Saturday, October 14, 2006

As the Blogs Turn (on Ned), Part II

(posted on October 14, 2006)

You know things are getting dicey for Negative Ned when even the leading liberal blog Talking Points Memo runs a brutal piece like this:

CT-SEN: Lamont Smacks Forehead Repeatedly, Berates Self as “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!”"

It’s been a surprisingly long time since the Midterm Roundup took a look at the Senate race in Connecticut, which for a while there – before Foley, before Macaca, so long, long, long ago – was the very cornerstone of this column. Since Lamont’s whirlwind rise and huge upset in the August 8 Democratic primary, it feels to the Roundup like a sort of “mm, that was fun, wasn’t it, oh well…” indifference has gradually settled back onto the race. Once-giddy Lamont supporters haven’t found their man ahead in a single post-primary poll. And Lamont’s name has been noticeably absent from recent weeks’ headlines.

Until now. Unfortunately for Lamont though, not for the right reason.

Not helping Lamont’s cause the slightest bit was a recent campaign letter criticizing Joe Lieberman’s past stance on affirmative action and a comment made Wednesday by former state Treasurer and Lamont endorser Henry E. Parker. At a press conference, with Lamont at his side, Parker questioned Senator Joe Lieberman’s civil rights work in Mississippi in the early 1960s. “I’m saying that my view is there's no evidence of what he's done. Let him prove that he's been there,” Parker said. “I suspect that he was not there, and the reason I suspect that is because he's a guy who says anything to win.”

The Hartford Courant reports, “Lamont's campaign, which immediately seemed to grasp the political misstep, disavowed Parker's claim even before Lieberman produced news clippings placing him in Mississippi. …

“But the damage was done. The episode gave Lieberman an opportunity to reinforce a constant theme of his campaign - that Lamont has relentlessly distorted Lieberman's record in the contest for the U.S. Senate.”

Read the full TPM post.

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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/14/2006 at 12:44 AM

Joe on the campaign trail

(posted on October 14, 2006 - click here to see images)

Joe was met on Friday by a huge group of diners and supporters100_0504.JPG at Coffee An’ Donut Shop in Westport. The small Westport staple (no pun intended for those of you from Westport) was so full that people had to file in behind the counter, including Joe himself. It was a natural fit for him though, as he walked over to some customers, introduced himse100_0515.JPGlf, and asked what he could get them.

One young supporter who was thrilled to see Joe asked about internship opportunities (he was probably 8) but the Senator assured him that when he was a few years older, he would be welcome to join his office in Washington and get an exciting first hand look at our government in progress. Today was another great day on the campaign trail, and with 24 days to go, everyone on the campaign team is filled with optimism!

More photos from Friday on our Flickr page.

Friday, October 13, 2006

Rep. John Lewis speaks out for Joe

(posted on October 13, 2006)

Below is a statement from Rep. John Lewis, a well-known leader of the Civil Rights Movement.

“Joe Lieberman is my colleague in Congress, my friend and my brother. Anyone who questions his commitment to civil rights is putting politics above the facts. As a young student, Joe Lieberman left the comfort of Connecticut to be a foot soldier in the drive to register black voters.

"Joe Lieberman responded to the greatest moral crisis of our time: He came to the heart of the delta of Mississippi to help tear down the walls of segregation and racial discrimination and he marched with Martin Luther King in the March on Washington. He is a man of principle and faith, who has worked his whole life to help give the hope and opportunity of the American dream to all people, regardless of the color of their skin.”
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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/13/2006 at 2:50 PM

Ned's Worst Week

(posted on October 13, 2006 - click here to see post with clickable links)

Courant columnist Kevin Rennie has probably the best take yet on the Lamont campaign’s uncivil lies about Joe’s record. It pegs Negative Ned so well we won’t even bother summarizing it — here is the whole piece:

POLITICAL WIRE

Lamont's Worst Week
When Ned Lamont infused another $2 million of his vast fortune into his campaign on Tuesday evening, he probably didn’t have it allocated to damage control. He’ll have no choice if he is to continue to be seen as a contender in the race for the U.S. Senate in Connecticut.

Incumbent independent Joseph Lieberman has maintained a firm lead in polls for the past month. Lamont, who has contributed close to $9 million to his campaign, has run a long series of negative ads against Lieberman but gained no ground of late. He appeared to be trying to alter the focus of his campaign this week with a speech on change and the future, a bow toward adding some substance to his campaign’s scrawny frame. He needed to talk about something other than Iraq. He’ll have no choice now.

His plans were upended by a self-made calamity on Wednesday when Lamont joined prominent Connecticut African-American Democrats to receive their endorsement. In the bitter contest, however, the Lamont campaign cannot resist taking a few whacks at Lieberman instead of featuring a purely positive endorsement event.

The Wednesday press event included another letter from the Lamont campaign to Lieberman (St. Paul didn’t write this many letters) criticizing him for mentioning his support of civil rights as a young man in a television ad. As Lamont stood by, former state treasurer Henry Parker accused Lieberman of lying about his trip to Mississippi in the fraught early 1960s and attending Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.’s August 1963 march on Washington. Wags insisted that the record should note that the press conference was not at the all-white Round Hill Club that Lamont resigned from, after 16 years as a member, before launching his Senate campaign.

