Joe Lieberman is standing at the crossroads of personality and ideology, and can’t seem to make up his mind. 

Joe, officially speaking, is an “Independent Democrat,” also known as a “Lieberman Democrat,” which officially denotes him as an independent.  He still, however, caucuses with the Democrats – his party since he won his seat in 1988.  Now, Joe is a staunch supporter of John McCain for president, and has been asked to speak at the Republican National Convention in September. The latest news stories say that he is on the republican short-list for possible “veep” candidates on McCain’s ticket.

The issue of course, lies between two distinct paths: The political, public path of Joe’s life, and the political, personal desires of Joe’s career – and given the circumstances, it looks as if the two have crossed paths enough to form a web so convoluted that we really don’t know what the hell Joe stands for anymore.

Joe was one of the first Democrats in the Senate to stand up and criticize then Pres. Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky.  Of course, he also decided to vote against his removal from office, lest we upset potential voters.

He was the Vice Presidential candidate – on the Democratic side – in 2000, when he and Al Gore lost to George W. Bush in what may have been the most contested election in US history.

After that time, he became an advocate for the War in Iraq and continued action there.  Joe ran for president in 2004, but dropped out of the race without winning a single contest – after his former running mate, Al Gore, endorsed his opponent, Howard Dean. Of course, at the time, he was still running as a Democrat.

When his Senate seat was up for re-election in 2006, the Democratic party decided that Joe had fallen away from liberal values, and the primary vote went to Ned Lamont, the Greenwich anti-war businessman.  He changed his affiliation from “democrat” to “independent,” and, once again, won his seat in the 2006 mid-term election by courting more conservative voters.

Joe voted for the War in Iraq, and against the Financial Accounting Standards Board proposal of requiring publically-traded corporations to report of the costs of stock options as a business expense. He co-sponsored for the “Family Entertainment Protection Act,” which was a failed bill mandating enforcement of ERSB ratings on video games (and a blatent violation of First Amendment rights).

But, he is an “independent Democrat.”

Now, Joe is in the running for the republican vice-presidential spot, after losing his “superdelagate” status at the democratic national convention in August.  His support for republican nominee John McCain is so prevalent that an advertisment for “John McCain 2008,” an advertisment that has appeared on this website, shows the two embracing and smiling.

But, he is still an “independent Democrat.”

Joe, the “observant, but not orthodox” Jew, is also a supporter of controversial pastor John Hagee – yes, the same John Hagee whose endorsement was rejected by John McCain. The same John Hagee who said that the Holocaust was an act of God to return the chosen people back to the Holy Land. That John Hagee  Joe even compared Hagee to Moses, after admitting that Hagee had his faults: “Even Moses fell short of God’s expectations.”

Lest we forget, he is still an “independent Democrat.”

The overlying theme of all of this is simple:  Joe is willing to pander to anyone willing to put him in a position of power, even if that means compromising his party, his people, his values, his friends, his supporters, his state, or even the wellbeing of the citizens of the United States. All so that Joe gets a nice cushy chair in a plush office, and gets to live comfortably off the taxpayer teat.

I think it’s time that the American public says “No to Joe,” and makes the illustrious senator come out from behind the curtain to pick a side and stick with it.

Both campaigns are gearing up for the long haul ahead, the big final stretch before September 4^th, when the media lets us know that we have only two months left.  Then it’s only 30 days until October 4^th, the last home stretch before the last week of campaigning, and then October 28^th, and then finally November 4^th.  Then we sit around until January waiting for “Dubya” to let go of the reins of his train-wreck of a presidency, and then we do our best to look forward.

Since both Barack Obama and John McCain have been trying to see who’s taller, in respect to who can change this country for the better, looking forward doesn’t sound so bad.  The issue is that for the next 99 days, both candidates will have to show Americans what they have to look forward to – whether or not they win.

What do we have to look forward to? Both candidates have issued their plans to tackle some major issues in this country, from the economy and gas prices to the war in Iraq and the showdown in Iran. Both candidates talk about change, and both argue that the other is the wrong kind of change (or, simply not a change at all).

What hasn’t changed, however, is how the end message.  Sure, the two major candidates have pushed their own agendas, but the end message is this:  Barack Obama is inexperienced, naive, and an unsuitable choice for president, and John McCain is an old, war-mongering, Bush-style, typical Washington insider who is just unsuitable for the presidency, so vote for the other guy.

Unfortunately, in American politics, the common message in most political campaigns is “Vote for this guy, and your lives will be caught up in a mire of debt, war, disease, famine, pestilence, etc, or you will pay out the ying-yang in taxes, or you will be trapped in a room full of chocolate chip cookies without a glass of milk…” – you get the idea.

What ever happened to voting for the candidate you feel has the best qualities, qualification, charisma, experience, etc., to lead the nation? When did Americans start voting against candidates, rather than for them?

Let’s look past the negative campaigning, the swift-boating, the mudslinging and the muck-raking to get down to what the true issues are, and pick a candidate based on their ability to address those issues.

Interesting…Last I checked, Bush was against sitting down with Iran.

But, more importantly for the Barack Obama and the Democratic Party is what this does for him. Understand that William Burns will meet with an Iranian official. There are no conditions to this meeting. Wait a second…This reminds me of an ad that John McCain had appearing on a lot of major ad networks. Actually, you might have seen it here.

