# Lieberman or Lamont?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [October 20, 2006, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274 "2006-10-20T19:58:46Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [October 20, 2006, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/1 "2006-10-20T19:58:46Z")
1. Who’s going to win the Connecticut Senate seat?
2. Who should win?
[Recent article](http://www.thenation.com/doc/20061106/shapiro) on the race.
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### Author:  [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)
#### Post date: [October 20, 2006, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/2 "2006-10-20T20:02:23Z")
1. Dunno. As a Conneticutian.
2. Lamont, without a doubt.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [October 20, 2006, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/3 "2006-10-20T21:30:59Z")
[QUOTE=rjung]
1. Dunno. As a Conneticutian.
[/quote]
Lieberman, easily.
> [@](#):
>
> 1. Lamont, without a doubt.
Don’t you think the person that CT folks elect is, by definition, the one who should win? We don’t know who that is right now, but why exactly should Lamont win unless he’s the choice of the people in that state?
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [October 20, 2006, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/4 "2006-10-20T21:46:17Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace]
Don’t you think the person that CT folks elect is, by definition, the one who should win? We don’t know who that is right now, but why exactly should Lamont win unless he’s the choice of the people in that state?
[/QUOTE]
Yeh, of course, but for purposes of this thread, WRT issue #2, let’s pretend we’re all Connectican? Connecticutan? Connecticutter? voters and we’re arguing about who would make the better senator.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [October 20, 2006, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/5 "2006-10-20T21:50:31Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
Yeh, of course, but for purposes of this thread, WRT issue #2, let’s pretend we’re all Connectican? Connecticutan? Connecticutter? voters and we’re arguing about who would make the better senator.
[/QUOTE]
Ok, so the question is: Who would you like win, not who should win. In that case, it isn’t “Liberman or Lamont”, it’s all the candidates. I’m not sure if there are 3rd party candidates, but there is a Republican candidate.
I don’t know enough about Lamont, but I’d be pretty hesitant to vote for Lieberman unless Lamont was pretty far out there. It doesn’t seem like he is, so I’d probably vote for him. The Republican comes off like a snake oil salesman, so he’s out of the question.
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### Author:  [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)
#### Post date: [October 21, 2006, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/6 "2006-10-21T00:02:01Z")
Lieberman is pulling away in the polls thanks to Republican support, and, if he does as he says and stays a Democrat, could be the seat that tips the Senate. Given his weakness, Nutmeggers (there’s the word, no shit) of the Republican persuasion can only wonder if they might have won the seat for themselves if they’d (A) run a real candidate and (B) actually supported him.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [October 21, 2006, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/7 "2006-10-21T17:04:18Z")
Well, there’s a good chance RI will have an ex-Republican Senator who could probably run successfully in CT next time. 🙂
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### Author:  [@SmackFu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmackFu)
#### Post date: [October 21, 2006, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/8 "2006-10-21T21:03:00Z")
This whole race is bizarre.
For instance, Schlesinger is polling at 6-8% right now. At Lieberman’s last election in 2000, his opponent got 34% of the vote. That 25%, which would be the moderate conservative vote, must have gone to Lieberman. But it’s not like his positions have changed in the last 6 years.
(And as an aside, Lieberman’s 2000 Republican opponent was [a very, very bad man](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Giordano) whose scandals since then make Foley look like a saint.)
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### Author:  [@Caridwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caridwen)
#### Post date: [October 21, 2006, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/9 "2006-10-21T21:06:36Z")
I would so love to hear from a Lieberman supporter.
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### Author:  [@An\_Arky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Arky)
#### Post date: [October 21, 2006, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/10 "2006-10-21T21:10:08Z")
I’m confused as to why Lieberman lost the Dem primary decisively but is winning the general even more decisively. I can understand that there may be a lot of soft Republicans picking him over whats-his-name (GOP loser), but why the huge flip-flop over Lamont?
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [October 21, 2006, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/11 "2006-10-21T21:13:40Z")
[QUOTE=SmackFu]
This whole race is bizarre.
For instance, Schlesinger is polling at 6-8% right now. At Lieberman’s last election in 2000, his opponent got 34% of the vote. That 25%, which would be the moderate conservative vote, must have gone to Lieberman. But it’s not like his positions have changed in the last 6 years.
(And as an aside, Lieberman’s 2000 Republican opponent was [a very, very bad man](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Giordano) whose scandals since then make Foley look like a saint.)
[/QUOTE]
But think about it. If you’re a Pubbie, a vote for Schles is a vote for Lamont. Last time you didn’t have that to deal with. You know Schles isn’t going to win, and he’s a real scumbag to boot. What’s to be gained by voting for him? Makes perfect sense to me. Lieberman isn’t a Republican, but he’s a moderate Democrat. Lamont, not so much.
You don’t really expect the Greens in FL to vote for Nader again if it comes down to that, do you? Similar situation here, too.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [October 21, 2006, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/12 "2006-10-21T21:36:01Z")
[QUOTE=An Arky]
I’m confused as to why Lieberman lost the Dem primary decisively but is winning the general even more decisively. I can understand that there may be a lot of soft Republicans picking him over whats-his-name (GOP loser), but why the huge flip-flop over Lamont?
