...Senator Lieberman decided to play "fluffer" for the Republican leadership and Bush with his statement today in the New York Daily News that he has flip-flopped on Bolton and would now support his confirmation as US Ambassador to the UN.

Lieberman knows that after the next election, when there is a lame duck session of Congress called, all of the controls on party discipline come off.

Some Senators will be on their way out -- some will be planning to move in. While Lieberman might vote for Bolton in a new game plan, several Republican Senators are so irritated by the confirmation that has been kicked to near death twice that they won't save it and may even kick it to definitive death to help reach out to progressives they may need to "kiss and make up to" after the election.

Lieberman just used a false stilt to prop himself up before some of Connecticut's pugnacious isolationist Republicans....

I have hesitated pounding too hard on Senator Lieberman who has been a great advocate of advanced technology development in this country and has been (until the Iraq war) a generally sensible voice on national security issues -- particularly at home. But to quote George Soros, "Lieberman has gone off the rails."

posted by tparty at 9:33 AM