Lamont seemed clueless that a vicious slander was taking place in his presence in the name of advancing his campaign. Now we know that the face of an imploding campaign is both impassive and clueless.

Lieberman seized the moment and summoned the press to denounce the ugly attack. The fight dominated the news in the state today as politicos were buzzing that Lamont and his team are looking like amateurs despite the millions showered on the campaign.

Parker recanted by midday Thursday. Lamont himself continues to labor in silence, whether it is stunned or studied, we don’t know. For mannerly Connecticut, the Lamont campaign smear of Lieberman is far out of bounds.

Lamont will have to shape a response by Monday afternoon when he is scheduled to meet Lieberman in their first debate since July. A shrug accompanied by pointing at the aged and addlepated Parker won’t suffice to change the subject. Some crow ought to be on the menu.

With his campaign in precipitous decline, Lamont can look forward to rougher treatment from Lieberman and his team as they smell the chance to put away the Democratic insurgent in the next week. More grainy photos will be gracing television screens.

As the week ends, events give rise to a sentence that may have never been written before: Poor Ned Lamont.

-- Guest contributor Kevin Rennie is a columnist for the Hartford Courant and a former Republican Connecticut state senator.
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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/13/2006 at 10:28 PM

Voters deserve to know how Ned is being financed

(posted on October 13, 2006)

We renewed our call today for Ned to release his family’s tax returns for the past five years. Voters of Connecticut have a right to know where the $9 million that Ned is pouring into his campaign is actually coming from.

This weekend we will be filing our fundraising report with the Federal Elections Commission, which will document the source of every penny our campaign has received over the past two and a half months, and that is as it should be we believe in full disclosure and transparency.

Ned's campaign, on the other hand, will only be disclosing the source of a small percentage of their campaign funding and hiding all the rest. That is because the overwhelming majority of Ned’s campaign funds are coming from the Lamont family’s assets, and Ned has repeatedly refused to let the public see his family’s tax returns, which would show where his campaign funds are actually coming from.

Joe has released his full tax returns from the past five years, but Ned has only released his individual tax return from last year, and that was only because he was pressured into doing so by the news media.

Ned has continued to hide his prior year’s tax returns, which he always filed jointly with his wife until last year. Ned also has not released his wife’s separate tax return for 2005. And he has yet to explain how he can justifying keeping this information secret.

This double standard is indefensible. Just as the public has a right to know how our campaign is being funded, they have the same right to know how Ned’s is being funded too. And the only way to determine that is for Ned to make his family’s tax returns public, so the public can see the source of his and his wife’s income and assets.

Ned and his campaign are planning to comb through our FEC filing and use it to continue their unrelenting negative attacks on Joe. Why should our campaign be denied the same opportunity to ask tough questions about where Ned is getting his campaign money from?

Is Ned’s $9 million coming from investments in the big corporations that he routinely attacks? Is it coming from investments in companies that ship jobs overseas, which Ned also routinely attacks? Is it coming from shady tax shelters that are unavailable to Connecticut’s working families and adding to the federal deficit, which Ned routinely attacks?

These are legitimate questions and they deserve legitimate answers. And that is why we are again calling on Ned to release his family’s tax returns for the last five years.

If Ned really believes in transparency and accountability, and he has nothing to hide, then he will adhere to the same standard followed by Joe and most every other congressional candidate and let the public know exactly how his campaign is being funded.

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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/13/2006 at 2:06 PM

Thursday, October 12, 2006

The truth about the Long Island Sound

(posted on October 12, 2006)

Leave it to the Lamont campaign to follow up its outrageous lies about Joe’s civil rights by falsely attacking Joe’s unmatched record of results on Long Island Sound.

This is what this campaign has come to — a dilettante whose greatest environmental accomplishment is trading in his Lexus SUV several months ago to ride around the state in a hybrid is trying to say he’d do a better job of protecting Long Island Sound than the guy who created the EPA’s Long Island Sound Office, continually fought to get funding for state cleanup efforts, and whose leadership on this issue has been recognized with the endorsement of the League of Conservation Voters.

The only thing that would make the Lamont campaign a bigger joke is if Ned of all people, with his unmatched record of inconsistencies and hypocrisy, directly questioned Joe’s integrity.

Sadly, that is just what Lamont did, ridiculously suggesting that Joe sold of the Sound for campaign contributions.

That is almost as big a lie as their assertion that Joe didn’t participate in the civil rights movement.

The fact is, the energy bill Lamont is talking about does nothing to hurt Connecticut’s ability to protect the Sound. That is a myth the Lamont campaign is cynically peddling in a desperate attempt to hurt Joe with voters who care about the environment. And just last month, Joe successfully worked across party lines to pass the Long Island Sound Stewardship Act, which designates $40 million for a Stewardship Committee that would have the authority to designate crucial parcels as ‘Stewardship Sites’ eligible for special preservation funds.

Moreover, Joe has been very clear about why he ultimately ended up voting for the energy bill. He opposed the big subsidies for big energy companies, and has cosponsored legislation to repeal them. But the bill contained a provision that would help save Connecticut homeowners and businesses close to a billion in lower electricity bills, and that was important enough for him to tip the balance and support the bill.

