REACT: Senator Lieberman Defeat Good for Conservatives

The strident America-is-always-wrong anti-war movement is salivating over the defeat of Senator Joseph Lieberman in the Democrat primary. And well they should. They focused their national resources on the myopic effort to make Iraq the deciding issue, and to demonize Lieberman for a modicum of independent thinking. It was their intent to send a message to the donkey party – that the extreme left as heft.

They now have bragging rights in claiming that the neo-libs have more influence in the Democrat party than they did a few weeks ago. I agree. I am thrilled with the outcome. But, if I am thrilled, shouldn’t the lefties be less than thrilled?

The praising press, the pleased pundits and the pat-themselves-on-the-back partisans seem to have forgotten that they only won a PRIMARY. All that talk about what message the “public” is sending is bad or biased analysis. It is only a fraction of a faction that brought about the Lieberman primary defeat. It appears at this moment that Lieberman will prevail in the general election among the broader range of voters not shackled to the politics of the fuzzy-headed fringe. The tactics of moveon.org and the tens of millions of dollars being spread around on every anti-American cause by gazillionaire George Soros will not be nearly as effective in November.

Since the Dems need to move to the right to get more traction with the public majority if they are to again become the governing party, the Lieberman outcome is good news for the GOP. The more the Dems look like the party of Kerry, Kennedy, Durbin, and Dean, the more they marginalize themselves. Even Hilary Clinton is starting to look like a moderate in the neo-lib dominated party.

Right now, the public is giving the Republicans the equivalent of a spanking in the popularity polls. It is not at all assured that they are ready to throw them out of the house. This would not be the first time the media reported a grim future for the GOP only to have the voters prove them wrong. In fact, that is almost become an American election tradition. The problem with media bias is that it tends to produce wishful thinking as opposed to clear-headed reporting. (Remember when they predicted a big GOP loss in the House and Senate, and the pachyderm party actually made gains in both. And, of course, they virtually gave John Kerry the 2004 election, only to have to curb their enthusiasm as George Bush and Company rolled to a convincing victory.)

I think the public will eventually go with the American vision of George Bush over the very un-American vision George Soros. I suspect mainstream American will trump moveon.org, as has been the case in the past. Perhaps, moveon.org should do just that.