One of the points liberals have made about Joe Lieberman in recent years is that he's not, fundamentally, been a heterodox Democrat. He's been a Republican. He attacks Democrats in the press and endorses Republicans for president, And now it turns out that he wrote checks to Republicans running for Senate and wrote op-eds defending Republican incumbents who were trying to save their seats. Given this new information, Steve Benen asks, "if the Senate Democratic caucus had known about these contributions, would it have made any difference when they were voting to give Lieberman everything he asked for?...I kind of doubt it." Benen's point, as least as I read it, is that this is evidence of Democratic spinelessness. But is that the right way to think about it? Take the recent line on Joe Lieberman seriously. Imagine he simply was a Republican. A generic moderate Republican. A Chris Shays Republican. And as a Republican, he voted frequently against Democratic priorities, attacked progressive bills on the cable channels, and endorsed his fellow Republicans for office. But imagine too that his state was changing, and his party looked unlikely to retake power, and for reasons of opportunism, he began talking with Harry Reid about switching to the Democratic Party. And Reid convinced him, though it took a lot of inducements and a lot of forgiveness, because in the Senate, one more vote can be worth a lot. Would most observers understand that as a coup for the Democrats or a capitulation to the opportunist? Or maybe both?
