Letters to the Editor
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The New York Times link
takes you to the Wall Street Journal. (as of 12:45)
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Zogby has Lamont
within the margin of error.
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Dems run the risk of declaring victory today
Someone should remind them that blogs and alternative radio stations are not the reality where votes actually get cast. The Dems run the risk of smugly having thought they already won before the election happens.
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Is Lamont the Democratic nominee only because a GOP strategy backfired?
When the Republicans perceived that the whole "left-wing extremist challenges reasonable Democrat in primary" spin would help them they pushed their message into the media and the primary received a great deal of coverage. Now that more coverage of the Lamont vs Lieberman isn't seen as an advantage the Republican media machine isn't pushing it and news of the race fades.
It's pretty sad, but if the Republicans never pushed any story about the primary it wouldn't have been a big deal and Lieberman probably would have won. It seems to me that it's likely that Lamont is the Democratic nominee because the original GOP strategy backfired.
No one's pushing for coverage of Lamont vs Lieberman race any more but Mr. Lamont really needs to be seen now. Hopefully he'll be able to make an effective media buy in the coming month to overtake Joe Lieberman in the polls. If you don't own the media you have to pay big money to be heard. That's the state of "free speach" in the political world today.
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Why Lamont Isn't Winning
The reason Lieberman is comfortably ahead of Ned Lamont is obvious: While Lamont’s great at criticizing Lieberman's obsequious fealty to Bush's incompetent anti-terrorism policies he hasn't offered a compelling alternative of his own. Without that, Lieberman, bad as he’s been, continues to own national security as an issue. Lamont’s campaign has essentially consisted of preaching to the choir, which is mind-blowingly dumb because he already has them.
What Lamont needs to do is promise to do all of the obvious things that Lieberman and the Republicans have dangerously left undone because they’re too busy recruiting terrorists while wasting lives and national treasure in the otherwise irrelevant Iraq debacle: Our port security is a joke. There’s no reason why 100% of containers coming into this country can’t be inspected, especially when that’s the easiest way to sneak in a crude nuclear device. The government should restore funding to buy loose nuclear materials in places that used to belong to the old Soviet Union. Chemical plants need to have higher, enforceable security standards. Blowing up a tank of vinyl acetate located near Boston would unleash a 5-mile long cloud of the deadly gas killing tens of thousands. Bush and the Republicans, with Lieberman’s approval have not only done very little, they’ve actually blocked obvious steps to improve public safety. Lamont needs to scare everyone with the fact and then promise to fix the problem. That would buttress Lamont's security bona fides while legitimately undermining Lieberman's.
Unfortunately, this strategy is likely to remain mere fantasy. Liberals are manifestly superior at running the country but, when it comes to winning elections, they usually have tin ears. In that way, they're exactly the opposite of Republicans.
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When's the last time you saw Ned Lamont on television?
Very much overlooked in this discussion of why Lamont is falling behind is the fact that the networks and cable news will not show Ned Lamont's face at all, unless it's a paid ad.
Meanwhile, Liebermann is welcome on every news and pundit show you can name. Larry King, Joe Scarborough, Wolf Blitzer's Situation Room, and of course Fox 'news' has him on so often you would assume he's been given his own dressing room.
I've written to CNN a couple of times recently after Holy Joe gets another five minute freebee to ask "where's Ned?" Of course, there's no response. Fox I can understand, but MSNBC and CNN? No excuse.