The New Republic Endorses Lieberman

[WillyBrandt]

Terrible: I used to defend this rag, since sometimes they run worthy articles (on arts, sometimes on politics, etc.) No more: it sucks.

It's at www.tnr.com

(Joe's ugly mug smack in the center)

Quoth:

"The deep irony of Lieberman's campaign is that many Democrats view him as timid. But how much courage does it take for Dean to throw red meat to the party faithful? The Democratic Party is racing back to the '80s, with interest groups enforcing litmus tests on everything from partial-birth abortion to steel tariffs, and party activists dangerously out of touch with a country that feels threatened by terrorism, not Donald Rumsfeld."

Missing the point entirely. It takes bravery to stand up to pro-war, pro-Bush propaganda, to a right-wing media. It takes bravery to not cower before the Right, to be proud to be a Democrat--to proclaim it as such. The candidate is supposed to be willing to challenge us, sure, but he cannot only do that: HE MUST BE OUR CHAMPION. Clinton, whatever his faults, wasn't always a champion of the liberal faction of the party--but he was the party's champion.

Clark is a new Democrat, and he would be a champion of our party. Likewise Dean. Likewise Edwards, Sharpton, Kucinich, Edwards, Braun, Gephardt.

Joe Lieberman is no one's champion. Except, perhaps, for The New Republic.

(In fairness, the other pro-other-candidate articles are basically quite good. The pro-Dean one is especially good; Johnathan Cohn is a very good writer. Those are worth checking out)

[saltpoint]

1. When I saw this post in the Forums --

-- I thought it was a joke. When I found out that the New Republic is actually endorsing Lieberman, I veered somewhere in between thinking they have a constitutional right to their opinion and the fact that they're crazy as hell.

But I'm leaning strongly toward "crazy as hell."

[sonias]

2. I vote "crazy as hell" too

I like New Republic but no way in hell does this make sense to me.

Sonia

[Jack Rabbit]

3. I read TNR when I was in college

There was a unjustified war in those days, too; then, TNR proudly supported anti-war candidates.

[The Zanti Regent]

4. Henry Wallace spins in his grave.

When he edited the New Republic, it stood for something.

Now thanks to whores like Andy Sullivan, Glass, and their ilk it has mutated into the NEW REPUBLIKKKAN

[pscot]

5. This is about Israel

N/T

[Catfish]

7. Yes

and it seems fairly predictable to me.

[Demeter]

6. Timid? No. How about anti-democratic?

Lieberman would put us further down the path to totalitarianism, exactly where Perle and Frum and Bushco are leading us.