The real question here, since Ned would have blindly opposed the bill regardless of the benefits for Connecticut, is why he would force Connecticut consumers to pay $1 billion in higher electricity prices? Is being rigidly partisan more important that helping his constituents?

Here are the facts about Joe's record of results on protecting and preserving the Long Island Sound:

* In 1990, Joe Lieberman authored legislation that established Office of Long Island Sound Programs within the EPA under section 119 of the Clean Water Act. The purpose of the Office is to coordinate Federal and State activities, assist in public outreach and education, and provide grants to help implement the Long Island Sound Comprehensive Management Plan and Restoration Agreement activities. Since that time, Lieberman has secured millions in funding for the Office, which partially funds the Long Island Sound Study. In 1994, the LISS developed the Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan for Long Island Sound. The plan identifies the specific commitments and recommendations for actions to improve water quality, protect habitat and living resources, educate and involve the public, improve the long-term understanding of how to manage the Sound, monitor progress, and redirect management efforts.
* In 2000, Joe Lieberman successfully fought to pass Estuary Habitat Restoration Act passed in the Senate. It authorized $40 million per year for five years to ensure a safer, less polluted Long Island Sound. This figure represented a 13-fold increase above the previous yearly funding high of $3 million for Long Island Sound programs.
* In 2005, Joe Lieberman helped broker a deal between the EPA, Connecticut and New York that allowed for the designation of two dredge material disposal sites in Long Island Sound. One of the innovative features of the agreement was the provision for the development of a comprehensive dredged materials management plan addressing the entire Long Island Sound. This plan will enable the states to work with EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers to develop long-term alternative uses of dredged material, including beach restoration and upland disposal, thus eliminating the need for continued open water disposal. Lieberman is currently fighting for federal funding for the plan.
* In 2006, the Senate passed the Long Island Sound Stewardship Act (LISSA), which was introduced by Joe Lieberman in 2004. The bipartisan legislation establishes a broad-based “Long Island Sound Stewardship Committee” comprised of all LIS stakeholders, including federal, state, public interest and landowners representatives. The Committee would be charged with evaluating the parcels of land within the LIS region and designating crucial parcels as “Stewardship Sites” eligible for special preservation funds. Under the legislation, the Committee would give owners of Stewardship Sites financial incentive to sell their land to preservation groups or preserve the environmental and public access features of that land by volunteering to sell development rights to the land to the Committee itself. The legislation designates $40 million for the Committee’s budget, to be taken out of the funds authorized for LIS preservation under the EPA’s Nation Estuary Program.
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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/12/2006 at 7:08 PM

Unsolicited

(posted on October 12, 2006)

From the president of the Waterbury branch of the NAACP and former state president of the NAACP...

For Immediate Release

Jimmie L. Griffin, a long time outspoken civil rights leader today expressed disappointment in the very partisan attack by black democratic leaders in Connecticut against Senator Joe Lieberman's civil rights activities.

Griffin said, "I have a lot of respect for Hank Parker but I will not stand by and let the community of Connecticut be misled by this uncalled for partisan attack against a friend of the civil rights community." Griffin who is an unaffiliated voter who has been both a democrat and republican added, "I am tired of our people being used a political pawns when a tight race reflects a need for their votes".

Griffin said as a president of a local branch of the NAACP and former state president I have not endorsed any candidate but I am fully aware of the civil rights record of Joe Lieberman and would be remiss in not sharing his excellent ratings, given in the NAACP report cards produced out of our Washington, DC office.


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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/12/2006 at 6:40 PM

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Joe re-endorsed by IAAF and AFSCME Local 15

(posted on October 11, 2006; click on link to see images)

Joe was joined by two leading Connecticut first responder unions today as they announced their continued support for him in his bid for reelection. Joe was re-endorsed for the general election by the International Association of Firefighters (IAAF), and AFSCME Local 15, the Connecticut Council of Police Union.P1020284.JPG

These unions, who represent 8,000 first responders throughout Connecticut, endorsed Joe because of his proven record of strong support for police and firefighters.

Lieberman has been a consistent and effective advocate for increased funding for Connecticut’s first responders. Since 9-11, Connecticut has received more than $163 million in homeland security funds to support first responders – including assistance for the prevention activities of law enforcement under the Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Program and money for equipment and training for firefighters under the Fire Assistance Grant program.

P1020149.JPG Joe authored and led the fight to pass legislation to guarantee Connecticut a significant minimum level of homeland security funding each year, and to require the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to employ a risk-based grant system that takes into account the factors that make Connecticut vulnerable to terrorism. Joe said:

The recent anniversaries of 9-11 and Hurricane Katrina reminded us all of the round-the-clock heroism we depend on you for in a disaster – whether at the hands of nature or of terrorists. And the recent school shootings in Pennsylvania, Colorado, and Wisconsin remind us of the life-and-death decisions we ask you to make in split seconds under crisis conditions. Those of us who serve in Congress or in state government can never make your jobs risk-free. But we can give you the support you need to get the hard job you do done for us.

