Informed Speculation

George Will becomes the latest to weigh in on the Nutroots® challenge to Joe Lieberman, and he sees through the red herrings to the central issue: Lieberman is being punished for supporting the War in Iraq.

…[T]his dust-up among Democrats is about the war, and Connecticut’s political market is working. Lamont, who says a deadline for a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq would “change the dynamic of things,” is serving an unmet demand from many Democrats. He says his position is “Murtha’s, probably.” (Democratic Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania is for prompt withdrawal from Iraq.) Lamont says the administration’s position—America will stand down as Iraqi forces stand up—is backward: “They won’t stand up until we stand down.”

Lieberman, whose 1988 victory over Sen. Lowell Weicker was aided by a Connecticut voter named William F. Buckley, last October attended the 50th-anniversary dinner of Buckley’s National Review. Lieberman is among the last of the Jacksonians, those Democrats who, like the late Washington Sen. Scoop Jackson, support both domestic liberalism and a muscular foreign policy. Although Iraq is a weight in the Republicans’ saddles this year, it also is bedeviling Democrats.