Josh, you just suggested you'd kick him out of the party for his belief in a man, John McCain, who is an honorable American and with whom Joe agrees on many key issues.  Don't you see the irony in then calling his potential to break from the party "thin-skinned" if the party effectively kicks him out first, by depriving him of everything they would give to any other Democrat of his seniority?  

I think that when a new congress is seated, the Dems have no choice but to throw Lieberman out.  Party solidarity has to mean something.  If the goal is to limit filibustering, the Dems would be better off giving chairmanships to the handful (less actually) of moderate Republicans.

Roidbouloi: Hear, hear. Imagine how long, say, Olympia Snowe would last in her party if she started touring the country with Obama on his campaign plane. It is time for Lieberman to go. I am very much the heterodox person but how far can you tolerate dissent of this magnitude? If supporting the other party's presidential candidate doesn't cross the Rio Grande, what does?

DMehlhorn: As I just blogged here recently, hermeneutic skills are in short supply. Josh is gaming the odds that Lieberman might go against his historically liberal stances on a variety of issues and join the Republicans in filibustering legislation, simply because his wafer - thin epidermal layer causes him to do so. The odds are pretty good that Josh will prove to be right, too, what with his praising Rush Limbaugh recently.

"Josh, you just suggested you'd kick him out of the party for his belief in a man, John McCain, who is... "  

Let me finish that sentence: "...running against the Democratic Party's standard-bearer."  It doesn't matter how honorable John McCain is or isn't.  The very definition of party is that you work together to elect candidates.  Working to elect candidates from the opposing party means you should go join that party.

I don't care what Joe Lieberman says or does. To hell with him.

Josh isn't suggesting that Lieberman be kicked out of the party.  He already has been kicked out of the party.  That was a pretty big snubbing and drubbing that he absorbed in the primary in 2006.  If that didn't get him to reflexively vote anti-Democratic, I wouldn't think an additional "snubbing" will.

Lieberman votes center to liberal on most issues because that is what he evidently believes.  He also is supporting McCain because he evidently believes that his friend will do best as president.

Say what you want about Lieberman, but he doesn't see to do things out of spite.

Didn't Joe recently call Obama a Marxist?  

They shouldn't outright kick him out of the caucus, but they should DEFINITELY kick out of the Government Affairs Committee and reassign him to a far less important committee. He has wasted opportunity after opportunity there to do some good out of sheer blind loyalty to the disastrous, failed administration of George W. Bush. Remember when he campaigned in 2006 on promises of using his committee to investigate Bush admin mistakes and malfeasance in Iraq and Katrina? He lied - didn't bother.

If he balks at losing that committee chairmanship, then it's time to cut him loose. And if he decides to cast aside his longstanding record to vote with the GOP, then so be it. That will give the Dems some headaches, but it will show Joe for the sniveling, two-faced little weasel that he truly is and will ensure that this is his last term as a senator from Connecticut.

DMehlhorn's implication that seniority buys Lieberman the right to consistently tell the Democratic Party to shove it up its collective ass is misguided and silly. And honestly, who gives a shit about seniority? He's not even the senior Senator from his own state, for crying out loud. Joe's best-case scenario is that McCain gets elected and appoints him to the Cabinet (hey, or veep!).

Once upon a time, the Whig party expelled a politician who started actively campaigning for the opposition Democrats. That politician, John Tyler, was the sitting president of the United States when his party expelled him.

Just, you know, mentioning an interesting historical fact.

I never knew that rhubarbs, thanks.

Timely post: Joe is on Wolf Blitzer talking about the Obama being the Hamas favorite. That should be it for Joe. Yes, wonderful, he's an unapologetic McCain lover. But that should come with consequences. If Harry Reid doesn't take away his chairmanship, I say Reid - who stinks in his current position - should be stripped of his majority leader status. Enough is enough, go join the Republicans, go become a lobbyist, go fluff McCain, but his chairmanship has to go.

