Bill Clinton saddled up and rode into one more political battle…this time for Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman, an early supporter, early political soul-mate and prominent Democratic critic of Clinton’s behavior in the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
But in campaigning for Lieberman it was interesting to note Clinton’s political approach: he outlined why he believes Lieberman should be elected, without demonizing or denigrating Lieberman challenger Ned Lamont:
Bill Clinton, campaigning to save an old friend from defeat, appealed to Connecticut Democrats Monday to put aside their opposition to the war in Iraq and send embattled Sen. Joseph Lieberman on his way to a new term in office.
Democrats “don’t agree on everything. We don’t agree on Iraq,” Clinton said, calling the conflict the “pink elephant in the living room.”
But “the real issue is, whether you were for it or against it, what are we going to do now. And let me tell you something, no Democrat is responsible for the mistakes that have been made since the fall of Saddam Hussein that have brought us to this point.”
So there Clinton illustrates his underlying perspective, the perspective of the big political tent: What do we have in common, what do you do in the future and how do we pool our resources? AND:
In a 20-minute speech to a capacity crowd in an ornate theater, Clinton went easy on Ned Lamont, whose challenge gained traction when he accused Lieberman of being too close to Bush on the war and other issues.
“He seems like a perfectly nice man. He’s got every right to run and he’s waged a vigorous campaign,” the former president said.
What? He didn’t demonize him? Hasn’t he learned anything from conservative and liberal talk radio yet? AND:
By contrast, he lavished praise on Lieberman, a third-term lawmaker whose once formidable lead in the polls has vanished.
Clinton said Lieberman has long been a loyal Democratic vote on issues as diverse as organized labor and the environment.
Clinton was greeted with cheers louder than Lieberman received from the audience, and the words “Four More Years” were clearly audible in the crowd.
Lieberman wasn’t nearly as deferential to Lamont as Clinton was. “My opponent is peddling what I would call a big lie, and that is I’m not a real Democrat,” he said.
Etc. Clinton’s appearance comes at a delicate time. Lieberman remains under fire from the Democratic party’s left wing which seems to want to make a political example of him to underscore their belief that to win Democrats need to accentuate differences between the two parties. Meanwhile, some Connecticut Democrats are concerned that a Lieberman loss in the primary will hurt Democratic candidates.
Why is Clinton REALLY campaigning for Lieberman? Colin McEnroe offers some theories in Salon:
Why is Bill Clinton stumping for the man who famously rebuked him from the floor of the Senate during Monica-gate eight years ago? Part of the reason is personal. Clinton and Lieberman have known each other nearly 40 years. They met in 1970, when both were Kennedy disciples involved in a Connecticut-wide liberal insurgency that won Lieberman a state Senate seat.
Part of the reason is selfish. Lieberman may have chastised Clinton, but he has also provided a template for the other politician in the Clinton family. Hillary Clinton has undergone a gradual but very public transformation into a kind of Bride of Lieberman, hawkish on the war, adamantly pro-Israel and tracking right on social issues. She even likes to bash video games, just like Joe.
Hillary’s politics are Joe’s politics. If Lieberman sinks, it will raise a lot of questions about the current Clinton strategy, which is really just a post-millennial version of that old-time DLC religion. When I asked Waters why she thought Clinton was coming to Connecticut, she said there were rumors in Washington that he and his wife are freaked out by the sudden progressive insurgency. The DLC is putting down a small rebellion before it spreads. Thus, Bill, the DLC’s greatest success story, will be standing alongside former DLC chairman Lieberman in Waterbury mere hours after Hillary gives the keynote speech at the DLC’s annual national convention in Denver.
What Lieberman gets from Bill Clinton, meanwhile, is obvious, at least at first glance. The liberal base of the party has turned on Lieberman with ferocity. With two weeks to go before the Aug. 8 primary, he seems to be in free fall. Lamont has a four-point lead in the latest Quinnipiac poll, a 19-point jump in six weeks. Sean Smith, Lieberman’s campaign manager, espouses the idea that “low-information” voters swing elections. Some of those folks will surely be swayed by Clinton, and make up for all the liberal votes that are bleeding away.
Perhaps a larger reason is that Clinton, of all American politicians in recent years, adhered to the “big tent” theory of politics where you try to embrace as many groups and people as you can and get them into the tent. However, key parts of the Democratic and Republican parties don’t see it entirely that way anymore.
The big tent theory of politics brings to mind a quote (which we will paraphrase here) made by President Lyndon Johnson in another context. He once said of a political foe that it was better to have him “inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in.” That priority has changed with the concept of “(political base) mobilization” politics which may explain why so many voters are polarized and “pissed off.”
On the other hand, Time’s Joe Klein gives some additional reasons why Lieberman has crossed the line for many Democrats:
There are those who believe the Senator’s unwillingness to criticize Bush has its roots in politics. “He flew too close to the sun,” said a Connecticut Democrat who believes that Lieberman played nice with the President in the hope of securing both the Democratic and the Republican nominations for Senate this year. (The G.O.P. seems intent on running a hapless benchwarmer named Alan Schlesinger for the seat.) No politician is exempt from hubris, and so there may be something to the theory.
But an almost saintly civility has always been part of Lieberman’s modus operandi. His unflappable strength in facing down extremists of both parties—on issues ranging from welfare reform to immigration, the environment, education reform and Hollywood’s frequent excesses—has been an elegant demonstration of political independence and flagrant humanity over the years. The real problem with Lieberman’s position on Iraq isn’t overweening civility, however. It is that he has abandoned his native moderation for utopian neoconservatism. His support for the invasion wasn’t reluctant, nuanced or judicious; he saw a better world coming. Before the war, he told me that he hoped Saddam’s fall would touch off a wave of democratic reform in the region. Given that the entire Middle East seems ready to collapse into chaos this summer, it might seem an appropriate time to revise or extend those remarks—to regret his naivete or defend his long-term vision or slam Bush for carelessly betraying that vision … or something. But the Senator isn’t doing that. Indeed, it sometimes seems his position is more reflexive than thoughtful. He still insists that progress is being made in Iraq. “What progress?” I asked. “There’s an elected national-unity government,” he said. “I don’t want to overstate it, but we’re beginning to reach out to the Sunni insurgency.”
Joe Lieberman is, without question, one of the finest men I’ve known in public life. I could never imagine myself voting against him. But he was profoundly wrong about the most important issue of the past five years—and now, at the very least, he has to acknowledge that there’s an elephant sitting in the pickup truck.
Will Clinton’s intervention be enough to overcome Lieberman’s hubris? What’s striking about the battle between Lieberman and his own party’s anti-war left is this: it seems highly PERSONAL now.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.