You keep out-doing yourself! Another excellent, thought-provoking essay! You are not sappy. You are a man with a strong moral compass. If you get a free moment (ha, ha), read Martin Pengelly's piece published On March 24th by Guardian US.
I’ll add a little molecule to what you already said—
The GOP establishment may have feared Palin, but in the public sense, she was picked by the establishment. This made it possible for people like my mom— a lifelong conservative— to accept Palin. My parents were very establishment, but didn’t like McCain. My mom was VERY enthusiastic about Palin.
I think the elevation of Palin made it possible for “low information voter” establishment conservatives like my mom to embrace a demagogue without feeling like they had gone against the party. I suspect a lot of people shifted in this psychological way.
And Andrew Johnson, southern Democrat that he was, promptly proceeded after Lincoln's death to do his best to undermine everything the Union had fought for in the Civil War - JFK's ghostwriter of "Profiles in Courage" was very wrong in citing the Republican Senator whose vote against impeaching Johnson saved the scumbag. Bringing on a "unity ticket" with a Southern white supremacist was Lincoln's most stupid act of his presidency.
Probably correct about the 2008 outcome (would have been the same, (which I'm glad of 'cause I think it's important that Obama was Pres.). And I think quite correct about the role Palin played. I still recall one 2008 Time article referring to her speeches as "a full-throated roar of cultural resentment" which I believe was a direct precursor to the Tea Party movement & its later morph into MAGA.
I like both of them and thought both of them were good senators. But I'm a contrarian thinker. Like McCain or not he was an independent thinker and a rebel We don't have enough of those. As someone else said Palin was a lightweight I thought, at the time, she was an excellent pick because of the evangelicals I don't believe Lieberman on the thicket would have changed much But it might have changed the future. The thought of Palin as president scares me almost as much as Trump again..
Interesting take. A few random things come to mind. 1) McCain/Lieberman certainly would have created a very different dynamic for that race, even though Obama still probably would have won. 2) Palin would not talk to the media during the race, then went on to a gig at Fox News (to your point, before this was a thing to do). 3) Also, as I heard a lot at the time, his Jewish Orthodoxy caused some issues/discussions. I remember hearing news commentators who did not seem to know how to deal with that.
I think McCain made the right call not picking Lieberman. There was a subsection of the party that never trusted McCain to begin with and they would've flipped had he picked Lieberman.
Why should Republicans elect a man in his 70s with a history of health problems, when the next person up was a Democrat?
Lieberman was also not a good pick for Gore in 2000. He did poorly in his debate against Cheney and his selection felt like Gore continuing to try and run from the Clinton years, which was stupid, since Clinton was a very popular incumbent.
Obviously Palin was a horrific pick, but if I was McCain, I would've picked Mike Huckabee. He was a two-term governor so he had executive experience, he vastly outperformed expectations in the primary, he was really good at doing the "awww shucks" shtick and he could appeal to the evangelical side of the party wary of McCain.
While I appreciate your perspective, Chris, and your thinking about the “what ifs”, I find it hard to think positively about Lieberman.
Let’s not forget that it’s generally acknowledged that he led the effort to keep a “public option” out of the ACA, and for that alone, I shed no tears for him. How many (potentially) millions of Americans in how many red states do not have health care now because there was no governmental force to moderate the costs in an essentially private corporation run health insurance industry? How many (potentially) millions of Americans could have had Medicare at 55 if not for his efforts? I firmly believe that the ACA would have passed even with these measures in the legislation.
I will not speak ill of the dead, but I will not concern myself with the “woulda shoulda coulda” with Lieberman.
John Mc Cain was definitely a contender…until he agreed to have Palin on the ticket. She was so dreadful as a candidate, a cartoonishly dumb and stridently awful pick, that many who were on the fence between McCain and Obama found it very easy to choose Obama. Palin called McCain’s judgment into serious question. Lieberman was by no means a perfect VP pick, but he would have brought McCain closer to victory, or possibly sealed the deal. Palin was the beginning of the end for actual Republicans, and made it much easier for Republican voters to accept a President Trump.
