Party Time

Watching a pompous and moralizing 18-year veteran of the Senate go down in flames at the hands of his own constituents was great fun. Knowing what a miserable day it is for both major party establishments is even better.

Surely the RNC would much rather be spending today spinning a Lieberman victory as a stunning blue state endorsement of Bush's policy in Iraq. Instead, they're stuck contorting Lieberman's defeat into a hijacking of the Democratic party by cut-and-run extremists. (This was the highest turnout for a primary since 1970, and antiwar sentiment is mainstream around here by any measure.)

Locally, Republicans (let's call them "deferential to the established order") are figuring out how to get rid of their choice to take on what now looks like a split Democrat electorate. And they can't be happy with the realization that they haven't bothered to challenge seriously Connecticut's entrenched incumbent senators for years—at least one of whom obviously turns out to have been unentrenchable.

As for the Democrats, Chris Dodd and other party leaders in Connecticut just had a press conference where they endorsed Lamont with about as much enthusiasm as hostages reading a statement at gunpoint. Lanny Davis spent the last few days in Connecticut aggressively attacking Lamont, and Bill Clinton stumped for Lieberman a couple of weeks ago.

Poor all these guys. What a great day.