"extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice"...

sampling the republican rhetoric on the heels of lieberlips getting the gate harkens chicken little's shriek about the sky...

to wit, josh marshall cites mike allen citing the usual and very suspect repo talking points:

The piece runs down each of the key GOP players -- Mehlman, Cheney, Snow -- each bellowing out RNC talking points claiming that Lieberman's defeat means the Democratic party is beholden to the hard-left and ostrich-like isolationists.

Lieberman, as Mike explains, is now slated to become the martyr to isolationism whom Republicans will laud at every turn. "On television and in speeches in coming days," writes Allen, "party officials and strategists plan to talk about their respect for Lieberman as a distinguished public servant and argue that Lamont's victory represents the end of the long tradition of strong-on-national-defense Democratic leaders in the mold of Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and John F. Kennedy."

speaking of harry truman, ronald reagan said back in '88 that, were he alive today, truman would be a republican... funny how that was what finally set mike dukakis off, and only about two days before the election... dukakis, pathetically anemic throughout his campaign, reacted strongly to reagan's tweak and shouted during a speech, "i AM a liberal!", which, of course, roused his base from its slumber, enough to shrink his polling-deficit to g.h.w.bush from roughly 7-8 pts to 3-4, too little too late of course...

and if i recall correctly, the nytimes did an election post-mortum showing that had dukakis campaigned just a little bit harder in 10 of the swing states that eventually went bush, a switch of as few as 10,000 votes total, across those same states, could've turned america blue in '88 (and, in hindsight, one might say, "indeed, blue!")...

but back to my point about truman: i remember reagan's comment and thinking as a counter, "well, if abraham lincoln were alive today, he'd be a democrat!" -- which, i contend, holds today, and perhaps more so...

i would now argue you could bring barry goldwater into the big D camp, again were he still kickin', for it grows plainer for even the modest reactionary to see: the extremism that exists in america this day is on the right, and it's not in liberty's defense but rather in its assault...

the good news, however, is that in its defense, it is ours to be made... and connecticut has shown us the way...

and if i can give reagan a little tweak: lieberman's defeat represents morning in america again...

and that is definitely no vice...