Throughout his career, Joe has fought for first responders:

* Joe Has Been a Leader in Promoting and Fighting for Funding for the Community Oriented Policing Services Program. Joe played a substantial role in shaping major provisions of the historic 1994 Crime Bill. This law created the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program that has put 100,000 new police officers on America’s streets and brought violent crime rates down to their lowest levels in years.
* Joe Has A Long History Trying to Stop Juvenile Violence. Joe has strongly supported Democratic efforts to reform the juvenile justice system, cosponsoring, for example, the Youth Violence, Crime, and Drug Abuse Control Act. This bill would, among other things, authorize funding for a number of crime prevention programs, reform the juvenile justice system and provide enhanced penalties for gang activities.
* Joe Lieberman Worked Across Party Lines for Homeland Security Funding that Benefited First Responders. When the President and Congress cut homeland security funding this year, Joe joined with Senator Collins (R-ME) to pass an amendment in the Senate to restore $986 million in funding for first responder and other homeland security needs.

Joe will continue his fight for first responders in Connecticut and throughout the country by:P1020147.JPG

* Fighting for increased funding for DHS first responder grant programs, DOJ COPS funding and pursuing reinstatement of the Cops in Schools program;
* Enacting legislation improving the DHS risk-based grant system;
* Fighting for effective implementation of the Information Sharing Environment;
* Renewing the ban on assault weapons and close the gun show loophole.

More photos from today on our Flickr page.

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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/11/2006 at 6:05 PM

Demanding Accountability from Ned

(Posted October 11, 2006)

Ned loves to talk about holding other people accountable. Well, it’s time to for Ned to be held accountable for running the most systematically dishonest campaign in a major race in recent American history.

With his campaign’s latest attack on Joe today, Ned has shown that it is now not enough to just repeatedly distort Joe’s record for him to try to get elected -- he must now openly lie about it.

In their ‘Daily Cup of Joe’ (link) attack piece this morning, the Lamont campaign repeated its claim that Joe is ‘continuing to back President Bush’s stay the course policy.’ That is not just a mischaracterization – it is an out and out lie. And the Lamont campaign knows it.

The fact is, in his major Iraq policy speech on September 25th, Joe explicitly rejected a stay the course strategy and called for a new approach to end the war without undermining our security. Here are the direct quotes from Lieberman’s speech:

I believe it would be every bit as much of a mistake to stay there indefinitely, both for the Iraqis and for us, and I have consistently opposed an open-ended commitment of American troops. That is something Ned Lamont and I do agree on.

Continuing on the same course we are on now is not a viable option either. We have to confront the reality that what we are doing now is not working, and to begin pursuing new approaches for achieving our mission in Iraq.

Let me repeat that, because it is important. Just continuing to do what we have been doing is not a solution. We must begin to pursue new approaches to get the job done in Iraq.

The Lamont campaign’s attack piece goes on to say that Joe is ‘isolated’ from several Republican skeptics, most notably former Secretary of State James Baker. Again, that is an out and out lie.

The fact is, James Baker’s recent statements closely mirror Joe’s assessment.

Here is what James Baker said:

I think it's fair to say our commission believes that there are alternatives between the stated alternatives, the ones that are out there in the political debate, of 'stay the course' and 'cut and run.

He explicitly rejected a rapid withdrawal from Iraq, saying that would invite Iran, Syria and ''even our friends in the gulf'' to fill the power vacuum.

Here is what Joe said in his speech:

I want to get past the false and empty choice between continuing to do just what we are doing and just giving up and pulling out, both of which are recipes for more failure and less security, and put forward some new approaches for getting the job done in Iraq.

The truth is, Lamont’s plan is not a plan for changing course. This is a plan for giving up in Iraq. For giving up on the hopes of the Iraqi people for becoming free and independent. And for giving up Iraq to the terrorists, the sectarian militias, and to the Iranians and Syrians, who would exploit the resulting chaos.

If anyone is out of step with the mainstream, it is Ned. As the facts show, Ned’s naïve and deadly plan for ending the war in Iraq — pulling all our troops out to meet an arbitrary pre-set deadline 9 or 12 months from now, depending on which day you ask Ned — has been explicitly rejected by the overwhelming majority of Democrats in the U.S. Senate, as well as by former President Bill Clinton.

The bottom line: how does Ned expect to change anything in Washington when the people of Connecticut can’t even trust him to tell the truth?

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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/11/2006 at 12:38 PM

Joe to Receive Major Police and Fire Endorsements

(Posted on October 11, 2006)

Joe will be re-endorsed for the general election by the Connecticut Council of Police Unions AFSCME 15 and the Connecticut International Association of Fire Fighters in Waterbury this afternoon.

Should have pictures up from the event later in the day.
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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/11/2006 at 12:23 PM

Lamont Hypocricy Watch: Faux Populism Edition

(They're late getting a "Blog of Joe" post up today, so for your Freedom of Speech commenting pleasure, I'm posting a copy of their latest smear effort from "The Full Lamonty" October 11, 2006. Yeah, they're a real classy bunch working at the Senator's campaign!)

Just when you think Ned’s chutzpah quotient could not rise any higher, he takes his hypocrisy to new heights.

In his latest shameless claim, Ned says in a letter to supporters that he will stand up and “defend his record of putting people first.”

