terrorists again, and the Democratic Party is filled with Ned Lamont clones, having exiled all the moderates. Suddenly my “third” party will become a much more plausible alternative, and the Democrats will become the spoilers whose candidates only serve to elect Republicans.
Is it likely to happen? Probably not. Is it possible? Yes. Just because we’re doomed to have two parties, doesn’t mean we’re necessarily doomed to have these two parties.
August 9th, 2006 at 1:23:09 pm
P.P.S. This should go without saying, but: obviously my “goal” does not include us being “attacked by terrorists again.” I sincerely hope that never happens. But alas, I believe it is inevitable — and when it comes to pass, giving Kos the keys to the kingdom is going to look a lot less smart politically.
August 9th, 2006 at 1:35:19 pm
Man, you are pining for this guy. Looks like you want some of that “the kiss” action Dubya was getting.
August 9th, 2006 at 1:39:51 pm
Angrier -
With all your passionate hatred for Bush, one could say the same for you. What did he not answer your Valentine?
Or is a rational third-party prospect that scary?
August 9th, 2006 at 1:44:10 pm
Actually, while I strongly disagree with your position re: Lieberman, you may yet see the Dems replaced for reasons entirely separate from the ones listed above.
Here’s how it will happen:
1) Someone will come up with a plausible alternative to conservatism, other than “great society” liberalism
2) the established left will vomit all over that person/group, because their power base will be entirely wrapped up in great society mentality.
3) the great society will grow increasingly irrelevant, and, with the willingness of conservatives to spend like drunken sailors, no longer a distinguishing feature between the parties
4) the alternative group will rise and replace the old left.
Probably won’t have anything to do with Iraq. Perhaps something to do with national security. It will be interesting to see.
August 9th, 2006 at 1:51:16 pm
Why, when people talk about third parties, do we always jump to the national level? As a Reynoldsian Orthogonal Moderate myself, we third-party-ites need to advocate for coherent moderate candidates at exactly the level Lieberman is … today. We need his Senate seat; we could use other seats around the country as well, as use that to force change on the other two parties - and maybe, someday, displace one of them.
August 9th, 2006 at 2:00:28 pm
Lojo-
I would love a third party. There are probably candidates you and I could agree on. However, it ain’t gonna happen.
August 9th, 2006 at 2:02:24 pm
Its weird: the Republican Party is known as the Grand Old Party, but the Democrats are the older party - the Republicans pretty much being the replacement for the Whigs.
I wouldn’t be against this happening again, and the Dems seem like the weaker party. We need a GOOD opposition, one that deals in ideas, not reactionaryisms. (Just made that up.)
August 9th, 2006 at 2:27:25 pm
Amen, B. Minich, I moderate my Republicanism with recognition of the inherent benefit arising from a viable two-party system.
First, the caveat: I am a big believer in capitalism/the American way/”the business of America is business”. This is historically a right wing view.
Indeed, low taxes and easy access to capital, hallmarks of the American system (and Republicanism) surely encourage entrepreneurs like Bill Gates and Paul Allen to make good on their garage dreams from the late 70s.
The problem is: once Gates/Allen have established their mega-company, they are no longer served quite the same way by low taxes. As a mature firm, Microsoft benefits from progressive taxes, as such taxes make it more likely that a larger absolute number of consumers will purchase Microsoft products.
So there is some benefit to “tax the rich” in making the economy strong and some benefit to “don’t tax the rich” in making the economy strong.
We find the right balance when both sides are strongly voicing their respective opinions.
August 9th, 2006 at 2:49:10 pm
brendan,
why you are mentioning stuff about lamont’s check book? is that really relevant? lieberman outspent lamont over 2 to 1 on the primary campaign, how does the checkbook really matter? do you realize that partially due to campaign finance reform, and partially due to machine politics in general its highly difficult to unseat an incumbant, so perhaps individually wealthy people are the only ones who have a chance to unseat an incumbant? lieberman hadn’t been seriously challenged by a democrat the past 2 teams he ran for re-election and with ct. being such a liberal state it means that he hasn’t faced a real challenge for his seat in a while.
