A Shot of Nedrenaline for Antiwar Democrats?

Seeking Nedification from Democratic Party analysts

Brian Doherty | August 11, 2006

So, what did the victory of Ned Lamont over Joe Lieberman mean? That campaign finance laws guarantee that only rich candidates can beat incumbents? That Connecticut voters are a bunch of anti-Semites—possibly including the self-loathing 39 percent of Jewish voters who, according to the CBS/New York Times exit poll, went for Lamont? That the Democrats are repeating the mistakes of the McGovern era, elevating feckless and hopeless peaceniks over serious statesmen? Or that any Democratic presidential candidate in 2008 better be at least as antiwar as Lamont, or else be toast?

Or will it just mean that Vinegar Joe will go on to claim his rightful space in Congress, as a partyless free agent, doing whatever is right for the people of Connecticut—or, rather, insuring that the people of Connecticut do what's right for him?

Most important, did it mean I was totally wrong when I predicted, though not specifically a Lamont defeat (ass = covered), that antiwar sentiment would play little role in this year's election? The exit poll data certainly show it played a big role in this particular one: 61 percent said their view of the war was very important in their vote.

According to the same exit polls, 21 percent of Lamont voters just said it's time for a change. That, plus the quite unusual primary defeat of three different incumbents this week might presage an anti-incumbent wave this year that I, and I suspect the whole nation, will find, however powerful and devastating, delightfully cool and refreshing.

I talked Thursday about the meaning of Lamont's victory with a couple of Democratic thinkers and analysts who have spent a lot of time thinking about the Democratic Party, its future, and where antiwar sentiment fits in.

First up is John Nichols, Washington correspondent for The Nation and an associate editor of the Madison, Wisconsin, Capital Times. His latest on Lamont is here.

Reason: Given some of the things you've written, it sounds like you'd be thrilled with what happened yesterday...

Nichols: It sounds like I should be thrilled. I've been writing for the past five years arguing the Democratic Party needs a coherent alternative foreign policy. The Lamont victory is significant, but it's not the one dramatic moment that shifts the Democratic Party.

Reason: Is it surprising given the amount of polled antiwar sentiment that more politicians haven't, like Lamont, really grabbed hold of the antiwar issue dramatically in their challenges to incumbents, of whatever party?

Nichols: It is surprising in the absence of knowledge of how the political system works. It's absolutely predictable when you understand the dynamics of American politics in 2006. It's almost fully dysfunctional, really controlled by money from interest groups of all sides. This year's election ought to be about war [given public discontent], and the fact that it isn't feeds resentment, frustration, and disenchantment. Connecticut may have the highest turnout of any state in its primary. Why? This election people got to cast a ballot that matters in a vital national and international debate, and that doesn't happen very often. But why it happened here was that Ned Lamont is a very, very wealthy man, able to buy the starting gate equality that most challengers cannot buy. He's not the citizen farmer who stood up and decides to challenge the elites.

Reason: Is Lamont's victory a sign that, as one Daily Kos diarist crowed, that the Democratic Party now clearly must be the antiwar party, and no presidential candidate in 2008 dare oppose this antiwar consensus?

Nichols: I think that it would be wonderful if Americans really did vote [based on] their honest sentiment on the war. But the Democratic grassroots are diverse. They will vote their sentiments in a number of different ways. I do think the Lamont victory and a number of other recent factors, some of them on the ground in Baghdad, will create a larger and more coherent antiwar vote than we saw in 2004.

Lieberman didn't adjust his statements and strategies [in the face of antiwar sentiment]. Clinton already has. She has just about the same stance on the war as Lieberman does, but the week before the primary she was blistering Rumsfeld at a hearing and issued a number of statements that make her sound skeptical, critical. She's making adjustments to make herself acceptable to all but the most precise antiwar voters.

What's significant about Lamont is not so much his antiwar stance, as that he was able to take a strong antiwar position and put it into a context that looked electable and broad. He never just talked about war in Iraq. He always said, we spent $250 million a day in Baghdad and Basra and that money could be spent in Bridgeport and New London.

It's an old school message and not overly sophisticated, but one Democrats have been lousy at delivering in recent years and it has a lot of appeal. He also talked about diplomacy and containment and other models for how to operate in the foreign policy world that most leading Democrats are unwilling to engage in. Lamont would get in front of 50-100 people and take five minutes to talk about George Kennan and models of how to deal with threats without invading countries.