And what would that record be?

* Oh yes, Ned clearly put people first by trading in his Lexus SUV this year to drive a hybrid and pretend he is environmentally conscious.
* He clearly put people first by resigning his membership in his too-white Greenwich country club after 16 years just to avoid embarrassing his campaign. [Greenwich Time, 4/2/06]
* He clearly put people first by refusing to allow his workers to unionize.
* He clearly put people first by laying off 68 percent of those workers he wouldn’t let organize according to the New York Times. [New York Times, 8/3//06]
* He clearly put people first by refusing to release his tax returns to the public, so they could see how he amassed his $90 million to $300 million fortune. [Multiple, 7/22/06]

That’s the Ned Lamont we know and love — putting posing first.

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Lamont's Latest Negative Attack Ad

(Posted October 10, 2006)

It is official – Ned is on track to set a new record for non-stop negativity in Connecticut campaigns.

The TV ad he is releasing today is his third attack ad in a week, and marks the 11th negative paid television or radio ad he has run since the primary – out of 12 ads total.

That means more than 90 percent of his ads have been totally or largely attacks on Joe – with no new ideas to solve the problems the people of Connecticut care about.

And it’s only going to get worse -- the Lamont campaign told the Hartford Courant that the ad is the first in a whole new series of negative attack ads they plan to run in the closing month of the campaign.

Sadly, with the ad he released today, all Ned is showing the people of Connecticut is his own desperation and hypocrisy.

The fact is Joe has a 93 percent career voting record over his 18 years in the Senate. That is the same exact percentage as Lamont compiled during his six years on a Greenwich town board.

Moreover, the overwhelming majority of the votes Joe missed were while he was working to defeat George W. Bush, who Ned attacks almost as much as Joe.

In 2000, Joe ran for Vice President to help Al Gore prevent George Bush from becoming president. In 2003, Joe ran for President to change the direction of the country by removing George Bush from office.

If you factor out those two campaigns, Joe’s voting record is 98 percent – he missed 109 votes out of 5295.

Ned should know this history as well as anyone. In the 2000 campaign, he gave $500 to Joe’s Senate campaign and $5000 to support the Gore-Lieberman campaign at a Greenwich fundraiser that Joe headlined.

In addition, in 2003 Ned twice contributed to Joe’s presidential campaign, well after the war in Iraq started.

Clearly Ned could not have that upset that Joe was missing votes in those years.

All of which shows that if it’s time for anything, it’s time for Ned to answer for his constant double talk and double standards.

How can he attack George Bush and the Bush policies and then turn around criticize Joe for trying to do something to stop Bush and change his policies?

Then again, we should not be surprised. This is the same Ned who last month had to reach back eight years to the Clinton impeachment proceeding to find something new to attack Joe, only for us to find that Ned praised Joe’s speech before he attacked it.

The bottom line: If Ned really wants to offer voters a change, he could give them a break from his relentlessly negative, misleading, and hypocritical attacks, and maybe provide just one new idea to solve a problem they care about.

So far, he has had practically nothing positive to offer the people of Connecticut — no experience, no credibility, and no ability to get things done for our state.

It is no wonder that the broad majority of voters outside his anti-war base are rejecting his campaign left and right.

HERE ARE THE FACTS:

* This new ad is his third attack ad in a week, and marks the 11th negative paid television or radio ad he has run since the primary – out of 12 ads total.
* That means more than 90 percent of his ads have been totally or largely attacks on Joe Lieberman – with no new ideas to solve the problems the people of Connecticut care about.
* The fact is Joe Lieberman has a 93 percent career voting record over his 18 years in the Senate. That is the same exact percentage as Ned Lamont compiled during his six years on a Greenwich town board.
* Moreover, the overwhelming majority of the votes Joe Lieberman missed were while he was working to defeat George W. Bush, who Ned attacks almost as much as Joe Lieberman.
* In 2000, Joe Lieberman ran for Vice President to help Al Gore prevent George Bush from becoming president. In 2003, Joe Lieberman ran for President to change the direction of the country by removing George Bush from office.
* If you factor out those two campaigns, Joe Lieberman’s voting record is 98 percent – he missed 109 votes out of 5295.
* Ned should know this history as well as anyone. In the 2000 campaign, he gave $500 to Joe Lieberman’s Senate campaign and $5000 to support the Gore-Lieberman campaign at a Greenwich fundraiser that Joe Lieberman headlined.
* In addition, in 2003 Ned twice contributed to Joe Lieberman’s presidential campaign, well after the war in Iraq started.
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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/10/2006 at 3:56 PM

===================================================================

ADDENDUM from Connecticut Bob (B.A.) - Here's the Lamont ad that Eric is referring to above. Judge for yourself:

New Internet Ad

(Posted on October 10, 2006)

Our first internet ad in the general election calling attention to Joe’s strong voting attendance record of 93%, Ned Lamont’s negativity, lack of new ideas, and increasingly desperate attacks on Joe’s record of results:

(Click this for Joe's ad)
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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/10/2006 at 1:33 PM

Joe on North Korea

(posted on October 10, 2006)

Here is Joe's statement on North Korea based off some comments he made to reporters yesterday...
We have known for some time that the North Koreans have had enough nuclear fuel to build as many as 10 or 11 nuclear weapons of the size that we used on Hiroshima. Now that they have used some of that fuel to test a nuclear device, it tells us again that we live in a dangerous world; that we have got to work with our allies and we’ve got to work with each other, and not simply use serious foreign policy challenges as just another excuse for partisan politics.

