Gah, I hate the stupid conservative buzzphrase "strictly interpret the Constitution." It has no literal meaning.

Rusty Shackleford @ 1:

Gah, I hate the stupid conservative buzzphrase "strictly interpret the Constitution." It has no literal meaning.

Because it's not meant for the literati.

and joe LIEberman is the chairman of the homeland security and governmental affairs...

ummm why?

the dems are going to have a hard time convincing anyone they are not easily pushed as long as they continue to give LIEberman a slow handjob. shut this douchebag out.

Holy Joe purportedly will be named Secy of State should McShame be elected. And we thought Kindasleazy was as bad as it gets. We ain't seen nothin' yet.

Dear Connecticut Democratic Party,

No fucking DUH.

Just can it. You're as disingenuous as Lieberman if you expect us to believe his rancid behavior comes to you as a shock.

Proud2bHumble @ 3:

Rusty Shackleford @ 1:

Gah, I hate the stupid conservative buzzphrase "strictly interpret the Constitution." It has no literal meaning.

Because it's not meant for the literati.

Not to mention they do the exact opposite at every opportunity. Can make a feller crazy just thinking about the (ever-dwindling) bobble-heads around the country nodding their heads is sheep-like approval every time a conservative starts in with this ridiculous talking point.

I've heard rumours floating around that he plans to participate in the Repub convention if McCain gets the nod.

I can so totally see it.

Perhaps it's time to escalate those "choice words" to "harsh words"?

Would strict interpretation of the Constitution (which I believe is a "living document') allow for any inherent powers of the presidency?

Joe is a prime example of Obama's unity.

John McCain The Myth of a Maverick

McCain: The Myth of a Maverick by Matt Welch

· "The Myth of a Maverick": Matt Welch on GOP Frontrunner John McCain
Ahead of Super Tuesday, Senator John McCain is leading Republican polls, a significant comeback for a campaign that appeared expired just six months ago. We speak to Reason Magazine editor Matt Welch, author of McCain: The Myth of a Maverick.

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to John McCain. Voters head to the polls in twenty-four states tomorrow in what’s being dubbed “Super Duper Tuesday,” the biggest one-day White House nominating contest in history. Hillary Clinton is locked in a dead heat with Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination. On the Republican side, Senator John McCain is ahead in nationwide polls and is considered to be the GOP frontrunner. His lead marks a significant comeback for a campaign that appeared expired just six months ago.

Matt Welch is editor-in-chief of the libertarian Reason magazine. He’s a former editor at the Los Angeles Times. He has written extensively on John McCain and the author of a new book called McCain: the Myth of a Maverick. He joins us now from Washington, D.C. Welcome, Matt.

MATT WELCH: Thanks much for having me, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s good to have you with us. Well, why don’t we just go back to the beginning with John McCain? He comes out of military royalty, as they say. Give us a background on John McCain’s family.

MATT WELCH: John McCain—his grandfather and father were the second-ever father-son four-star admirals in the US Navy. One of the interesting things that I found out in the course of researching my book was that the first-ever father-son admirals in the US Navy were my own great-great-grandfather and his son, strangely enough, and they both commanded people named John Sidney McCain. He comes not only on his father’s side, obviously, from this military background, but I believe his grandmother’s side, as well. In one of his many books that he has written, he talks about how, if anything, his grandmother’s side was more martial and war-making than even on his father’s side. He’s basically participated—some McCains have participated in every military conflict in United States history, except for maybe the first Gulf War. And right now, he has two sons who are in the military, including one who’s deployed in Iraq, if I have my story straight these days.

AMY GOODMAN: In addition to being in Vietnam, his father was also—was part of the invasion of the Dominican Republic, is that right, in 1965?

MATT WELCH: He led the invasion of the Dominican Republic. His grandfather—the McCains historically had been in the Army. There was Wild Bill McCain, who was, you know, chasing Mexican bandits along the border. But then his grandfather went into the Navy right as Teddy Roosevelt was building it from, you know, a couple of tugboats into the Great White Fleet and was expanding it greatly and using it as a forward thrust of American power under the influence of Alfred Thayer Mahan, his book of the role of sea power in world history. And it became a sort of a model based on British colonialism of how a navy can guarantee the world—you know, make the world safe for democracy and bring fruits upon the empire who takes it out there.

