Joseph Lieberman's Astounding Hypocrisy

As mentioned in this space a few weeks back, the Democrats are poised to capitalize on the GOP-fatigue currently pervading the country in the Fall, and pick up at least 5 Senate seats, thereby increasing their presently razor-thin margin.

The nearly ubiquitous disdain for Lieberman amongst the Democrats is well known, but it has intensified particularly in recent months as he has slandered Barack Obama and castigated those who oppose the surge as myopic, and even patriotic.

Also in the last column, I discussed the likelihood being high that one of the foremost duties of the new Senate leadership would be to vitiate the presence of Joseph Lieberman in committee chairmanships. One group, funded by filmmaker Robert Greenwald, has attempted to hasten said departure with the release last week of their new website: www.liebermanmustgo.com.

The site is amusing, and spot on in its critiques of Lieberman as a fringe right figure when it comes to foreign policy issues, particularly those involving his beloved protectorate, Israel.

But, this column is centered on Lieberman's subsequent response to the website, and what it exposes about the blatant hypocrisy that imbues many of the Connecticut Senator's statements.

When asked to respond, Lieberman said:

"I think most people in this country are really tired of this kind of partisan politicking."

Such a laudable and beneficent statement from Lieberman. If only he wasn't exhibiting the apotheosis of hypocrisy in stating it. Going by the accepted definition of partisan, instead we see that Lieberman exemplifies the very tactic that he so decries in the statement above.

Unsurprisingly, multiple incidents involving Lieberman shows that he typifies the definition of a thoroughly partisan figure.

According to Dictionary.com, a partisan is: "A fervent, sometimes militant supporter or proponent of a party, cause, faction, person, or idea."

Unsurprisingly, multiple incidents involving Lieberman shows that he typifies the definition of a thoroughly partisan figure.

For example, when MoveOn.org featured a full page advertisement in the NY Times giving David Petreaus the pejorative sobriquet of "David Betray-us", Lieberman responded with this fusillade of indignation, most of which directed at politicians from the Democratic party who had nothing to do with the ad:

"The Personal Attack On Gen. David Petraeus Launched Today By Moveon.org Is An Outrageous And Despicable Act Of Slander That Every Member Of The Congress -- Democrat And Republican-- Has a solemn responsibility to condemn."

His ludicrous insinuation that members of the party with whom he caucuses have any sort of obligation to repudiate an advertisement that has nothing to do with them is the epitome of "partisan", as it illustrates Lieberman's overly fervent devotion to an idea. Lieberman has for months endorsed Petraeus as the Army's savior in Iraq, and as a result, he is forced to "respond" when an attack is lobbied forth against the general. In becoming inordinately obsessed with a tangential statement by a PAC, instead of the litany of policy failures that confront the U.S. military in Iraq quotidian, Lieberman reveals his true colors and shows himself to be militantly obsessed with a person, or idea.....the very definition of partisan.

More over, Lieberman has recently showed an insidious proclivity for "partisan" politics as he attempts to convey his Draconian, uncompromising stance vis a vis the "War on Terror", he attempted to distort Barack Obama's position on the surge with a statement that, at the very least, strains credulity, and at the worst, is malicious slander:

"If we did what Sen. Obama wanted us to do last year, Al-Qaeda in Iran would be in control of Iraq today. The whole Middle East would be in turmoil and American security and credibility would be jeopardized."

Even ignoring his incalculable misunderstanding of the facts on the ground in the Middle East (Al-Qaeda is a Sunni group, and would never associate with who they consider to be apostates in the Iranian regime), this statement is a vivid portrayal of Lieberman’s frequent attempts to fear monger and spread lies about Barack Obama’s campaign, a person who, again, he caucuses with in the Senate. In his deliberate, borderline salacious perversion of the facts, Lieberman again reveals his true allegiances; they are to his ideology, no matter how diametrically opposed that may be to the situation in praxis. By doing so, he yet again serves as a nauseating personification of a partisan politician, in that his allegiance to an idea, or particular policy, supercede that of the reality. As the two examples above starkly lay out, Lieberman's dismissal of Robert Greenwald's website as "yet another example of partisan politicking" was the height of hypocrisy. Before he departs from the Democratic radar scene hopefully forever, Lieberman can evince his unabated support to the militaristic policy that has stained the United States perception in the Middle East, cost thousands of lives and siphoned billions of dollars from what was a relatively stable economy.

But at the very least, he could do us a favor and not insult the polity's intelligence with the blatant hypocrisy he spewed out a few days ago.