Most important of all, the UN Security Council and the nations in the region with whom we’ve been working, the Chinese in particular, have leverage with the North Koreans. We have to stick with them as we try to get Kim Jong-Il and the North Koreans to do away with this capacity that they have now shown that they have. I think we’re stronger when we are working with the other nations in the region, not just alone, but if the nations in that region and we think that the United States can accomplish something by sitting down with Kim Jong-il in bilateral talks, I also believe that since we are strong, we don’t lose anything -- and we certainly don’t lose any strength we have -- by sitting down with the North Koreans and trying to negotiate the end of their nuclear program.
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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/10/2006 at 8:56 AM

Monday, October 09, 2006

Protecting kids from online threats

(posted October 9, 2006)

Saying that the Foley scandal in Washington underscored the growing threats to children online, Joe outlined a broad new Internet safety agenda today to help parents keep their kids safe from sexual predators and other harmful influences.

P1020137.JPG

In a speech today at the WDRC Listener Lunch hosted by Brad Davis in East Windsor, Joe denounced Foley’s use of email and instant messaging to prey on teenage Congressional pages as reprehensible, saying it was one of every 21st Century parent’s worst nightmares:
This is a real and dangerous threat, as parents here in Connecticut well know. You’ve probably seen the headlines. . . the 27-year-old man in Chaplin who was arrested for an alleged sexual assault committed against a 13-year-old girl from Hebron, whom he had met on the web site called MySpace. . . . and the arrest of two men who used MySpace to lure and assault two girls from Fairfield County, just 11- and 14-years-old.

Those two examples, along with the Foley case, represent just the tip of an iceberg of indecent activity spurred on by the Internet. One study reporter that about one out of every six children online receive a sexual solicitation. That is a frightening statistic – and an even more frightening reality for today’s parents.
Joe also said that if there were ever a time to put people ahead of politics and focus on finding solutions, this was it:
Sadly, my opponent in the Senate campaign, Ned Lamont, could not resist the urge to politicize this awful incident. He spent much of last week twisting my statements and launching more false political attacks against me. And as usual, he offered no constructive ideas to address the larger problem here of keeping kids safe online.
After highlighting his long record of fighting to help parents raise their children with good values and protect them from harmful media influences, Joe noted that the Internet presented a whole new set of challenges and a whole new focus on keeping kids safe online.
Let’s face it: technology is changing more rapidly than our ability to protect our kids. I believe the time has come to fight back. Not to stop the march of progress – but to help parents keep pace.
With this in mind, Joe outlined several ideas aimed at stopping Internt predators and empowering parents to control the media their children consume:P1020135.JPG

Demand More Corporate Responsibility from Media Companies. Big media companies should do more to help parents protect their children online and limit their exposure to sexual predators and inappropriate content. In particular, these companies should fund a national campaign to educate parents about the online risks faced by children and how they can best protect their families.

Demand More Parental Responsibility. Saying parents have to be the last line of defense, Lieberman called on parents to be more vigiliant in monitoring their children’s online activities. It’s no longer enough to keep the computer in family room when most parents have no idea what chat acronyms mean. Parents need to tell their kids not to share personal information and to tell them when they receive online sexual solicitation.

Pass the Internet Safety and Child Protection Act. Joe Lieberman is a cosponsor of the bipartisan Internet Safety and Child Protection Act, which will help complement industry initiatives by:

* Requiring adult websites to conduct online ID checks using age-verification software.
* Tax online pornography to fund an Internet Safety and Child Protection Trust Fund.
* Establish Internet Crimes Against Children Task Forces in each state.
* Funding research into new filtering technologies.
* And supporting education programs on child Internet safety.


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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/9/2006 at 4:44 PM

Setting the Record Straight on Social Security

(posted on October 9, 2006 - Click here to see images)

Joe was at the Ashlar Village Senior Community this morning and spoke to a packed room. Mary Fritz, the Deputy Speaker of the State House, and the100_0452.JPG newest member of the growing group, “Dems for Joe,” joined him. Joe touched on several issues, including Ned Lamont’s eight different positions on Iraq, the need to improve the healthcare system in our country, and the need to end the partisan gridlock in Washington.

One of the questions asked was on Joe’s plans to protect Social Security. Earlier this week, some of the residents received a mailer from Ned Lamont that twisted Joe's views on Social Security.

Joe wasted no time in setting the record straight:

I am just going to say flat out that I am not for privatization of social security and social security is probably the best program the federal government ever created.

Now on privatization, I’ll tell you that in the 90’s some people came to me and talked to me about privatization. Now this was an interesting idea, but the more I looked at it, the worse it looked. Ultimately you have to take more than a trillion dollars out of the social security trust fund to finance these privatized accounts. And what would be the effect of that? You make social security short on money years sooner.