So his grandfather was—you know, he was fighting the Philippine insurrection at the turn of the century, which was a fairly controversial conflict, and then fought in World War II with distinction. And then his father was actually the commander of all US forces in Vietnam for a couple of years there, including when John McCain, himself, was a prisoner of war.

John McCain, being the third generation here with a lot of expectations on him, rebelled against those expectations. He finished near the bottom of his class, 894th out of 899 at the Naval Academy in Annapolis. And he was a real sort of maverick in the kind of Top Gun way, always getting into trouble, sneaking off to drink beer and smoke cigarettes and date strippers and had a pretty colorful kind of straining-at-the-leash type of life, because he knew he didn’t really have a choice but to fulfill his sort of family’s destiny.

And he became a flyboy in the Navy and was involved in one of the worst—and in fact, I think the worst—Navy sort of tragedy after World War II, which was the Forrestal fire in Vietnam, which killed 130-plus men. He tumbled off the nose of his airplane as it was sort of exploding on the deck of this aircraft carrier in Vietnam. And then on his—I believe his fifth mission was flying over Vietnam on a—Hanoi on a bombing run and was shot out of the sky and, of course, became a prisoner of war for five-and-a-half years, where he, you know, withstood torture with great bravery and distinction. He eventually cracked, like most prisoners of war do under the duress, and taped some statements, you know, disparaging his country and apologizing for his crimes, but stuck it out and then came back to the US in ’73 and became the Navy liaison to the Senate and eventually started his political career in 1982.

AMY GOODMAN: And that political career, he started in Congress?

MATT WELCH: He started in Congress. He humorously—he had divorced his first wife, married a young woman named Cindy—Cindy McCain now, Cindy Hensley. Her father was—owned the exclusive beer distributorship for Budweiser in Maricopa County in Arizona, and so was—had a lot of money. And he was shopping around basically for a congressional seat. On the day that Congressman John Rhodes announced that he was resigning—or actually even before he announced, but on the day that he decided that he was resigning from his seat, John told Cindy, you know, buy a house in the district. So he kind of moved to Arizona with the explicit idea that he would immediately run for Congress and then use that as a springboard to run for the Senate seat when Barry Goldwater retired in 1986.

And what’s very little sort of understood—one of many things that’s little understood about John McCain is that from the beginning he was spending crazy amounts of money. You know, he’s this champion of campaign finance, but he wildly outspent his opponents in Arizona time and time again, especially at the beginning of his career, with his father-in-law’s money, with money from Charles Keating and money from other people, and built up this political career and ended up going to the Senate and becoming the maverick we all know and love.

Check out the entire Democracy Now! show from February 4, 2008, and transcript @:
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/2/4/the_myth_of_a_maverick_matt

ahh luv that tune

McNero and his faithful fiddle playin the hits "Bomb Iran", "Killforus Girls", and "It Is Not Going To Shit in Iraq, B" from the album Repet Sounds.

It's gonna be something when Obama debates McCain. Liebermen will not be able to help his buddy out.

Zogby poll now has Obama ahead of Clinton in California, Missouri, Georgia and tied in New Jersey now.

What amazes me is that anyone is shocked by ANYTHING Joe says or does. It has always been about Joe, it will always be about Joe. He doesn't care about Connecticut anymore than the man-in-the moon. He is a whore--only out for himself and Haddassah.

It is a shame that Connecticut has no provisions in the state to recall him. He will continue to be a problem.

If, and this is a big if, the Democrats win the White House, a lot of us see Joe officially jumping ship to the Republican party. This is what friends of mine in Connecticut say and they are very astute.

So, reich-wingers can demand to have Conservative judges, but if a Dem suggested having librul judges, the MSM would implode with [fake] outrage. Nice double standard.

Where is the Micelle Obama video?

From Good morning America: "GMA: Could you see yourself working to support Hillary Clinton should she win the nomination?

MICHELLE OBAMA: I'd have to think about that. I'd have to think about that, her policies, her approach, her tone."