August 9th, 2006 at 2:54:47 pm
Yea, you’re right. I don’t like the trend in politics that candidates almost have to be independently wealthy to run for Senate — and you’re right that campaign finance reform has worsened it — but that “trend” isn’t Lamont’s fault and it isn’t one of the reasons I oppose him, so I probably should have left it out of my description. I guess I just threw it in because I was feeling pissy. “Not only is he a captive of left-wing nutjobs, but he’s rich! Also, he’s a big fat poopy-head!” :)
August 9th, 2006 at 2:57:42 pm
this terrorist fear mongering being spread is a joke. it can be strongly argued that the bush/lieberman types who support wasting troops and trillions of dollars in iraq instead of going after bin laden that is the real security risk. someone explain how withdrawal from iraq threatens america’s security at all? is anyone really naive enough to think that us being in iraq is significantly making us more secure, than if the resources were being spent elsewhere? are we supposed to lose troops and spend trillions of dollars perpetually because we refuse to admit to our mistakes?
to imply that we are necessarily more likely to get hit by a terrorist attack so matter of factly because the democrat party is supposedly shifting left because of an increasing internet influence might be one of the silliest things ive ever heard.
August 9th, 2006 at 2:59:33 pm
The tone on my above post is harsher than i intended, which tends to happen too often and i apologize. I just get annoyed when people assume that every time someone brings up a left side viewpoint people think we are going to get attacked. I hope i mis-characterized your viewpoint Brendan and feel free to correct me.
August 9th, 2006 at 3:44:58 pm
good riddance from the democratic party. i’m not sure what you’re doing there in the first place. the fact that you welcome readers from michelle malkin — who adds nothing to the public discourse but distortion, ignorance and vitriol — is sufficient to exclude you. Unless you care to explain why she ought to be taken seriously.
August 9th, 2006 at 4:05:31 pm
and aaron kinney once again proves the intolerance of the facist left.
August 9th, 2006 at 4:25:35 pm
Aaron, I don’t agree with Michelle Malkin on very much, and even when I agree with her on the substance, I generally disagree with her tone. That said, why should I not “welcome readers from” her blog? What do you want me to do, erect some kind of technical barrier whereby her readers will by unable to penetrate my blog’s Internet force field?
Seriously, you want me to be “unwelcoming” to them, just because they come from Malkin’s site? What a totally stupid, backwards idea — telling people who happen to read someone with whom I disagree that they shouldn’t even bother to read what I say. That’s a GREAT way to persuade people! No wonder the Democratic Party always does so well in elections!
August 9th, 2006 at 4:27:42 pm
Yea, I’ll try to give your post a detailed response later… don’t really have time now. But anyway, apology accepted.
August 9th, 2006 at 5:00:34 pm
“[S]omeone explain how withdrawal from iraq threatens america’s security at all.”
I’m also too busy to respond in greater detail at the moment, but my first reaction is to think about what bin Laden himself said about his world view shortly after 9/11 (don’t have time to look up the article, but I seem to remember reading it in the New Yorker), which was that Reagan’s pullout of Beirut in ‘83 after the marine barracks bombing, and Clinton’s similarly ignominious pullout of Somalia after the Blackhawk Down fiasco in Mogadishu, cemented the notion of the U.S. as a “paper tiger” that could be attacked with impunity.
August 9th, 2006 at 5:10:32 pm
I too have voted mostly for democratic candidates in the past…but now vote the individual who are most centrist. I voted for gore/lieberman…mostly on the strength of lieberman. I do not see voting for another democratic candidate till they move toward the center and drop the radicals on the left.
August 9th, 2006 at 5:18:52 pm
you shouldn’t seek to exclude anybody from your site. i apologize for not being clear. i’m making the assumption that you’re seeking the attention of instapundit and malkin. did you ping them? why are they reading your blog?
to ke_future: isn’t a facist leftist an oxymoron? plus, i thought we were communists. can’t keep it straight.
August 9th, 2006 at 5:31:49 pm
to chime in on iraq and security, the “paper tiger” idea is interesting, but it runs counter to the theory, articulated by richard clarke, that 9/11 was designed to provoke the U.S. into precisely the kind of response the bush administration gave them, to lure us into the middle east where we could be engaged directly, to win the propaganda war by being able to say: We told you these western imperialists hate arabs and want your oil. certainly, al qaida could not have been so foolish as to imagine the u.s. would not respond to 9/11.
August 9th, 2006 at 6:33:29 pm
Joe Mama-
So what you are saying is that Osama Bin Laden will try another 9/11 if we withdraw from Iraq? Funny, I thought he was trying to do that already.
