"Northerners have a tendency to be cool, make nice, work out their deals, keep a low profile...."

GK has lived in the Twin Cities so long he thinks they are the center of the universe, or at least The North. Sorry, not quite accurate. What he describes above has nothing to do with Northerners in general, and everything to do with what Minnesota's award-winning mystery writer Ellen Hart calls "Minnesota Nice."

We should recognize Mel's star power and christen a new crime. In addition to DUI, being Drunk and Disorderly, and Resisting Arrest, he was DWB: Driving While Bigoted.

The Washington Post today makes this observation about the change in Lieberman's fortunes:

"His instincts for collegiality and bipartisanship, once regarded as virtues, are now seen as virtual disqualifications by his critics here and nationally."

Too bad he wasn't more collegial to members of his own party!

I'm sure you could find some Jewish ethicist who would write a piece saying quite the opposite. But you don't need faith to understand how despicable the Senator's behavior was. I wrote Lieberman a letter right after his Clinton bashing speech, condemning his shameful attack from a Jewish perspective, even though I wasn't an observant Jew. I'm sure I wasn't alone, and I'm sure Lieberman doesn't care what anyone thinks unless they agree with him: his narcissism is more than obvious.

Well, on to more entertaining topics. I'm hoping salon will ask the blazing question: given the crisis in the Middle East, IS THIS THE END OF TIMES? And have a devout, apocalyptic Christian consider the question. Deeply.

The Good Rabbi evinces very little psychological understanding or empathy when he says this:

President Clinton was humiliated by his own actions, not by something that Joe Lieberman said. Lieberman's rebuke was based on information that was already public, and as such could not have humiliated Clinton any more than the president's own actions did.

I've co-authored books on shame with one of the country's leading pioneers in psychological thinking about this crucial human emotion (he popularized the term "shame spiral"). Yes, the President shamed himself, but shame isn't just about revealing information or information being revealed. Once a scandal is out, you can be further shamed repeatedly by people referring to it, rebuking you, mocking you, etc. The shame is re-experienced and even deepened into humiliation. Lieberman attacked the President, called further attention to his misdeeds, and that's shaming behavior. The Good Rabbi might want to do some reading in Affect Theory to get a handle on what shame really is and how it works.

Bravo. Iraq has a (worthless) constitution, a government (cowering in the Green Zone), and elections (that have led nowhere). Dozens of people are killed there every day, horribly, in a civil war. The main charges of those who were against the Iraq invasion were these: it was unjustified, it was dishonest, it was against American values, and it would unleash chaos. All of that, to our nation's shame, has been proven correct, over and over.

I wish Lamont would run ads that said

JOE LIEBERMAN:

DICK CHENEY'S FAVORITE DEMOCRAT

That's all. Cheney is so unpopular, even among Republicans, that this would be a dagger in the heart of Lieberman's campaign.

Dear Anonymous:

We already are an empire. The Republic is moribund, if not quite dead. Read Chalmers Johnson's The Sorrows of Empire for the signs like massive debt, military adventurism, rubber-stamping Senate. And read Senator Byrd's excoriation of the weak-kneed Senate in Losing Our Democracym (and don't skip his speeches at the end). Then go back in time with Tom Holland's Rubicon. It's all there, all clear, and all depressing.

Speedo, schmeedo. A speedo covers too too much. If he were a real man, this dude would strut around in a cache-sexe

(aka cachet). Now that's bold, that's daring, that's healing the shame that binds you. And it obviously the sequel to this thrilling essay.

Okay, let's imagine that Allen didn't speak French, his mother wasn't French Tunisian, and even posit that there is no such ethnic slur as Macaca. Just for the sake of argument.

In a group of white people, he pointed to a man of color and called him a "funny" name. It could have been, oh, something else, say, Ishnkabibble. The point is, he was making fun of the guy's perceived "foreignness," his being "not one of us."

And so the Senator is not only a liar, he's a bigot, or in words he'd understand, une ordure.

BTW, where was Mr. half-French Tunisian while Congress renamed French toast and French fries. What a coward, what a loser. Lui, il est minable.

Virginia Veteran, I had the same response to Allen just from watching clips. And he does indeed remind me of another George. I'm glad you mentioned the lack of empathy, the eyes and the vibe, because one of the things that's been incredibly frustrating is that the MSM for six long years has blathered on and on about George of the Texas Jungle's charm and easy-going nature, his humor, etc. Like those "funny" nicknames, that are really about power of naming, not about having fun. All you have to do is turn the sound off when he's on TV and watch the affects expressed on his face: contempt, disgust, anger. They predominate and they belie his words, as does the smile that emerges at the wrong times. One of the only people to get this and say it in print is Justin Kaplan in Bush on the Couch. The MSM blindly takes GB at his word, or has for way too long, and has helped create a Potemkin President.

Laura, it's au contraire, mes amis. Mon is singular. Unless you had someone specific out there in mind. . .