So I looked at it and decided in the late 90’s it was a bad idea and I have a very consistent record of opposing President Bush every time he had tried to bring it up since then.

100_0450.JPGJoe was met with wild applause and was swamped with supporters.

One lady came up to him and said she is a life long Democrat, and she is sticking with him because she just doesn’t trust Lamont. Right after that another man came up to him and said he was a life long Republican and he also didn't trust Lamont.

Joe is getting such strong bipartisan support in this election, and it seems this election has brought Connecticut voters together on one more issue: people just don’t trust Ned Lamont.

To see more pictures from this morning click here.

Week in review in photos

(posted on October 9, 2006 - click this link if you want to see the actual blog entry with the photos; I'm way too busy to save and post each additional photo. If anyone knows how to copy and paste an entire blog page with images intact, email me at futuredv at yahoo dot com)

Joe was on the road this week taking his message of putting people ahead of politics to the voters of Connecticut. Here are a couple pictures from Joe’s travels this week:

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Joe visited a fire station in Milford. He later joined the fire fighters on the fire truck after they offered him a ride to the local day care center.

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"There's no business like shoe business," said the owner of this local shoe store that Joe visited in Milford.

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Joe greeted customers at a local bank in Milford and spoke with supporters .

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Pro-Joe UConn students came out to the Lamont rally with Wes Clark to make sure Negative Ned's latest, lamest attacks did not go unchallenged this week.

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Joe visited the Town House Diner in Hamden as part of his Doors and Diners tour and spoke with supporters about issues.

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Joe went Door-to-Door on Brentmoor Street in East Hartford where he recieved overwhelming support from residents.

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Joe helped Bantam Fuels announce a new attempt to offer cleaner, more environmentally friendly heating fuel to its customers.

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Speaking at Fercondini Properties, Joe highlighted the growing stresses on Connecticut’s middle class families. In his speech he proposed expanding home ownership for the middle class and a small business health insurance reform plan.

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Joe and former New York City Mayor Ed Koch greeted rush-hour commuters returning to Connecticut at Grand Central Station this week. Koch joined the growing list of Democrats for Joe.

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Joe and Democratic congressional candidate Diane Farrell exchanged a hug and a kiss at Shelton Day.

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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/8/2006 at 6:12 PM

30 Days Out: State of the Race

(posted October 9, 2006)

So with 30 days left until Election Day, we thought it was an appropriate time to take stock of where the Lamont-Lieberman race stands.

The barometer most outside observers are relying on are the public polls. The recent Quinnipiac poll, the most credible survey in the state, put Lieberman up 10 points at 49-39 on September 28th. That was almost unchanged from the first Q poll six weeks before.

Other polls, though, have fluctuated wildly. To us, that shows the volatility of this electorate and the limits of using these surveys to make conclusive judgments about the state of the race. We fully expect those polls to move again in the final weeks and for the horse race number to tighten.

At this point, then, we believe it is much more instructive to look at what the various campaigns have been saying and doing over the last several days. What you will find are two dramatically different campaigns moving in two dramatically different directions.

Last week, our campaign continued to highlight Joe Lieberman's record of experience and results for Connecticut; rolled out a series of progressive, practical plans to help ease the middle class squeeze on Connecticut families and renew the American dream; and compared Lieberman's positive agenda with Lamonts campaign of no ideas, no experience, and no ability to get things done the state.

Joe started the week by telling the people of Connecticut about his recent success in passing legislation to speed the cleanup of Long Island Sound.

Then he outlined a series of forward-looking plans to:

* reduce the barriers to homeownership
* lower the cost of health care for small businesses and their employees
* promote cheaper renewable fuels
* reduce our reliance on foreign oil
* make college more affordable and more accessible

Thats five specific ideas to solve problems people care about from Joe Lieberman in one week.

By contrast, the Lamont campaign did not put out one specific policy idea last week new or otherwise.

That should come as no surprise, though. Go to the Lamont campaign website, and you’ll find that since the end of the primary two months ago, the Lamont campaign has released just two policy proposals.

One, his education plan, mostly recycles proposals Joe Lieberman has already introduced in the Senate, and does not appear to include any original ideas.

The other, contained in Lamonts big national security speech, mostly regurgitates planks of the Senate Democrats security agenda. That is, when it was not attacking Joe Lieberman, to which the bulk of his policy speech was dedicated. Either way, no new ideas.

See for yourself on Lamont's official blog, their self-proclaimed window into the campaign. As of this morning, there were about 275 posts since August 8th, and there were actually more entries praising a hatchet job article GQ ran on the primary (6) and personally attacking our staff (4) than there were about specific policy ideas (3).

Its little wonder, then, that the Quinnipiac poll found that Connecticut voters overwhelmingly believe that Lamont is running a negative campaign (62-25). Or that Lamont does not have the right experience to be a U.S. Senator (47-38).

This point was driven home in todays frontpage article in The Hartford Courant under the headline, Lamont Still the Novice.

The piece opens by recounting Neds visit to Watertown High School, where he was pressed by a student to explain how he would change the culture in Washington.

[Lamont] talked about shunning special interests, helping folks who need health care and being an agent for change. None of it was enough for one teenage boy.

"You're here. You're talking," the boy said. "I still don't know what you are going to do."