Mr. XXXX @ 21:

John McCain The Myth of a Maverick

McCain: The Myth of a Maverick by Matt Welch

· "The Myth of a Maverick": Matt Welch on GOP Frontrunner John McCain
Ahead of Super Tuesday, Senator John McCain is leading Republican polls, a significant comeback for a campaign that appeared expired just six months ago. We speak to Reason Magazine editor Matt Welch, author of McCain: The Myth of a Maverick.

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to John McCain. Voters head to the polls in twenty-four states tomorrow in what’s being dubbed “Super Duper Tuesday,” the biggest one-day White House nominating contest in history. Hillary Clinton is locked in a dead heat with Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination. On the Republican side, Senator John McCain is ahead in nationwide polls and is considered to be the GOP frontrunner. His lead marks a significant comeback for a campaign that appeared expired just six months ago.

Matt Welch is editor-in-chief of the libertarian Reason magazine. He’s a former editor at the Los Angeles Times. He has written extensively on John McCain and the author of a new book called McCain: the Myth of a Maverick. He joins us now from Washington, D.C. Welcome, Matt.

MATT WELCH: Thanks much for having me, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s good to have you with us. Well, why don’t we just go back to the beginning with John McCain? He comes out of military royalty, as they say. Give us a background on John McCain’s family.

MATT WELCH: John McCain—his grandfather and father were the second-ever father-son four-star admirals in the US Navy. One of the interesting things that I found out in the course of researching my book was that the first-ever father-son admirals in the US Navy were my own great-great-grandfather and his son, strangely enough, and they both commanded people named John Sidney McCain. He comes not only on his father’s side, obviously, from this military background, but I believe his grandmother’s side, as well. In one of his many books that he has written, he talks about how, if anything, his grandmother’s side was more martial and war-making than even on his father’s side. He’s basically participated—some McCains have participated in every military conflict in United States history, except for maybe the first Gulf War. And right now, he has two sons who are in the military, including one who’s deployed in Iraq, if I have my story straight these days.

AMY GOODMAN: In addition to being in Vietnam, his father was also—was part of the invasion of the Dominican Republic, is that right, in 1965?

MATT WELCH: He led the invasion of the Dominican Republic. His grandfather—the McCains historically had been in the Army. There was Wild Bill McCain, who was, you know, chasing Mexican bandits along the border. But then his grandfather went into the Navy right as Teddy Roosevelt was building it from, you know, a couple of tugboats into the Great White Fleet and was expanding it greatly and using it as a forward thrust of American power under the influence of Alfred Thayer Mahan, his book of the role of sea power in world history. And it became a sort of a model based on British colonialism of how a navy can guarantee the world—you know, make the world safe for democracy and bring fruits upon the empire who takes it out there.

So his grandfather was—you know, he was fighting the Philippine insurrection at the turn of the century, which was a fairly controversial conflict, and then fought in World War II with distinction. And then his father was actually the commander of all US forces in Vietnam for a couple of years there, including when John McCain, himself, was a prisoner of war.

John McCain, being the third generation here with a lot of expectations on him, rebelled against those expectations. He finished near the bottom of his class, 894th out of 899 at the Naval Academy in Annapolis. And he was a real sort of maverick in the kind of Top Gun way, always getting into trouble, sneaking off to drink beer and smoke cigarettes and date strippers and had a pretty colorful kind of straining-at-the-leash type of life, because he knew he didn’t really have a choice but to fulfill his sort of family’s destiny.

And he became a flyboy in the Navy and was involved in one of the worst—and in fact, I think the worst—Navy sort of tragedy after World War II, which was the Forrestal fire in Vietnam, which killed 130-plus men. He tumbled off the nose of his airplane as it was sort of exploding on the deck of this aircraft carrier in Vietnam. And then on his—I believe his fifth mission was flying over Vietnam on a—Hanoi on a bombing run and was shot out of the sky and, of course, became a prisoner of war for five-and-a-half years, where he, you know, withstood torture with great bravery and distinction. He eventually cracked, like most prisoners of war do under the duress, and taped some statements, you know, disparaging his country and apologizing for his crimes, but stuck it out and then came back to the US in ’73 and became the Navy liaison to the Senate and eventually started his political career in 1982.

