Skip to main content

Mr. Irrelevant

By



After garnering quite a bit of attention in 2008 by endorsing John McCain over Barack Obama, some were curious who Joe Lieberman would endorse this time around.  Apparently, he actually had a hard time deciding, telling Fox a couple days ago that he was thinking about supporting Trump.  It seems the "second amendment" threat tipped him the other way, as he has now come out in favor of Hillary Clinton.

As you might recall, Joe traveled all around the country with Mackie 8 years ago, and there was some speculation McCain would pick him as his VP, but Joe didn't have enough clout among the religious conservatives, so we got Sarah Palin instead.  No matter, Joe still gave his full-throated support to his Senate buddy, while everyone else was questioning such an absurd choice.

Despite being one of the featured speakers at the Republican convention, the Democrats still let Lieberman caucus with them in the next Senate session.   Nonetheless, Joe couldn't bring himself to endorse Obama in 2012 either, choosing instead to sit that election out.  He also chose to retire from politics, and has quietly assumed a role in a group that goes by the name of No Labels, promoting a "middle way" in politics.  It seems to be the place has-been politicians end up when they have no clout left in their own parties.

It would have been surprising if Lieberman had supported Trump, who has been the most deeply divisive political candidate in decades, but Joe likes to keep people guessing with the hope they will seek his political advice.

Joe's moment of glory was finding himself on the same ticket with Al Gore in 2000.  It was perhaps the most boring presidential ticket since Harding and Coolidge.  They managed to garner more votes than Bush/Cheney nationwide, but failed to win the key electoral state of Florida by a paltry 500 votes.   I never understood what Gore thought he gained by putting Lieberman on the ticket.  It was probably the first time many persons ever heard of him.  Usually, you pick someone from a swing state, like Florida, to be your running mate.  Senator Bob Graham would have been a great choice, but Gore did just about everything a presidential candidate could do to lose that election.

So, why should anyone take Lieberman's advice?  He didn't help Gore in 2000 or McCain in 2008, but here he is hoping to play a role in the Clinton campaign.  If I were Hillary, I would keep Joe at a distance, as he appears to be bad luck.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire

By
  Welcome to this month's reading group selection.  David Von Drehle mentions The Melting Pot , a play by Israel Zangwill, that premiered on Broadway in 1908.  At that time theater was accessible to a broad section of the public, not the exclusive domain it has become over the decades.  Zangwill carried a hopeful message that America was a place where old hatreds and prejudices were pointless, and that in this new country immigrants would find a more open society.  I suppose the reference was more an ironic one for Von Drehle, as he notes the racial and ethnic hatreds were on display everywhere, and at best Zangwill's play helped persons forget for a moment how deep these divides ran.  Nevertheless, "the melting pot" made its way into the American lexicon, even if New York could best be describing as a boiling cauldron in the early twentieth century. Triangle: The Fire That Changed America takes a broad view of events that led up the notorious fire, noting the gro
228 comments
Read more

Dylan in America

By
Whoever it was in 1969 who named the very first Bob Dylan bootleg album “Great White Wonder” may have had a mischievous streak. There are any number of ways you can interpret the title — most boringly, the cover was blank, like the Beatles’ “White Album” — but I like to see a sly allusion to “Moby-Dick.” In the seven years since the release of his first commercial record, Dylan had become the white whale of 20th-century popular song, a wild, unconquerable and often baffling force of musical nature who drove fans and critics Ahab-mad in their efforts to spear him, lash him to the hull and render him merely comprehensible. --- Bruce Handy, NYTimes ____________________________________________ I figured we can start fresh with Bob Dylan.  Couldn't resist this photo of him striking a Woody Guthrie pose.  Looks like only yesterday.  Here is a link to the comments building up to this reading group.
182 comments
Read more

Team of Rivals Reading Group

By
''Team of Rivals" is also an America ''coming-of-age" saga. Lincoln, Seward, Chase et al. are sketched as being part of a ''restless generation," born when Founding Fathers occupied the White House and the Louisiana Purchase netted nearly 530 million new acres to be explored. The Western Expansion motto of this burgeoning generation, in fact, was cleverly captured in two lines of Stephen Vincent Benet's verse: ''The stream uncrossed, the promise still untried / The metal sleeping in the mountainside." None of the protagonists in ''Team of Rivals" hailed from the Deep South or Great Plains. _______________________________ From a review by Douglas Brinkley, 2005
293 comments
Read more