As for the “paper tiger” thing, that’s a bogus argument. We kicked the crap out of the British. That didn’t prevent them from hitting us again. We helped beat the Germans. That didn’t prevent them from hitting us again. We have defeated enemies all over the world and there is always some asshole who thinks we are lazy and won’t fight. We always prove them wrong.
Finally, if being hawkish is our best defense, how do you explain Israel? Constant fucking attacks for decades. Do you want the U.S. to be like Israel? I don’t.
August 9th, 2006 at 6:47:19 pm
Brendan, I know you’re averse to looking at politics through ideological prisms, but given your recent abandonment of the Democratic Party and your hope that the Angry Left goes the way of the Whigs, it’d do you well to reconsider your disfavor of ideological explanations.
One of the reasons the Whigs fell out of power was that their raison d’etre ceased to be powerful enough to answer the major questions of the day; opposition to a powerful Executive was simply not enough to answer Yea or Nay on the expansion of slavery to the new western territories.
Despite my adamant and enduring disgust with progressive politics, I cannot say that the guiding principles of the Left are on their deathbed; clearly democratic socialism, multiculturalism, and the accompanying accommodationist foreign policy entailed by those -isms have proven their weakness, but as in the Monty Python scene, these diseased ideals are not dead yet no matter how hard we conservatives bludgeon these ideological foes of ours. Indeed, the report I linked to earlier shows that the anti-Bush Leftist mindset comprises a solid 40% of the electorate, making it the single strongest ideology in America today. Conservatives and libertarians and their various stripes run about 30%, while the rest are somewhere in between.
A presiding myth is that America is becoming more polarized in part because of Bush’s playing to social conservatives, but the reality is Bush did very well among independents because the vast majority of moderates are more abhorred by the 40% to their left than they are the 35% on their right. This same rough ideological explanation conveniently overlaps with your own disillusionment with–and abandonment of–the Democratic Party.
That 40% is Ned Lamont’s crowd. Joe simply had no chance in this election, and in the future, Lieberman-type Dems will also lose out in primaries to Ned-like foes because the demographics are clearly going in that direction. The Dems cannot ignore this 40% of America any more than the GOP can afford to stray from its base, either. The difference is, to most moderates, unless you’re a religion-phobe, the Religious Right is not actually that scary when put up against the Angry Left, and that’s why the GOP is dominating nationally right now. As a result, the GOP tent is growing even as the polarization of the Dems is increasing.
To wind back to a concrete point, I mean to say that the Dems are not going to die out anytime soon per your fantasies. The Left will be around for a loooong time; their propaganda, ideologies, and proponents are too well-ensconced in seats of power, whether in media and bureaucracies, academia, or the cultural elite. It also doesn’t help that secular progressivism is still the driving political force in Europe.
The Dems right now, by moving towards that 40%, are doing two things: They are ensuring their survival as a political party by moving towards a prominent ideology that is well-esconced and will continue to be the dominant ideology in Western politics; and they are ensuring their role as a minority party for the next generation because such a movement requires the purging of moderates like yourself. The only way the Dems can claw their way back to being a majority party is to either convert more Americans to Leftist ideologies, which isn’t likely (I think the 40% is a peak that should trend downward as the Baby Boomers begin dying off), or alienate their core ideological constituency to win moderates and Republicans into their coalition, and thereby risk becoming a de facto third party as the Angry Left leaves in droves for the Green Party (or a similar party).
You’re going to hate this answer like all hell, but the true answer is for people like you to join the Republican Party and help us weaken the Pat Robertsons, Tom DeLays, and George W. Bush’s of the party so that we can have a broad-minded coalition of people who largely agree on free-market economic principles, conservative fiscal policy, muscular, neoconservative-like foreign policy, and libertarian social policy. You’d have to sacrifice a few sacred shibboleths… but then again, so would we. For example, the Religious Right would have to decide the protection of Western culture and economy and the defense of classical liberalism is more important than minimizing the participation of homosexuals in American culture and society or achieving legislative prohibitions against abortion. In return, you’d have to abandon the precepts of Big, Helpful Government in the grand tradition of FDR and LBJ in favor of more market-oriented tax-and-spend principles. Neither sacrifice will be easy or painless, but they are both more probable, more possible, and more beneficial for America than your alternative dream of a dead Left and a “Third Way” centrist party to battle against right-leaning Republicans for control of America–a dream that is both seriously contra-ideological reality and probably less beneficial, because if moderates like yourself become the new dominant foe for the GOP, the Right will only go further to the right in contradistinction, to your chagrin.