AMY GOODMAN: And that political career, he started in Congress?

MATT WELCH: He started in Congress. He humorously—he had divorced his first wife, married a young woman named Cindy—Cindy McCain now, Cindy Hensley. Her father was—owned the exclusive beer distributorship for Budweiser in Maricopa County in Arizona, and so was—had a lot of money. And he was shopping around basically for a congressional seat. On the day that Congressman John Rhodes announced that he was resigning—or actually even before he announced, but on the day that he decided that he was resigning from his seat, John told Cindy, you know, buy a house in the district. So he kind of moved to Arizona with the explicit idea that he would immediately run for Congress and then use that as a springboard to run for the Senate seat when Barry Goldwater retired in 1986.

And what’s very little sort of understood—one of many things that’s little understood about John McCain is that from the beginning he was spending crazy amounts of money. You know, he’s this champion of campaign finance, but he wildly outspent his opponents in Arizona time and time again, especially at the beginning of his career, with his father-in-law’s money, with money from Charles Keating and money from other people, and built up this political career and ended up going to the Senate and becoming the maverick we all know and love.

Check out the entire Democracy Now! show from February 4, 2008, and transcript @:
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/2/4/the_myth_of_a_maverick_matt

Hi folks...

Excellent research...

I hope the Dems are taking notes on this....

uncle joe mccarthy @ 28:

please....had the ct dems not been so pigheaded and read the blogs, they woulda known that holy joe was full of bs

every progressive blog predicted this course....every one

yet they allowed the wingnuts to form the argument that the only reason we were against him was the war

they deserve what they got

Most CT dems (such as moi) voted for Lamont, twice. It was CT rethucks who returned Lieberturd to the senate.

and in 08. when he is stripped of all his power, they will deserve having no representation in the senate

VietVet8666 @ 35:

uncle joe mccarthy @ 28:

please....had the ct dems not been so pigheaded and read the blogs, they woulda known that holy joe was full of bs

every progressive blog predicted this course....every one

yet they allowed the wingnuts to form the argument that the only reason we were against him was the war

they deserve what they got and in 08. when he is stripped of all his power, they will deserve having no representation in the senate

Most CT dems (such as moi) voted for Lamont, twice. It was CT rethucks who returned Lieberturd to the senate.

cervantes @ 34:

I got a question - did DiNardo campaign for Ned Lamont? Lots of Democrats endorsed Lieberman in the general election, or sat on their hands. The party did not unite behind Lamont. They got what they deserved, in that sense.

DiNardo had a different view a year and half back:

Nancy DiNardo, the state Democratic chairwoman, said Lieberman gave Democrats a reason to vote him into office for another term.

"I think that it became very clear that Joe showed that he is a Democrat. He is, in fact, a candidate who can get Democrats elected in this upcoming election," she said.

Boston Globe

But don't think its fair to slam on CT democratic voters entirely for Lieberman being in office.

Oddly enough, I stopped reading Americablog after poor John A. started whining piteously about all the poor people earning above $75,000/year who wouldn't get a tax rebate (according to the way the economic stimular package stood at the time), how hard it was to live in NYC and D.C. on only 75 grand a year, etc. etc. I commented that anyone in that category should shut the fuck up and be grateful, and I see no reason to go back to Americablog's self-indulgent preening.

Atrios makes the same mistake too many times, mistaking East Coast urban life for some sort of moral paradigm. There are a lot more people than just me who need to get out more, lemme tell ya.

I'd sure like to hear Obama's reasoning for endorsing Lieberman. I've posted previously that I thought Lieberman would be a positive influence on McCain in respect to issues like judges....but on second thought, seeing as how Lieberman has backed off of everything relative to Bush (i.e., Homeland Security screwups, Katrina scandal, etd) where he had committee power, I just wonder if Lieberman will not also see his core Democratic/liberal principles down the drain in the name, of again, of "war on terror" - a code word of course for the pro-Israel PAC positions. Just as we're holding Hilary accountable for her war vote(s), I'd like to force Obama to at least explain what was going on when he endorsed Lieberman, if in fact he actually did, and if he thought he has been "double-crossed" by Lieberman, because that's what Hilary says Bush did to her over the Iraq War Resolution......interesting.

