A close examination of hundreds of Mr. Lieberman’s statements on Iraq over the past five years shows that while he repeatedly praised President Bush, he was far more likely to criticize him. But those critiques dropped off markedly in the last two years, even as the insurgency in Iraq gained strength.

At the same time, Mr. Lieberman made negative comments about fellow Democrats three times as often as he made positive comments, particularly after his failed campaign for his party’s presidential nomination in 2004.

Near the end of this year’s primary, Mr. Lieberman ramped up his criticism of the Bush administration’s handling of the war, and soon after his loss, called for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to resign. More recently he has called for “bringing the troops home.” Yet he continues to strongly oppose setting a timetable for withdrawal, echoing the position of the White House.

Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman and his main rival, Democrat Ned Lamont, stood toe to toe as the live WTNH, Channel 8, television broadcast ended, continuing to argue about the veracity of their multimillion-dollar advertising campaigns.

"I don't think much of his ads, and he doesn't think much of my ads," Lamont said, when asked to recount their tete-a-tete. Lieberman's staff called it a private conversation....

Lamont, who appeared reticent in previous debates, moved comfortably about the stage wearing his wireless microphone in a cumulative time format in which the candidates could use their time however they saw fit.

Lieberman ignored the format and gave a three-minute opening statement in response to the opening question on Iraq.

"So much for no opening statement," said the moderator, ABC newsman George Stephanopoulos....

"You constantly distort and, frankly, just tell lies," Lieberman said.

His comment set off boos, catcalls and the first round of singing by hecklers.

"Whoa. Whoa. Whoa," Stephanopoulos said, calling for order. When Lieberman finished, Stephanopoulos called for a new question, but Lamont got to his feet and took a few quick steps to Lieberman.

"Sen. Lieberman just called me a liar, and he made a lot of outrageous accusations," Lamont said, facing Lieberman. "Senator, everything we are talking about is your record."

Lieberman eventually continued, charging Lamont with distorting his past positions: “No matter how much you distort my record, they're not buying it,” he said, referring to the state's voters.

That seemed to get a rise out of Lamont, who has contributed roughly $12 million of his own fortune to his campaign to topple Lieberman, a challenge largely generated by what he has described as Lieberman's unwavering support of the war in Iraq and of the Bush administration's foreign policy.

“Senator, everything we're talking about is your record,” Lamont snapped. “You can't run from your record.”...

And as in previous exchanges, Lieberman said Lamont's vision for the country was “a recipe for defeat and disaster.”

Lamont's retort was just as firm.

When opponents of the Iraq war protest the current policy, Lamont said, “it's Senator Lieberman who questions their motives, suggests they're negative, suggests they're partisan, suggests they're undermining the credibility of the president. ... Joe Lieberman and George Bush's stay-the-course strategy - that's the recipe for failure.”

“I spent a lot of my life in telecommunications,” said Mr. Lamont, a cable executive from Greenwich, Conn., “and let me tell you, if you really want to connect the dots for Mohamed Atta and if you want to put together a trail between e-mails, domestic immigration and other consumer databases, we can do that. We also need checks and balances.”

Mr. Lieberman criticized Mr. Lamont, who has said he would have supported a resolution in the Senate to set a deadline for troop withdrawal, for having a plan that was a “recipe for failure and disaster.”

Mr. Lamont, who has hammered at Mr. Lieberman for his support of the war, said, “Only Senator Lieberman thinks having 140,000 of our brave troops stuck in a bloody civil war in Iraq is making America safer in dealing with terrorism.”

But it was Mr. Schlesinger who again seemed to grab the spotlight, with zingers on subjects from campaign finance to stemming illegal immigrants.

New London - If the election were decided by the size and spectacle of the demonstration, Democrat Ned Lamont would have been chosen, by loud acclaim, the state's new senator by the crowd outside the Garde Arts Center tonight.

Accompanied by two giant papier-mâché heads, of President George W. Bush's infamous state-of-the-union peck on the cheek of Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman and the martial airs of the Scotch On The Rocks bagpipe band, more than 300 fans of Lamont packed the entrance to the theater.

There were also fans of Lieberman, a knot of about a dozen New London firefighters and another half dozen Young Republicans from Quinnipiac University....

“My biggest problem is the war,” said Eleanor Susan LaPlace of Old Saybrook. “I'm tired of us spending money on that war. We're going to end with a political settlement anyway, so just stop bombing and work for a political solution.”

Asked why she supported Lamont, Mary Fisher of Madison said, “Number one, he has honesty and integrity, and I think that's so lacking in Washington. Number two, of course, is the war in Iraq. Lieberman has supported this war all along, even though his constituents have said we don't want this.”

And that was the other major complaint of Lamont supporters: That Lieberman has become a puppet of the Bush administration and no longer listens to his constituents.

“I became very unhappy with Mr. Lieberman many years ago, wrote him many letters asking him why don't you stand up for this, why don't you stand up for that, and I don't even get so much as a form letter saying thank you for wasting your time, we'll get back to you some day,” said Ken Gucker of Danbury. “His lack of concern about the people is just disheartening.”

That’s why he doesn’t want to “pull out of Iraq” without a clear victory, Lieberman said – he worries that doing so would encourage terrorists. “I’ve traveled to just about Arab country except Iran” and learned the importance of this issue, Lieberman said.

When his turn came, Lamont (shown immediately after the debate) didn’t mention that Iran is not an Arab country. But he did characterize continuing the U.S. war in Iraq war as the problem, not the solution.