If I were Harry Reid I'd call JL into my office and tell him "Joe, I understand that you'e campaigning as a Democrat for McCain, but there's a good way and a bad way to do that.  If you just point out that McCain is a great guy- praise his support for the Iraq war and tax cuts, and say that he's nice to kittens and puppies- we can live with that.  What we can't live with with is if you use your status as a Democrat to make our nominee appear toxic.  If you start saying that Obama is a marxist, or a black liberation radical, or a crypto-Muslim, or unfit to be commander-in-chief, then we can't afford to let you call yourself a Democrat."

Come January, and the new session of Congress, I'd offer him the same deal that Republican leaders have offered to their "moderates".  That is, vote anyway you like on up-and-down votes, but vote with us on filibuster/closure issues.  Or else.

William-g: No, Lieberman did not call Obama a Marxist. He was asked in an interview if he thought that Obama was a Marxist and his reply was somewhere between a weak negative and agnosticism. He said that he didn't think so but that it was an interesting question, if I recall correctly.

Right on, WoodyBombay:

Expelled the sitting president from the party? Sweet!

I am not sure how I feel about this; I think bi-partisanship is important, but I never really considered what it would be like if Dems and Reps started campaigning for each other.

I suppose if some Reps started sincerely jumping on Obama's bandwagon, I'd be thrilled, and perturbed if the GOP booted the individuals for it; I guess I need to have the same feelings towards Joe, let him practice his politics as he sees fit.

I may have to revisit the issue if Joe ends up winning the McCain Veepstakes, though.

Joe also failed to mention that Hamas gave W the nod in 04. Convenient fact to leave out.

Rhubarbs is right!  Are we no better than a gaggle of damnable Whigs, with their pressed shirts and love of tariffs? Damn their oily hides!  

Oh good - I hope Holy Joe starts banging on about family values, socialized medicine, tax and spend liberals, war forever with everyone, bone crazy judges, etc...he'd be much more likely to be kicked out of office completely by the people who voted him in.  Then he'd be gone :)

Yeah, wandrey, but his term isn't up until 2012.  I don't think he would be re-elected.  I doubt he will even run.

Rush Limbaugh actively campaigned for Hillary; many of his supporters even voted for Mrs. Clinton.  Do you see Republicans calling for Limbaugh's head or asking him to give up his talk-radio perch?  Why are Democrats so thin-skinned, partisan and vengeful?

Can't we just get along?

Approved by Democrats for McCain anti-Whig Party of the United States, leader Jomentum

DMehlhorn, Joe Lieberman is not a Democrat he is an Independent, he was given his committee seats by the Democratic party but the Democratic party is under no obligation to continue to do so. There is no kicking out. Give the seat to a loyal Democrat, that is why we have parties for.

I'm a dem, I support Obama, but McCain is a genuine hero........with experience. I just wish he didn't believe all the things that I do not support. I could have easily gone to that side. But supporting the war in Iraq as WINNABLE no less, thinking that a gas tax holiday might actually do some good, hugging Bush. It's all too much, even for a hero.

How about an Obama-McCain ticket?

Joe Lieberman is not going any where.  Democrats can't pick that fight with him without a little blowback from the Moderate Democrats.

Leberman is Carl Levin without the rumpled clothes or liberal base behind him.  They need Joe to balance the morons like Ted Kennedy and Barbara Boxer who are so far out there in Left Field they don't contribute anything useful.

Maybe Obama will take care of that problem by giving him a cabinet seat as a Bi-Partisian move.  

But putting Joe out to pasture will just create an angry man that will come back to haunt the party later.

One of the more luridly revolting aspects of those who resist beginning an immediate, steady draw-down of troops in Iraq is their penchant for drawing the cloak of "patriotism" around their buzzard-like shoulders, as if chest-thumping in the current context equates to love of country. Whereas, in reality, the opposite is true.