Never having voted for Lieberman is just the fucking gift that keeps on fucking giving.

I don't think it's right to put 'looks on lovingly' in the title. It implies that the senator has homosexual feelings for Mccain, and further implies that such a thing is wrong, or at least undesirable.

Lieberman is a turncoat, plain and simple.

AKA, "I will appoint traditional conservative backward motion judges so as to curtail liberty, the embrace of change and to deny the imminent evolution of American society for so-called traditional values, Amen and LeChiam"..

It's America. Joe Lieberman was trashed by his own party. I can't say I am
surprised by this conduct. I also think he is too much a tool of Israel.
But, the dems in Connecticut slammed him. I guess he figures its payback time.

Won't matter, our man Obama is going to kick everybody's a$$.

Our friend Jomentum. (can you believe he was actually a candidate for
vice president with Gore?) awesome!

His endorsement of Senator McCain means he either doesn’t care about the issues noted above, or he’s putting politics ahead of people.

No, it means that Lieberman has been a Republican agent all along.

Had Gore taken office, he would have been impeached on some trumped-up charge as Clinton was. Had he been successfully removed from office, Lieberman would have been President.

That's more or less how Huckabee got to be governor of Arkansas, when Jim Guy Tucker, who succeeded Bill Clinton as governor, was forced to resign after being convicted on a trumped-up charge in the Whitewater investigation.

Gore's failure to see that Lieberman was a Republican trojan did not speak well for him.

"Moreover, in July of 2006, Senator Lieberman even stated that he intended to work to help a Democrat get into the White House in 2008. His endorsement of Senator McCain means he either doesn’t care about the issues noted above, or he’s putting politics ahead of people."

I was thinking it means he's a big fat liar, but whatever.

I continue to be disappointed beyond words with Joe Lieberman, as are a lot of Connecticut Democrats — saddened, surprised, and truly disheartened by just how completely he has abandoned the Democratic principles that have guided him over the years and the Party whose members have supported him and helped him achieve his goals.

Don't blame him. You had your chance to kick him out two years ago.

I have no faith in the governance of the deocratic leadership as long as Lieberman holds any position on any committees having that 1 seat that important that he'll just vote for the wrong side and not do his job on at least one position that he holds, sorry but get him off those committees

P.D. @ 49:

Lieberman is a turncoat, plain and simple.

Yep. All LIEberman cares about is Israel. I wonder if he gets a kickback from the $4 Billion that Congress sends to Israel every year in foreign aid? Which begs the question: Why does the country with the 29th highest GDP in the world deserve or need $4 Billion a year in US foreign aid?

Answer: Because every member of Congress is completely owned by the lobby.

“I will appoint judges that strictly interpret the constitution of the United States of America and do not legislate from the bench.”

Yeah, that's why we have idiots appointed to the bench who support the "unitary executive."
Tell me, McInsane, where in the constitution does it say that?

Yes Mcain

get a Bush KISS OF DEATH TOO

ha ha ha h

trader joe liberman did and look what happned to him

he became a democratic TRAITOR

Yes, that is a loving look.

We have to put up with this creep for just a little while longer. Hopefully there will be enough of a democratic majority after November elections that when LIE berman shows up to "Caucus" with the majority they give him a broom and tell him to go clean up the toilets down the hall and then empty the trash in all the offices......naaaa even those jobs would be to honorable for that traitor! After the Election when he is completely irrelevent he will resign rather then be a complete bump on a log in the senate and then the citizens of conneticut can make restitution to the nation and elect a real Democratic Senator............they can be pround of.

The Lieberman connection to Hillary, McCain and Obama.

Lieberman's friendship with Billary is well known. His endorsement of McCain and chairing of his 2008 Conn. campaign is also public knowledge.

I would like to know more about his role as a mentor to Obama in the Senate. Did the mentorship go beyond a mere introduction to Senate protocol?

I have heard that Obama's language in speeches towards the war softened since he became a Senator.

I love the way he speaks for Connecticut Democrats. It's so weirdly specific and overly general at the same time.