Ah, 2008 - the year most people found out the governor of Alaska was clearly not a capable person, while some decided that was exactly what they wanted in office, a reality TV politician. I mean that is what both Trump and Palin share, though Palin picked up the reality TV stuff after office (and it has kept her somehow relevant).
Apart from the not-VP thing, the biggest Lieberman political story was his out-there embrace of the Republican candidate in the 2008 race…and what happened next. He endorsed McCain, campaigned for him, and spoke at the Republican convention (exclamation points next to each). A stunning display of political disloyalty in our partisan times (not a criticism, just an observation). Then when Obama won, the “Trumpy“ response might have been to exile the disloyal Lieberman to the metaphorical “cellar” of the Senate. But Obama and democratic majority leader Harry Reid magnanimously allowed Lieberman to retain his important Homeland Security committee chairmanship. And Lieberman gave them their critical 60th AHA (Obamacare) vote a year later. Which he probably WOULDN’T have done if he’d been exiled. A tribute to the skill, mental health and generosity of Obama and Reid
We’ll never know, but personally I think you are misreading things with respect to Palin. Say Obama defeats McCain-Lieberman in 2008. The Tea Party movement still happens circa 2009. Palin was a rising star in the party whose moment in the sun came before she was ready for it. If she hadn’t been on the losing ticket in 2008, but instead kept building her political chops, maybe she would have been the nominee in 2012 (because Romney would have been too similar to the losing McCain-Lieberman ticket), and maybe she would have won.
Although Sarah Palin "paved the way for Donald Trump" absent her being McCain's (rather desperate) VP pick, all the elements for Trump and Trumpism were percolating since the 90's.
The much more critical "paving the way" for Trump was Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh.
Newt brought no-holds-barred scorched Earth politics to the GOP. Shamefully demagogic which he felt no shame, but rather purposely used it to advance his lust for power.
Rush Limbaugh, the bombastic liar, racist, bigot and master demagogue, was THE precursor to Trump relishing being a sociopath, and perfecting the politics of destruction via constant smears, character assignation and vicious bigotry.
Rush also showed Trump the way to his cult, with Rush's listeners kneeling at the alter of Rush calling themselves "Dittoheads".
Trump never had an original idea in his life.
All he did was combine the take-no-prisoners, compromise is a dirty word politics of Newt, and the viscous, hate filled bigoted demagoguery of Rush and put them on steroids.
As a person he mostly has my respect. He had a moral center that was admirable (if not one I necessarily always agreed with). He was a principled man in politics, and that should always be valued.
On the other hand, he single-handedly prevented the most important health care legislation since Medicare to be MUCH more effective than it is.
Joe Lieberman, was the ONLY Non-GOP-aye Senate vote that prevented the "public option" to be included with the ACA. That single feature would have made the ACA exponentially better and possibly paved the way for voluntary single payer system.
In addition the other (there were many other) critical feature that he prevented from being included (if the Senate adopted more of what the House DID pass and could have made it through reconciling the two versions, Senate & House...but was prevented from including anything from the House version when Ted Kennedy died) was the formation of a national exchange, and instead resulted in the patchwork system of each state supplying their own state-based insurance exchange.
That led to red states with much less robust marketplace for insurance and in many instances these red states did everything they could to sabotage the success of the law.
Him caucusing with the Democrats was a mostly a joke as his being an "independent" was a scam. Joe not only endorsed Republican John McCain in the 2008 election vs then Sen Obama, he was supposed to be McCain's VP pick, only prevented by the uproar within the hard right anti-abortion ideologues that would not stand for any GOP candidate that did not toe their strict anti-abortion Shibboleth.
He continued his right wing GOP instincts after he retired (thankfully) with this support (and founding chairman) of the absurd "No Labels" fake independent party that was nothing more than posing as "centrist" but in reality was GOP-Lite.
So, RIP Joe.
My memory of you political career is bitter as you did more damage than good.