Our mishandling of the politics and urban guerrila warfare in Iraq is but one of many dangers, most of them all or largely self-imposed, that threaten America's security, economy, and quality of life. I don't have to delineate them all here--you can name a dozen of them in five seconds. Here are a few favorites of mine: climate change, energy policy, GWOT, nukes, dollar devaluation, Social Security, health care. Each is a strategic threat. One or two would be a full agenda for any leader; the next President gets the whole litter.

Solutions to each of these problems have some things in common, in particular fiscal prudence to allow huge investments of monetary and human capital. Yet Lieberman and McCain, among others, would continue our Iraq policy even as it prevents us from addressing these other problems. Tell me again, how is pouring another trillion down the rathole helping us reverse the decline in the educational achiefement, vis-a-vis China and India, of our children? How is shooting Iraq into the military's veins helping it to confront the Taliban? In short, where does Lieberman get off implying that this course of continued folly is patriotic?

And yet, with a bit of the Democrat still coursing through his veins, he'll no doubt vote to fund any number of domestic programs with that old stand-by, deficit spending. That will certainly shore up the dollar and increase our international leverage, now, won't it, Joe? At least a few fiscally responsible Republicans have resisted the guns and butter myth, to their credit. At least some legislators aren't too keen about throwing tens of thousands of dollars of indebtedness at tens of millions of Americans whose parents have not yet reached puberty.

But it's all okay, because Joe wears an American flag lapel pin. What a patriot!

barbara1:  McCain is a hero, but Lieberman is a draft deferment coward. It's amazing that Joe was totally opposed to the Vietnam war--a war, that like Iraq 2, was launched based on a lie (Gulf of Tonkin), but was arguably understandable (the Iron Curtain, Domino Theory,, etc)--when his cowardly ass was potentially on the line, versus his current jingoistic obstinacy. And which country's security is Joe really concerned for?

williamyard: Well put. However, the problems you listed can all be solved by. . .war! Total, unending warfare.  Didn't you know that a  truculent philosophy is the "solution?" That's five-deferment poltroon Dick Cheney's unified field theory to world affairs.  When one can write checks that others' bodies have to cash, one can have all the balls in the world.  

I just read somewhere that Lieberman is going to be a featured speaker at the RNC. That, I think, is taking it too far. It's one thing to support a Republican for president if you're a Democrat, it's another to diss your own party's presidential candidate, which he is in effect doing. I think it's only a matter of time until Lieberman declares himself a Republican. Why doesn't he just get it over with?

Lieberman called Obama a marxist. That's now his signature moment. The guy is a piece.

What's good enough for Zell Miller is good enough for Joe Lieberman, no?

Virginiacentrist: Joe Lieberman did not call Obama a Marxist. But his comment was craven enough as is (cf. my post above on this matter).

Obama/Zinni vs. McCain/Lieberman.

Let's have a loud, smart donneybrook over foreign policy. It's long overdue.

None of the four got us in this mess, let's hear how they plan on getting us out.

Joe is wrong.The Democratic party is better represented by Obama.  I hope Carter will be the keynote speaker of the convention,followed by Kennedy,Kerry and Pelosi.  I wouldn't miss this one for the world.

Here's a thought.

The Candidate could extend a speaking slot for Joe at the Democratic Convention.  That would put Joe in a bit of a bind, does he speak at the Democratic Convention or the Republican or both.

By forcing him to speak his mind to the two different constiuents, it forces him to get his argument pretty tight and clear.  He would be open to a lot of criticism if he waffles between the two crowds.  It also steals their spotlight.

But the Candidate would have the last word and could use Joe as he tacks to the center.  A lot of Democrats don't get it.  They do not realize that most of the electorate is like Joe Liberman.  Pulling in those moderate voters will be key through Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida.

The only risk is having Joe get the last word with the Republicans.  Right now he can say what he wants with the GOP without any regrets.