You took longer than I thought to abandon the party of your youth, but I hold out hope that it will take you significantly less time before you join the party of your future adult wisdom. May your time in the partisan wilderness be short and forgiving.
Don’t view the GOP through the prism of who currently reside there. Instead, come join me and cross the Jordan River in search of the milk and honey you’ve been craving; we’ll conquer these Canaanites together and build a better party.
August 9th, 2006 at 7:52:27 pm
Joe Lieberman should just be honest for the first time in his life and run as the republican candidate. As for Tammy Bruce being a democrat? LOL. She’s about as much a democrat as Bill O’Reilly. Oh, but I guess you think he’s not a republican either. Somebody call PT Barnum.
August 9th, 2006 at 8:27:29 pm
The amount of teeth-gnashing going on among Democrats - or former Democrats -like Brendan when it comes to Lieberman is ridiculous. “Oh, the Democrats aren’t a Big Tent Party like the Republicans.”
Really? How many openly gay Republicans are there in the party leadership of the Republicans compared to Democrats? Or blacks? Or Jews? Or Muslims? Or Hispanics? Or Women? Damn fewer than the Democrats.
How many women or Jews have the Republicans put up for VP? Zero.
As for showing people the door, where were you, Brendan, when the GOP marginalized Colin Powell? Or Paul O’Neill? Or Bill Weld? Or JC Watts? Or Christie Todd Whitman? People who disagreed with Bush or, in the case of JC Watts, DARED to try to take a leadership role in the House.
You appreciate Lieberman for not bowing to the Left in the Democratic Party. Where are you on John McCain kissing Falwell’s ass after admonishing him in 2000? On the race-baiting the GOP used against McCain in South Carolina in 2000?
The Republican Party is the party of rich white oil men. Everthing else is window dressing. Sorry to burst your - and Andrew’s - bubble.
August 9th, 2006 at 10:24:08 pm
. . . and there’s plenty more where that came from!
August 9th, 2006 at 11:18:00 pm
Max, I haven’t been reading Brendan’s blog long enough to know the answers to the questions you asked him. I’m going to assume by your tone that he may have been silent on those issues. I don’t see how that makes any point here. If you’re on the Democrat team then you want your team to do what you think is the right thing to succeed. Just because Brendan may not have criticized the Republicans on their faults doesn’t mean he can’t try to make his own party better. You act like he ran to the other party when he divorced the Dems. If anything, he’s showed he feels he doesn’t belong in either party.
August 10th, 2006 at 7:21:06 am
Angrier -
I’m still holding out foolish hope for a third party. Though Andrew’s scenario of the GOP (or moderate Democrats) melding into a different party after intercine conflict sounds more likely.
We really are a two-party system, but I don’t think its absurd to think that one party might rise up our of the ashes of another.
August 10th, 2006 at 8:31:33 am
mad max….
condi rice, alberto gonzales, colin powell, liz dole, michael steele, christine todd whitman, mary cheney just to name a few off the top of my head. i read somewhere that bush had more minorities and women in his cabinet in his first term then clinton during his entire term in office. funny thing is that bush chose them for their abilities not for their gender or race. funny how that led to the number of women and minorities in positions of power….and how the liberal left invariably accuses any minority that is conservative of being a sell out and not really of what ever race they are.
on the one hand the left wing accuses the bush administration of being in thrall to jewish neo-cons and then they go and question how many jews are in positions of power within the republicans. can’t quite wrap my head around the logic of that one.
i’m sorry, but that tired old screed that republicans are racist, chavaunist pigs just doesn’t fly any more for those that have a brain. go find some other lie to peddle
August 10th, 2006 at 12:11:53 pm
Andrew - you risk making *ME* burst out into showtunes ! “By Jove, he’s got it ! He’s really got it !”
OY !
(grin)
The Republican Party in California, in particular, is SO ripe to be basically taken over by moderates and turned into the kind of Party that Brendan is seeking …
And, yes, some of the truly OLD Guard in CA would have coronaries and strokes - which would be a good things because it would mean, with their excellent private health coverage, that the census in CA hospitals would go up with patients who can pay well for their treatment … everyone benefits !