You keep out-doing yourself! Another excellent, thought-provoking essay! You are not sappy. You are a man with a strong moral compass. If you get a free moment (ha, ha), read Martin Pengelly's piece published On March 24th by Guardian US.
I’ll add a little molecule to what you already said—
The GOP establishment may have feared Palin, but in the public sense, she was picked by the establishment. This made it possible for people like my mom— a lifelong conservative— to accept Palin. My parents were very establishment, but didn’t like McCain. My mom was VERY enthusiastic about Palin.
I think the elevation of Palin made it possible for “low information voter” establishment conservatives like my mom to embrace a demagogue without feeling like they had gone against the party. I suspect a lot of people shifted in this psychological way.
And Andrew Johnson, southern Democrat that he was, promptly proceeded after Lincoln's death to do his best to undermine everything the Union had fought for in the Civil War - JFK's ghostwriter of "Profiles in Courage" was very wrong in citing the Republican Senator whose vote against impeaching Johnson saved the scumbag. Bringing on a "unity ticket" with a Southern white supremacist was Lincoln's most stupid act of his presidency.
Probably correct about the 2008 outcome (would have been the same, (which I'm glad of 'cause I think it's important that Obama was Pres.). And I think quite correct about the role Palin played. I still recall one 2008 Time article referring to her speeches as "a full-throated roar of cultural resentment" which I believe was a direct precursor to the Tea Party movement & its later morph into MAGA.
I like both of them and thought both of them were good senators. But I'm a contrarian thinker. Like McCain or not he was an independent thinker and a rebel We don't have enough of those. As someone else said Palin was a lightweight I thought, at the time, she was an excellent pick because of the evangelicals I don't believe Lieberman on the thicket would have changed much But it might have changed the future. The thought of Palin as president scares me almost as much as Trump again..
Interesting take. A few random things come to mind. 1) McCain/Lieberman certainly would have created a very different dynamic for that race, even though Obama still probably would have won. 2) Palin would not talk to the media during the race, then went on to a gig at Fox News (to your point, before this was a thing to do). 3) Also, as I heard a lot at the time, his Jewish Orthodoxy caused some issues/discussions. I remember hearing news commentators who did not seem to know how to deal with that.
I think McCain made the right call not picking Lieberman. There was a subsection of the party that never trusted McCain to begin with and they would've flipped had he picked Lieberman.
Why should Republicans elect a man in his 70s with a history of health problems, when the next person up was a Democrat?
Lieberman was also not a good pick for Gore in 2000. He did poorly in his debate against Cheney and his selection felt like Gore continuing to try and run from the Clinton years, which was stupid, since Clinton was a very popular incumbent.
Obviously Palin was a horrific pick, but if I was McCain, I would've picked Mike Huckabee. He was a two-term governor so he had executive experience, he vastly outperformed expectations in the primary, he was really good at doing the "awww shucks" shtick and he could appeal to the evangelical side of the party wary of McCain.
They would've lost anyway though.
While I appreciate your perspective, Chris, and your thinking about the “what ifs”, I find it hard to think positively about Lieberman.
Let’s not forget that it’s generally acknowledged that he led the effort to keep a “public option” out of the ACA, and for that alone, I shed no tears for him. How many (potentially) millions of Americans in how many red states do not have health care now because there was no governmental force to moderate the costs in an essentially private corporation run health insurance industry? How many (potentially) millions of Americans could have had Medicare at 55 if not for his efforts? I firmly believe that the ACA would have passed even with these measures in the legislation.
I will not speak ill of the dead, but I will not concern myself with the “woulda shoulda coulda” with Lieberman.
John Mc Cain was definitely a contender…until he agreed to have Palin on the ticket. She was so dreadful as a candidate, a cartoonishly dumb and stridently awful pick, that many who were on the fence between McCain and Obama found it very easy to choose Obama. Palin called McCain’s judgment into serious question. Lieberman was by no means a perfect VP pick, but he would have brought McCain closer to victory, or possibly sealed the deal. Palin was the beginning of the end for actual Republicans, and made it much easier for Republican voters to accept a President Trump.