The ad states: “Is it OK to Unconditionally Meet With Anti-American Foreign Leaders? Yes or No.” Looking at that ad, it suggests that it is horrible to sit down and have diplomatic conversations with anyone that does not follow our rules. Basically, if you don’t agree with America, we won’t sit down and talk with you. John McCain, time and time again, was on Obama’s case for this. But, Senator Obama continued to say “it’s good to sit down and talk. We need to talk. Diplomacy before war.”

And it seems that Obama’s arguments have worked. Because John McCain stepped behind George Bush on the notion of having no sit down with Iran, McCain is now in a situation where he needs to walk carefully. If he suddenly says, “Yeah, let’s meet with Iran!” then he looks like a flip flop. But, more importantly, it is ammunition for the Obama campaign to say, “Look guys, he’s following Bush some more…Do we really want a third term?”

However, Americans are afraid of a war with Iran, so if McCain doesn’t do something and continues with his argument that we can’t sit down with a nation without some sort of conditions, he can come off as a war-monger and that will hurt him too.

So what does McCain do?

What he does will be incredibly important. Despite how he responds, this hurts his campaign. He has made himself out to be the firm, erect man who will not back down to America’s opponents. We don’t meet with enemies without them following certain conditions. Now that Bush has done it, it suddenly boosts Barack Obama. How McCain responds will be very important.

America is tired of war. America is tired of high gas prices. And America knows that if we go to war with Iran, we get more death and higher gas prices. These sit downs will help America, but it will McCain. What will he do? We’ll have to wait and see. This is great news, though, for Obama. Score one for diplomacy!

It becomes a boost for Obama.

Last week, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki suggested that it was time for Americans to develop a time table for withdrawal. This is great news for those that think that the War in Iraq is a bad idea. But…It’s not great news for everyone. Here’s why.

For Barack Obama, he has been saying for a long time that he wants to get out of Iraq. He suggested throughout the entire primary that within sixteen months, we would be out of Iraq. That’s good. That’s very good. Americans are fed up with this war. I’m fed up with this war. It was a war that was unnecessary and now that we have the opportunity to pull out, we have to.

But for John McCain, this is bad news. He has time and time again used the War in Iraq as one of his biggest issues. “We will win!” he proclaims. Well that’s great, but if they want us out, we have to get out. But when you base your campaign on victory in Iraq, it can hurt you when the Prime Minister of Iraq says “time to go.”

So, what does this mean?

It means that now is the time to focus on what we need to focus on. America cannot become an imperialistic country. We are not Rome. As much as people suggest that we are like Rome, we are not. We cannot afford to invade countries. We are so many trillions of dollars in debt because of this war and we need to stop spending it.

I pose a question to President Bush and Senator McCain: are you conquerors or are you liberators? Do you want to be at war to expand American territory or to ‘do great things for the Iraqi people?’ If your answer to those two questions are the latter, then you must understand it is time to withdrawal.

Fortunately, one of the candidates is not a war monger and understands the need to withdrawal. Barack Obama seems to be focusing his attention now on the need to withdrawal. A time table is necessary.

With the Iraqis saying it’s time to go, I say it’s time to go. And this is only going to help Barack Obama. If he can focus in on how the Iraqis are saying that it is time to go and if he can really expand that, it will definitely make him look like the less war hungry of the two candidates. And at a time when the economy is in the toilet, that’s definitely something that will make people happy.

So, President Bush and John McCain…Are you conquerors?

I spent some time looking at some polls and some graphs this evening and I began to realize that there was some very interesting things that were happening in the political world.  First and foremost, I realized that according to polls, every single state that John Kerry won in 2004, Barack Obama was currently leading in.  That’s great news except for one problem: John Kerry lost.  But, this is 2008, not 2004.  Different polls show something else appearing.

Six of George Bush’s states in 2004 are not in John McCain’s hands.  The states that have suddenly flip flopped from Republican to Democrat are: New Mexico, Colorado, Virginia, Iowa, Indiana, and Ohio.  When looking at how many electoral votes that is, we see something that, for Democrats, is very exciting.  John Kerry won 251 electoral votes in 2004.  Add those six states and you now have 316 electoral votes for Barack Obama.  Last I checked, all you needed was 270 to win.

However, this isn’t a for certain for Barack Obama.  It’s only July 1st…The way I see it, he has quite a few more months to potentially screw up, so he needs to be careful not to get arrogant.  The interesting thing, though, is his battle strategy.  I wanted to touch on that a little bit…

According to him, he intends on campaigning in all 50 states.  That’s great, but it’s very costly.  But then I realized that his tactic was to try to outspend John McCain.  It’s going to be a tough one, though, especially since he is not taking money from special interest groups and McCain is.  The way I see his tactic working is this:

He has no intention of winning in very red states.  He knows that he cannot win in them, but is going to spend money anyways.  By doing this, John McCain will have to spend money in those states as well.  The less money that McCain has for swing states, the better the chances that Obama has to win the general election.  I see it working.  If Barack Obama can fundraise and raise enough money to fight hard in all of these states then I see him being a very formidable threat to John McCain in states that, in previous years, Republicans could take advantage of.

However, in the end, only one thing matters: who can get to 270 first.  A full, 50-state war for votes?  It’s going to be interesting.