During his victory speech in Chicago, President-elect Barack Obama promised to “work to heal the partisan divide.” So he needs to take a good look at what his fellow Democrats are planning to do to their own former vice presidential nominee. A loyal Democrat forced to run as an independent in 2006 after being spurned by fellow party members for supporting the war in Iraq, Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman is now in danger of losing the chairmanship of the Homeland Security and Oversight Committee because he campaigned for Republican hawk John McCain. Majority Leader Harry Reid reportedly told his colleagues that he has no intention of letting Lieberman keep his committee chair even though the Connecticut senator voted with Democrats on virtually every other issue and gave them a critical one-vote majority, never mind that he is arguably the best man for the job.
So Lieberman can either accept a greatly diminished position within the Democratic caucus, switch to a party with which he has little in common besides a fierce determination to make sure the U.S. is victorious against its enemies, or resign and let his state’s Republican governor appoint his successor. But if anybody has mastered the new spirit of bipartisanship, it’s Lieberman. “Everybody seems to agree that we need a new kind of government in Washington that breaks across party lines, right? That gets things done,” he told a crowd in New Hampshire. “I want to present myself immodestly as Exhibit A. I’m a Democrat, re-elected as an Independent, here to support the Republican candidate.”
Although Senate Democrats beefed up their numbers from 49 to 57, they’re still short of the 60 votes needed to cut off filibusters, so they will still need Lieberman on close votes. Success in Iraq and the war on terror are the only major issues on which he parted ways with the same party leadership that’s now trying to make an example out of him. That’s too bad, because stripping Lieberman of his chairmanship will only make other Democrats think twice about voting their consciences on life-and-death issues that should be beyond partisan considerations. Ousting such an experienced and independent voice from the Homeland Security Committee may also come back to haunt Democrats if Vice President-elect Joe Biden’s chilling prediction comes true and foreign powers decide to test the mettle of the new administration.