[/QUOTE]
Only the Democrats vote in the primary, and they are only about 30% of the voters in the general. The biggest group of voters in CT are independent. And the primary was 52-48, so I’m not sure if that constitutes a “decisive” victory, although it certainly was a victory. As soon as I saw those numbers, I thought that Lieberman had an excellent chance to win in the general.
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### Author:  [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)
#### Post date: [October 22, 2006, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/13 "2006-10-22T16:28:33Z")
There’s no Dem flip-flop over Lamont; they’re supporting him even more strongly now than in the primary. [The latest Quinnipiac](http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x11362.xml?ReleaseID=974):
> [@](#):
>
> In this latest survey, Lieberman leads Lamont 70 - 9 percent among likely Republican voters, with 18 percent for Schlesinger, and 58 - 32 - 5 percent among likely independent voters, while likely Democratic voters back Lamont 55 - 36 percent.
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [October 22, 2006, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/14 "2006-10-22T20:09:13Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace]
Well, there’s a good chance RI will have an ex-Republican Senator who could probably run successfully in CT next time. 🙂
[/QUOTE]
I hope you’re not encouraging those goddam Rhodie carpetbaggers . . .
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [October 22, 2006, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/15 "2006-10-22T20:10:44Z")
[QUOTE=Caridwen]
I would so love to hear from a Lieberman supporter.
[/QUOTE]
I would love to hear some thoughts about how this election reflects on the most important issue distinguishing Lieberman from Lamont: The war.
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### Author:  [@Billdo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Billdo)
#### Post date: [October 22, 2006, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/16 "2006-10-22T21:38:10Z")
The Democratic primary was between the sanctimonious Holy Roller Joe and Ned Nobody whose only defining characteristic was that he opposed the Bush administration’s entry into and handling of the Iraq war. Lieberman, on the other hand was perhaps the biggest Democratic supporter of the administration’s war policy.
The Democratic primary voters, by a small margin, expressed their frustration with Lieberman by voting against the former Vice Presidential candidate and for, basically, some guy off the street that wasn’t Lieberman. Once this happens, Lieberman decides to run as an independent, essentially telling the Democratic leadership and its primary process to go fly a kite, further pissing Democrats off.
However, in the general election, the broader electorate had three choices. First, there is Lieberman, who is liberal as heck, but at least supports the war. Second there is Lamont, who has positioned himself as more liberal than Lieberman. And third there is the Republican patsy, who won’t win no matter how you slice it.
If you’re a democrat who was involved in the primary process, you’ll vote the same way, or perhaps switch from Lieberman to Lamont because of irriation with Lieberman running as an independent. However, for everybody else, mostly mainstream or right-of-center, it’s a case of do we want the ultra-liberal we know, the ultra-ultra-liberal who has come out of nowhere, or to throw our vote away on the Republican. Most of the remaining voters have wound up supporting Lieberman.
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### Author:  [@Caridwen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caridwen)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2006, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/17 "2006-10-23T04:00:44Z")
I really think it’s as John Mace says, it’s the independents & republicans voting for Lieberman. He’s been getting lots of money from the repubs so it’ll be interesting if he’s re-elected. His campaign money has always come mostly from out of state.
I don’t understand why the big guns like Clinton, etc. aren’t out campaigning for him. He’s a disgrace to the democratic party. Did he have to return any of the money he received from the dem. party when he changed to an independent?
I think he’ll win, but I’d love to see him loose.
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### Author:  [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2006, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/18 "2006-10-23T05:54:35Z")
Speaking as a Republican… neither Liberman nor Lamont holds the slightest appeal for me. Not that it matters- Connecticut is not about to elect a Senator who’s to my liking anyway.
I interject only to make one point: On every issue EXCEPT the Iraq War, Joe Liberman is a standard, straight down the line liberal Democrat. The widespread notion that he’s a Democrat “in name only” is not only false, it’s absurd.
Now, it’s not my place to tell liberal Democrats whom they should vote for. If Lieberman’s stance on the war strikes a liberal Democrat as reason enough to vote against him, fine!
But I don’t think that’s the reason. I think the reason is that, even though Lieberman’s voting record shows he’s a standard, reliable liberal, he just doesn’t FEEL like a liberal to some people. He talked enough about his faith in 2000 to make a lot of liberals think, “I dunno… he just doesn’t feel like one of us.”
John McCain has the same problem in reverse. His voting record shows pretty clearly that he is what he’s always claimed to be: a Reagan Republican. But somehow, conservatives don’t trust him, because he just doesn’t FEEL like a conservative to them.
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### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2006, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/19 "2006-10-23T14:05:19Z")
**astorian** : I’ll just add that one reason neither of those guys is fully trusted by the partisans in their respective parties is that they are actually willing to work with the other side and not just play politics _all_ the time.
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### Author:  [@SmackFu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmackFu)
#### Post date: [October 23, 2006, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lieberman-or-lamont/377274/20 "2006-10-23T14:50:21Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Joe Liberman is a standard, straight down the line liberal Democrat.
Well, not from my perspective. One of his major issues is “protecting our children” by putting in rating systems and the like. That’s why I’ve opposed him in the past.
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