Joe Lieberman, his Republican friends and the London terror plot

I guess there's an upside for Joe Lieberman in losing his Senate primary.  Now he can let his inner Republican come out even more freely:  Independent Lieberman kicks off revamped campaign in Waterbury AP/Stamford Advocate 08/10/06.

In Waterbury on Thursday, [Lieberman] countered Lamont's longstanding criticism of his support of the Iraq war by comparing it to the terror plot against aircraft that was foiled Thursday in London.

"I'm worried that too many people, both in politics and out, don't appreciate the seriousness of the threat to American security and the evil of the enemy that faces us - more evil or as evil as Nazism and probably more dangerous that the Soviet Communists we fought during the long Cold War," Lieberman said.  [Technically, the only time US and Soviet troops actually fought each other was at the end of the First World War.]

"If we just pick up like Ned Lamont wants us to do, get out by a date certain, it will be taken as a tremendous victory by the same people who wanted to blow up these planes in this plot hatched in England. It will strengthen them and they will strike again."  (my emphasis)

When hearing all the Republican jive about the "blame-America-first" left taking over the Democratic Party, it's worth keeping in mind that in every Presidential election since - what? 1928? - the Reps have discovered that the Democratic condidate is some extreme social tinkerer or has some kind of reckless foreign policy.

They're hung up on 1972 nominee George McGovern for whatever reason.  But they also tried to portray Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, Bill Clinton, Al Gore and John Kerry as tax-and-spend, soft-on-defense liberals, too.  (If you listen closely, the Reps usually manage to toss out the word "socialism" somewhere along the way to turn on the Republican hardcores.)

But this campaign has some time-specific elements.  Check out the time-line:

Friday 08/04/06: Bush hears about the alleged British plot.  From Bush seeks political gains from  foiled plot by John Knox AFP/Yahoo! News 08/10/06 (via John Aravosis at AmericaBlog):

White House spokesman Tony] Snow said Bush first learned in detail about the plot on Friday, and received two detailed briefings on it on Saturday and Sunday, as well as had two conversations about it with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Tuesday 08/08/06: Joe Lieberman loses Senate primary race to Ned Lamont.

Wednesday 08/09/06: The Republican Party comes out with their usual unified position, this time saying that the Lamont victory means that Democrats are soft on terrorism.  Party Chair Ken Mehlman sends e-mail to Republicans stating:

[Democratic] leaders ... want to cut and run from the War on Terror, and surrender other tools needed to keep America safe.  ...

With 90 days to go before the election, National Democrat leaders have made their choice in favor of defeatism, isolationism, and blaming America first.

Dark Lord Dick Cheney emerges from his undisclosed location to give a highly unusual (for him) interview with the press, in which he said:

The thing that’s partly disturbing about it is the fact that, the standpoint of our adversaries, if you will, in this conflict, and the al Qaeda types, they clearly are betting on the proposition that ultimately they can break the will of the American people in terms of our ability to stay in the fight and complete the task. And when we see the Democratic Party reject one of its own, a man they selected to be their vice presidential nominee just a few short years ago, it would seem to say a lot about the state the party is in today if that’s becoming the dominant view of the Democratic Party, the basic, fundamental notion that somehow we can retreat behind our oceans and not be actively engaged in this conflict and be safe here at home, which clearly we know we won’t — we can’t be. So we have to be actively engaged not only in Afghanistan and Iraq, but on a global basis if we’re going to succeed in prevailing in this long-term conflict.

So it’s an unfortunate development, I think, from the standpoint of the Democratic Party to see a man like Lieberman pushed aside because of his willingness to support an aggressive posture in terms of our national security strategy….

... But clearly within the Democratic Party, it would appear to be that there are deep divisions. I think there’s a significant body of opinion that wants to go back - I guess the way I would describe it is sort of the pre-9/11 mind set, in terms of how we deal with the world we live in.  (my emphasis)

Thursday 08/10/06:  British officials announce the discovery of an alleged plot to bomb planes travelling from Britain to the US.  "Put simply this was intended to be mass murder on an unimaginable scale," said the statement from Scotland Yard, who apparently decided that the famous British style of understatement was not appropriate for the announcement.

George Bush makes his first public statement explicitly reflecting knowledge of the alleged terrorist plot on which he was briefed in detail six days earlier (President Bush Discusses Terror Plot Upon Arrival in Wisconsin):

The recent arrests that our fellow citizens are now learning about are a stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists who will use any means to destroy those of us who love freedom, to hurt our nation.  ...

This country is safer than it was prior to 9/11. We've taken a lot of measures to protect the American people.  But obviously, we're still not completely safe, because there are people that still plot and people who want to harm us for what we believe in. It is a mistake to believe there is no threat to the United States of America.  And that is why we have given our officials the tools they need to protect our people. 

Travelers are going to be inconvenienced as a result of the steps we've taken. I urge their patience and ask them to be vigilant. The inconvenience is - occurs because we will take the steps necessary to protect the American people.  (my emphasis)

Knox/AFP:

His remarks came a day after the White House orchestrated an exceptionally aggressive campaign to tar opposition Democrats as weak on terrorism, knowing what Democrats didn't: News of the plot could soon break.

Vice President Dick Cheney and White House spokesman Tony Snow had argued that Democrats wanted to raise what Snow called "a white flag in the war on terror," citing as evidence the defeat of a three-term Democratic senator who backed the Iraq war in his effort to win renomination.

Concluding with the Lieberman theme being used as the vehicle for the Republican message, here's an example of the stock use of the them that is now the Republican Party line:

Dead With Ned: Why Lamont's victory spells Democratic disaster by Jacob Weisberg Slate 08/09/06:

The election was about one issue and one issue only: the war in Iraq. Joe Lieberman was an otherwise highly regarded, well-ensconced Democratic incumbent who would never have faced a meaningful primary challenge had he not vocally supported President Bush's invasion in 2003, continued to defend the war in principle, and opposed adopting a timetable for withdrawal. Ned Lamont, a preppy political novice from Greenwich, got the idea to run last year when something he read in the Wall Street Journal made him gag on his breakfast. It was a hopeful analysis of Iraq by Lieberman. As a candidate, Lamont was less a fleshed-out alternative to Lieberman than a stand-in for an anti-war, anti-Bush movement. His campaign was made plausible by Web-based "Net roots" activists who cared principally about the war in Iraq and badgered Lieberman mercilessly about his support for it.  (my emphasis)

The election was about much more than the Iraq War, though that was a major issue.  Lieberman's very public defenses of Bush and criticisms of other Democrats were a huge factor, as was his neglect of constituent service in Connecticut.

Mark Schmitt takes on the Vietnam theme in the Republican line on Lieberman (Vietnam Analogies Everywhere! TPM Cafe 08/10/06), specifically responding to Weisberg's argument:

But is Iraq really a "tragic misstep in a bigger conflict"? As opposed to "a cynical and politicized right-wing response to Sept. 11"? Read the history of Vietnam, and it’s hard not to be somewhat sympathetic -- within the limits of what men like McNamara knew and assumed, you can see how each little step made sense to them at the moment, and before you know it, you’ve got 50,000 dead and no way out. But Iraq is not a "misstep" in the same way, or series of missteps. It was a very considered, aggressively sold choice to pursue a war that had little to with "the fight against global jihad," for reasons that we may never fully understand. It is a perfectly reasonable position to support ending the U.S. involvement in Iraq as quickly as possible, while strongly advocating the sort of engagement in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere that would be part of "the fight against global jihad," if you want to put it that way.