Home > ’Single issue’ candidate knows what’s important

’Single issue’ candidate knows what’s important

by Open-Publishing - Sunday 6 August 2006

Wars and conflicts Parties International Elections-Elected USA

BY JESSE JACKSON

To this day, Joe Lieberman still doesn’t get it. The 18-year incumbent Democratic senator from Connecticut is in the battle for his political life in the Democratic primary. He dismisses his challenger — Ned Lamont, a Connecticut businessman whose campaign is grounded on opposition to the war in Iraq, as a single-issue candidate.

But Iraq is not a single issue, it is a central issue — both for the country and for the Democratic Party. It is a catastrophic foreign policy debacle. It has alienated us from our allies and generated hatred among Muslims across the world. It has weakened our military, forcing our troops into an extended occupation in the midst of a growing civil war for which they have neither appetite nor training. It has proved a recruiting boon for al-Qaida. It has sorely weakened our foreign policy influence, as demonstrated graphically in the current conflict in Lebanon. It has cost nearly 2,700 American lives, over 20,000 Americans wounded — and an estimated 50,000 Iraqi deaths.

It has skewed our budget priorities. We’ve spent about $300 billion already — with the estimated cost likely to exceed $1 trillion — even as we cut support at home for the still-displaced Katrina survivors, raise interest rates on student loans and cut access to preschool for poor children. The budget is a statement of our moral choices — and this is a deeply immoral choice.

The Iraq debacle has featured the cronyism, corruption and incompetence that is characteristic of this administration. Billions have been pocketed in Iraq by companies like Halliburton, which the Pentagon charged with contracting abuse even as it renewed its no-bid contracts. The administration cooked the intelligence to get us into the war, and then launched the war with no plan for the occupation, and with inadequate forces and inadequate equipment.

The war has undermined our own democracy, with a president claiming untrammeled powers to act above the law for the duration of a war on terror that he says will last for generations. And from this arrogance has come shameful abuses, from the torture in Abu Ghraib to the hidden prisons of the CIA to the locking up of people — too many of them innocent — without hearing or lawyer or charges in Guantanamo and elsewhere. America, which has championed the rule of law throughout the world, is now widely viewed as a rogue nation that views itself as above the law.

Through all this, Lieberman has been, as the New York Times termed it, the president’s "enabler." He lobbied early and hard for the pre-emptive war of choice. He echoed the lies and dismissed the folly of the president’s men while questioning the patriotism of those who raised sensible questions about our course.

Iraq is not a single issue; it is a central issue. Lieberman’s response has been to line up the Democratic Club — basking in the embrace of Bill Clinton, whom he once called a moral disgrace, and enlisting fellow Sen. Chris Dodd to mobilize other senators to support him. The Democratic Senate Committee has rushed in political pros and organizers to help "save our guy."

But across Connecticut, voters are saying "this is not our guy." They are sending a message not just to Bush but to the Democratic Party — calling them to account. Lieberman’s opponent, Ned Lamont, has run a principled campaign, devoid of personal attacks or gutter politics. He has simply argued, correctly, that Lieberman has not simply been wrong on the war, but has been a leader of the war hawks, the president’s favorite Democrat and leading defender.

Workers in Connecticut — which has witnessed a steady hemorrhaging of manufacturing jobs — have other reasons to think Joe is not their guy. He’s been a leading promoter of the corporate trade policies that have devastated U.S. manufacturing while racking up the largest trade deficits in the history of mankind. He’s the single greatest defender of off-the-books, short-term executive stock options, which contributed directly to the worst corporate crime scandals in a century.

Whatever happens in the primary next Tuesday, the message has already been sent. Americans don’t pay much attention to politics. They are easily roused by appeals to patriotism and fear. They tend to re-elect incumbents. But periodically, democracy works. A defining issue rouses opinion, and that leads to a defining election. In Connecticut, the Democratic primary is just that. And every member of the club had better listen to what the voters are saying.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/jesse/cst-edt-jesse01.html