BY THE WAY: My utmost respect to anyone that can explain the rationale of the following also from The Times editorial: “…and despite some unappealing rhetoric in the Terri Schiavo case, he has strongly supported a woman’s right to choose.”

Is it really so hard to do a bit of research?

Can you so quickly forget little hypocrisies such as Bush cutting short a vacation to sign the unethical and unConstitutional Schiavo bill, yet ignoring 1300 dying Americans afloat in New Orleans for three full days while he vacationed in the sunny and dry American West??

Read up on it. Lieberman supported the Schiavo fiasco, and I guess we bleeding heart liberals ought to be glad he did. That's when the public started to wake up to just how invasive and self-righteous these

�The time to consider a pragmatic vote for Specter will be in November.�

I apologize if I put any words into your mouth, because that wasn't my intent, and rereading my previous post, I don't think I did. Anyway, there's little point in proceeding so we'll just have to agree to disagree.

Come back down to reality man.
Geez, where to begin.

FWIW, my principles about freedom and liberty havent changed either. WE all love freedom and liberty. How to go about securing them is another matter, and that matter is not a question of "core principle" but of strategy and tactics.
Bush laid out a strategy and tactics. De-emphasize the fight in Afghanistan against the Taliban (now coming back) and binLaden (still on the loose), and rather, invade Iraq. Bad strategy. The manner of the invasion and occuptation revealed horrid tactics. These are not wacko lefty assessments, but are mainstream views, held by the majority of American citizens.

The issue is not whether anyone changed their "core beliefs", but rather whether one can learn from experience in the arena of strategy and tactics.

I am not a single issue voter, but the war certainly is the most important pressing issue of the day. That said, if Lieberman does win the Democratic nomination, I would certainly support him over any Republican. So no, there is no impulse to "complete demonization". I would predict that the NYT would probably agree, if that is the way the ballot looks in Nov.

The rest of your post is just an argument for a Bush-like foreign policy. You have the right to your opinion - even though it is an increasingly small minority opinion. It makes no sense though, for you to pretend that your view is mainstream, and that war-opponents are a fringe. Have you not read any polls in the last many months?

And makes no sense for you to claim that the NYT should endorse someone also holds a discredited and minority opinion on a major issue of the day. One does not need to be motivated by BDS or any other irrational impulse in order to decide to support a candidate that agrees with the mainstream on a major issue.

No real surprises here with the way the endorsements fell, considering the NYT’s anti-war Iraq stance and the WaPo’s pro-Iraq war stances (expressed in various editorials in the past). However, the WaPo’s editorial discusses Lieberm...

Joe Lieberman only supports George Bush on foreign policy with respect to the conduct of the GWOT, so far as I can tell. If you look at his positions on domestic policy, I don't think you can find much that he is in agreement with the president on, certainly no more than just about any other Senator in the Democrat caucus.

You seem to base your disdain for my comments on a belief that clearly the US has adopted the wrong strategy in fighting the GWOT, and that this error is so egregious as to make you a single issue voter, if not a voter who now finds it necessary to spin everything else so as to make the demonization of Joe Lieberman complete. You are entitled to your belief, however, your assumption is far from obvious to me. I find much of the hand-wringing even today about Iraq, Afghanistan, et al, rather ahistorical.

Be careful what you ask for when it comes to changing the status quo, because you might get it in ways you don't like. I can envision scenarios that would change the rules of engagament for our forces and make us even more lethal than we are today. If anything, I wish we'd go harder and faster in identifying and eliminating the threats we face, but perhaps it is fortunate that I don't get to make this call. Meanwhile, I certainly will not support cut and run strategies or tactics and then wait for the next inevitable challenge. Capitulation buys you nothing but a more aggresive enemy. Joe Lieberman understands this. The pseudo-pacifists of the Angry Left either don't understand this or don't care, thinking they can play this game close to the edge witout fear of it getting drastically worse. That's not a bet I am anxious to take based upon my reading of history. I use the term pseudo-pacifists, because the Angry Left today appears to me to be motivated by Bush Derangement Syndrome moreso than actual pacifism. Eventually, a Democrat will be elected president and when this happens I don't believe the Angry Left will be as pacific when it comes to protecting American, Americans, and American interests, but your mileage may differ.

To the extent I adopt a partisan tone concerning the NY Times editorial policy, I am glad they have endorsed Ned Lamont. It is going to help more people see just how craven the NY Times endorsemetns have become. They could always be relied upon to favor Democrats, but it should be clear to even the casual observer now that their received and delivered wisdom now consists of little more than the automatic knee-jerk gainsaying of anything President Bush says or does.

Pathetic. Utterly pathetic.

I dont see the sense in your comment. Its a very different world today than it was 6 years ago. Its seem rather bizarre for you to claim that the NYT changed while Lieberman didnt (even if true, why do you think that is a compliment to Lieberman? - is failure to learn from experience a good thing?).

Lieberman campainged against Bush 6 years ago. Today he is a freindly supporter. How does that amount to "not changing".

And it is all besides the point anyway. The NYT endorsed Lieberman over Cheney. It wasnt Lieberman vs. Lamont for Senate. I suspect that, were it possible, the NYT, the DailyKos, even Ned Lamont would gladly substitute Lieberman for Cheney, even today.

This is about Lieberman falling �in love with his image as the nation�s moral compass�

Well of course. The nation has only one moral compass, and that's the New York Times.

</sarcasm>

(Though I think I may need to close that tag more than once to cover it.)