Joe's loss

Though Ned Lamont won yesterday's primary, I'm not quite ready to compose Joe Leiberman's political eulogy. Joe's competing in the general election this November, and with 49 percent of CT Democrats already supporting him, I expect Joe to prosper now that the candidates can run to the middle, which is what always happens after the primaries conclude.

Meantime, I would like to make two points - one positive and one negative - about my friends and colleagues in the liberal blogosphere.

First the good. Most of my liberal friends hate Joe Leiberman. Still, despite all the nasty things bloggers have been saying about Joe, I saw no anti-Semitism. It sure must have been tempting, though. Liberal criticism of Leiberman focuses on his unreflective support for the war in Iraq. It would have been too easy for a snarky blogger to say that Joe only wanted the war in Iraq because it would help Israel - and perhaps some of the small fry leveled those types of accusations - but I never saw anything ugly from the big boys.

Now the bad. Joe lost yesterday because he failed a litmus test. Despite being a reliable vote on what liberals care about-defending the right to abortion, fighting oil drilling in the Alaskan Arctic, raising the minimum wage- CT's rank and file tossed him overboard for being insufficently anti-war. I don't like one-issue politics. I don't vote for terrible candiates simply because they support Israel, and I would not have agitated or voted or against a successful Senator who made one bad decision.