Seeing the Writing on the Wall, Lieberman Starts Talking Up "Respect" For Obama

The Washington Monthly Saturday reports that Joe Lieberman is starting to try to rewrite history as he begins to backtrack on his criticism of his party's nominee, Barack Obama. Steve Benen in his Political Animal column says:

LIEBERMAN HASN'T BEEN PAYING ATTENTION TO HIMSELF.... Joe Lieberman adopted the role of Republican attack dog early on, but as the election draws near, he's hoping the political world has a very short memory.

Lieberman, a self-proclaimed "independent Democrat" who was chosen by McCain to make the case against Obama at the Republican National Convention in early September, said his comments have been within bounds.

"When I go out, I say, 'I have a lot of respect for Sen. Obama. He's bright. He's eloquent.'"

My hunch is, Lieberman sees the direction of the political winds, and hopes to convince Democrats that while he's been a McCain sycophant, he's always been "respectful" towards Obama.

Lieberman, in other words, has to hope Democrats haven't been paying any attention at all. The party is supposed to forget, for example, when Lieberman argued that Obama doesn't put "country first."

And the time Lieberman said it was a "good question" to ask whether Obama is a "Marxist."

And the time Lieberman ironically accused the Obama campaign of "sleazy tactics."

And the time Lieberman, at the Republican National Convention, falsely accused Obama of trying to undermine the troops

"Respectful"? Nice try, Joe.

The article is here. The comments alone are worth the visit!

Sarah Palin and the AIP

We learn more and more about John McCain's running mate Sarah Palin every day. And we're learning more and more about our 50th state as well. We've learned just how under populated Alaska is. Anchorage is the largest city with a population of approximately 280,000 people. Fairbanks is second with only 31,000 people and Juneau, the capital, has just 30,000. The fourth largest city, Wasilla, the town where Sarah Palin started here political career, has just 9000 people. The entire state of Alaska, the largest state by far as measured by land mass, has a population of only 670,000. Alaska is almost two and a half times as large as the next nearest state, Texas, but it's total population is less than that of the 17th largest city in America, Fort Worth, Texas.

Despite the over $14,000 per person that Washington sends to Alaska every year (the largest per capita recipient of any state in the country), a surprising number of Alaskans aren't exactly happy to be a part of these United States. About 13,000 Alaskan's are registered with the Alaskan Independence Party - the third largest political party in Alaska. The AIP was founded in 1984 to explore whether the 1958 vote by Alaskans authorizing statehood was legal and to work to explorer alternatives to statehood including remaining a territory, becoming a commonwealth, and even complete secession.

Another surprising fact is that as governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin supports the "good work" of the AIP (aka AKIP). (Her husband, the "First Dude" Todd, was actually a member of the party in 1995 and 2000.) She even addressed the AIP 2008 Convention, welcoming their members and lauding their efforts. Here's the video:



To get a better taste of just what the AIP is about, here's an audio clip of John Vogler (AIP founder pictured above) expressing his feeling about the United States. Is someone who supports such an organization really qualified to be Vice President of the United States?? What does this say about her judgment? What does her selection say about John McCain's judgment?