Ta-Nehisi Coates doesn't think (and I agree) that Joe Lieberman will pay any price for his disgraceful behavior on health care and that while Lieberman "deserves" to lose his chairmanship, "it's simply not clear to me that--in terms of passing legislation--the Dems would be better off" if Lieberman got his just deserts. David Kurtz agrees with less regret. I don't disagree with the idea that getting good legislation passed is more important than taking revenge per se. And while I was skeptical about not stripping him of his chairmanship after the 2008 elections, I had to admit that whether it was a good idea or not was an open question. If he was willing to go along with major Democratic priorities -- at a minimum, not filibustering them -- I could live with his keeping the perks of office despite his endorsement of McCain.
But surely, at this point, the question is closed and I can't agree with Coates and Kurtz at all. We now know that the Democratic leadership didn't extract any major concessions from Lieberman in exchange for undeservedly keeping his Homeland Security seniority. We certainly know that nothing he says about his alleged support for other Obama administration initiatives can be trusted at all, and to let him keep his privileges in the hope that next time he'll hold on to the football would be insane. And if you care about passing progressive legislation there are also very real costs in allowing someone -- even if he endorsed the other party's presidential candidate! -- to double-cross you again and again all while keeping his committee privileges.
Party discipline is critical to getting anything done in the Senate, and signaling that there's essentially nothing you can do to get sanctions from party leadership ensures that the playing field between the two parties will remain asymmetrical.
Coates addresses that last argument, arguing that the Democrats don't want to become a regional rump party like the current Republicans. I certainly agree that having an ideologically pure minority -- while in many ways useful for conservatives -- doesn't help progressives in most respects. So this is a good argument for not drumming Ben Nelson out of the caucus despite his marginally more principled obstruction. But surely this argument is irrelevant to Lieberman, who after all represents a state Obama carried by 23 points. Disciplining Lieberman isn't maximalist party discipline -- it's the minimum a party should be expected to do if they're serious. And the fact that Reid is unlikely to do anything about Lieberman's betrayal simply doesn't speak well of his leadership.
--Scott Lemieux
