Hullabaloo

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

 
Neutralize Lieberman - Jim Martin for Senate

by dday

Today is Veteran's Day, and six years ago, Saxby Chambliss perpetrated one of the more cowardly and despicable attacks on a veteran in recent political history, accusing multiple-amputee Max Cleland of disloyalty and producing an ad connecting him to Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden (the core of the charge was because Cleland favored union rights for Department of Homeland Security employees, by the way - so it was an anti-union smear as much as it was a national security smear). Here's what one prominent politician had to say about it:

"I'd never seen anything like that ad. Putting pictures of Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden next to the picture of a man who left three limbs on the battlefield -- it's worse than disgraceful. It's reprehensible."

That was John McCain, who is later this month headed to Georgia to campaign with Chambliss in his runoff election against Jim Martin.

At least he still has his principles, right?

I will say that Saxby Chambliss is at least consistent. His contempt for veterans in the political arena is matched by his opposition to them on the floor of the Senate, voting against funding for the new GI Bill, traumatic brain injury research, proper amounts of time between deployments, and dozens of other initiatives.

Now, Chambliss is facing Jim Martin, an Army veteran who served one tour of duty in Vietnam. Neither candidate reached 50% in the November election, so there is a December 2 runoff scheduled. Barack Obama is sending aides to Georgia to work on the campaign, which will undoubtedly come down to turnout, and now it's our turn. On Veteran's Day, bloggers are having a national day of action to raise money and awareness for Martin. There are scattered events planned across the country, but you can visit this ActBlue page and give to Martin directly. Considering that not just McCain but Mike Huckabee and even Sarah Palin are scheduled to rush to Chambliss' aid, it's a chance to humiliate them once again.

But I want to look at it another way. The Georgia seat was not expected to be Democratic this year. Picking this one up in extra innings adds a vote on a variety of substantive issues - Martin looks to be pretty solid (here's an interview between Martin and Matt Stoller - this is not Zell Miller revisited). And so all the wonder about Joe Lieberman's status in the caucus would be made somewhat irrelevant. His bad vote on the war? Cancelled out by Martin's? Veteran's issues? The same. His bad positions on economic stimulus and other progressive issues? Martin would likely nullify those as well. His chairmanship of the Homeland Security committee? Lieberman shouldn't have it, but Democrats are nearing a tipping point where they would gain extra seats on these committees (they are proportionally distributed), and thus it's possible that adding Martin to the Senate would put enough Democrats on that committee to vote down any frivolous subpoenas Lieberman might be itching to issue.

I'm not saying it's the only thing we can do - the calls and letters to Senators asking them to strip Lieberman of his gavel must continue. But one of the best ways we can marginalize Joe Lieberman is to put more Democrats in the Senate and make his votes meaningless. Help out Jim Martin today.

Bloggers for Martin


.
dday 11/11/2008 10:30:00 AM |