More flawed Lieberman reporting
October 28, 2009 12:07 pm ET by Jamison Foser
Politico's Manu Raju and Glenn Thrush join the lengthy list of reporters who have quoted Joe Lieberman's stated reasons for opposing health care reform that includes a public option without noting that those reasons appear to be, as TNR's Jonathan Chait put it, "babbling nonsense."
Raju and Thrush quoted Lieberman arguing: "To put this government-created insurance company on top of everything else is just asking for trouble for the taxpayers, for the premium payers and for the national debt. ... I don't think we need it now."
But they didn't mention that, as Media Matters noted yesterday, "while Reid has yet to release details of the compromise Senate legislation, every other proposed bill with a public option so far has required the costs of the public plan to be covered by the premiums of those who enroll in it."
Later, the Politico reporters wrote that among Democrats "there is much lingering ill will over Lieberman's perceived lack of loyalty."
"Perceived"?
In the past three years, Lieberman has run against the Democratic nominee for his seat, endorsed the Republican presidential candidate, attacked Barack Obama during a speech at the Republican National Convention, and campaigned for Republican Senate candidates. When President Obama and the Senate Democratic caucus let him keep his committee chairmanship anyway, he repaid their kindness by announcing his intention to join Republicans in filibustering health care reform.
What does he have to do to get Politico to drop the "perceived"?
This'd be a two-fer, no one in the Democratic Party like Lieberman much anyway, Lieberman has painted a target on his back by speaking up when he did and it's far better to slap down disloyal members of the Democratic caucus now, rather than to wait for the other Blue Dogs to start getting funny ideas about screwing over their colleagues.
I cannot fathom why he still is a head of a committee, unless he has said that he would switch parties if that leadership position is taken away. Of course, that would be another sign of disloyalty.
For the Politico writers to drop the word "perceived" they would actually have to risk a political judgement about Lieberman. Perhaps they just weren't in the mood to stick their necks out today. Their default is to report "man perceives being bitten by dog".