Ah, 2008 - the year most people found out the governor of Alaska was clearly not a capable person, while some decided that was exactly what they wanted in office, a reality TV politician. I mean that is what both Trump and Palin share, though Palin picked up the reality TV stuff after office (and it has kept her somehow relevant).
Apart from the not-VP thing, the biggest Lieberman political story was his out-there embrace of the Republican candidate in the 2008 race…and what happened next. He endorsed McCain, campaigned for him, and spoke at the Republican convention (exclamation points next to each). A stunning display of political disloyalty in our partisan times (not a criticism, just an observation). Then when Obama won, the “Trumpy“ response might have been to exile the disloyal Lieberman to the metaphorical “cellar” of the Senate. But Obama and democratic majority leader Harry Reid magnanimously allowed Lieberman to retain his important Homeland Security committee chairmanship. And Lieberman gave them their critical 60th AHA (Obamacare) vote a year later. Which he probably WOULDN’T have done if he’d been exiled. A tribute to the skill, mental health and generosity of Obama and Reid
An interesting--and fair, IMHO--thought exercise!
We’ll never know, but personally I think you are misreading things with respect to Palin. Say Obama defeats McCain-Lieberman in 2008. The Tea Party movement still happens circa 2009. Palin was a rising star in the party whose moment in the sun came before she was ready for it. If she hadn’t been on the losing ticket in 2008, but instead kept building her political chops, maybe she would have been the nominee in 2012 (because Romney would have been too similar to the losing McCain-Lieberman ticket), and maybe she would have won.
Very thought-provoking. Could make a great alternate history experiment in fiction or film!
Although Sarah Palin "paved the way for Donald Trump" absent her being McCain's (rather desperate) VP pick, all the elements for Trump and Trumpism were percolating since the 90's.
The much more critical "paving the way" for Trump was Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh.
Newt brought no-holds-barred scorched Earth politics to the GOP. Shamefully demagogic which he felt no shame, but rather purposely used it to advance his lust for power.
Rush Limbaugh, the bombastic liar, racist, bigot and master demagogue, was THE precursor to Trump relishing being a sociopath, and perfecting the politics of destruction via constant smears, character assignation and vicious bigotry.
Rush also showed Trump the way to his cult, with Rush's listeners kneeling at the alter of Rush calling themselves "Dittoheads".
Trump never had an original idea in his life.
All he did was combine the take-no-prisoners, compromise is a dirty word politics of Newt, and the viscous, hate filled bigoted demagoguery of Rush and put them on steroids.
I have mixed feelings about Joe Lieberman.
As a person he mostly has my respect. He had a moral center that was admirable (if not one I necessarily always agreed with). He was a principled man in politics, and that should always be valued.
On the other hand, he single-handedly prevented the most important health care legislation since Medicare to be MUCH more effective than it is.
Joe Lieberman, was the ONLY Non-GOP-aye Senate vote that prevented the "public option" to be included with the ACA. That single feature would have made the ACA exponentially better and possibly paved the way for voluntary single payer system.
In addition the other (there were many other) critical feature that he prevented from being included (if the Senate adopted more of what the House DID pass and could have made it through reconciling the two versions, Senate & House...but was prevented from including anything from the House version when Ted Kennedy died) was the formation of a national exchange, and instead resulted in the patchwork system of each state supplying their own state-based insurance exchange.
That led to red states with much less robust marketplace for insurance and in many instances these red states did everything they could to sabotage the success of the law.
Him caucusing with the Democrats was a mostly a joke as his being an "independent" was a scam. Joe not only endorsed Republican John McCain in the 2008 election vs then Sen Obama, he was supposed to be McCain's VP pick, only prevented by the uproar within the hard right anti-abortion ideologues that would not stand for any GOP candidate that did not toe their strict anti-abortion Shibboleth.
He continued his right wing GOP instincts after he retired (thankfully) with this support (and founding chairman) of the absurd "No Labels" fake independent party that was nothing more than posing as "centrist" but in reality was GOP-Lite.
So, RIP Joe.
My memory of you political career is bitter as you did more damage than good.