So how has the Lamont campaign moved to address those negative perceptions and serious vulnerabilities? By doing everything in their power to reinforce them.

Indeed, here is a summary what the Lamont campaign did and said last week:

* Repeatedly made up things to attack Joe Lieberman for on the Foley scandal
* Aired a bizarre new ad accusing Joe Lieberman of scaring voters, which has the states political establishment scratching their heads (and covering their ears)
* Brought in Ted Kennedy to falsely attack Joe Lieberman on Iraq
* Brought in Wes Clark to falsely attack Joe Lieberman on Iraq
* Surrounded himself with a small group of veterans to attack Joe Lieberman on Iraq

In fairness to the Lamont campaign, they do have one positive ad up on the air now. It features Ned making a bunch of vague statements about education to a group of cute children. The closest he comes to an actual idea in there is preschool for every child (something Al Gore and Joe Lieberman proposed in 2000 and which Lieberman has advocated since).

But perhaps the most telling indicator of the Lamont campaigns troubles is the tone of their statements. So far their solution to their dropping poll numbers has been to make even more shrill, desperate, and dishonest attacks on Joe Lieberman.

The best example of that -- the ridiculous, reality-challenged statements Lamont and his campaign made this week about the Foley scandal.

To show just how ridiculous these attacks were, here is a quick accounting of what Lieberman actually said, and what the Lamont campaign pretended he said.

Right after the news broke, Joe Lieberman put out a statement last Sunday condemning Foleys reprehensible behavior, calling for an immediate independent investigation into the House Republican leadership, and declaring that anyone who was found to have ignored or covered up Foleys predatory behavior should be held fully accountable.

Through the course of the week, Lieberman criticized the House Republicans for trying to deflect blame by dredging up past Democratic scandals and for being overly-partisan in responding to the initial concerns about Foleys contacts with pages. He also urged both parties not to exploit this awful incident for partisan political gain.

And he point blank said on several occasions that if the investigation found that Speaker Hastert or any other House leader knew about Foleys predatory behavior and did nothing to stop it, then they should resign -- most recently on Fox 61s Behind the Headlines show that aired today.

Which is to say he took pretty much the same stance as most other leading Democrats in Congress, including House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi.

So in the face of all those public comments, the Lamont campaign tried over and over again this week to attack Joe Lieberman for supposedly defending Speaker Hastert and supposedly criticizing Democrats who called for Hasterts resignation.

[We should note that the Lamont campaign didnt bother to say anything about this national disgrace until three days after Lieberman issued his first statement and until they could use it to attack Joe Lieberman.]

Lamont made their accusations despite the fact that Joe Lieberman did not once criticize any Democrat by name or even by implication. Not even in the one slim quote that the Lamont campaign repeatedly tried to twist to support their manufactured attack.

The Foley case bothers people, he added. If anyone thinks they can make this into another partisan flap, its not. Its very real and human. The House Republican leaders and, frankly, the Democratic leadership, should not make it partisan.

Only the Lamont campaign could turn that statement into something negative.

Judging from this particular attack and other over-the-top distortions and falsehoods that we are seeing from the Lamont campaign these days, they are taking their say anything strategy to a whole other level.

The garden-variety distortions that they got away with in the primary are not working with the general electorate. So out of desperation they are now ramping up to sheer fabrications, in hopes no one will call them on it, and that one of their ugly hail mary passes will bring our numbers down a little.

If it is not already apparent, in time people will see Lamont is running one of the most systematically dishonest campaigns by a prominent candidate in recent American history.

For now, though, one thing is clear their approach is failing to sway the voters they need to win. Even the Lamont campaigns biggest boosters the liberal bloggers are acknowledging that.

In fact, over the last several days, we have noticed that the blog comments in Connecticut and on the big national sites have turned increasingly sour and pessimistic, with many of them openly challenging and criticizing Lamonts post-primary strategy.

Some supporters decry the lack of positive messages and new ideas. Others say the attacks are not vicious enough. One common thread, though, is that the Lamont campaign has made a serious mistake by essentially re-running the primary over the last two months -- and that they will likely fall further behind if they dont change course.

You can find a sampling of these blog comments here [PDF]. Taken together, they suggest Neds people-powered campaign may be petering out.

This helps explain why Ned has been forced to dump another $2.75 million of his own money into the campaign over the last several weeks, on top of the $4 million he put into the campaign during the primary almost all of which is being used to pay for negative attack ads.

[Our campaign, in contrast, has accumulated more than 23,000 small donors in this campaign, and since the primary, has received more than $110,000 in mostly small unsolicited checks from around the country.]

The fact is, while Ned may like to pitch himself as a successful businessman, the broad middle of voters outside his anti-war base clearly are not buying what hes selling. And like a lot Neds friends on the blogs, we have trouble believing that his increasingly shrill and disingenuous attacks will change that fact.

All of which raises the obvious question: how does Ned win?

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Posted by: Eric Blankenbaker on 10/8/2006 at 4:42 PM

Why this blog was created

My name is Bob Adams, and I have a progressive blog called "Connecticut Bob".

We're about a month away from the election, and I've read dozens of complaints from interested voters who are being denied the opportunity to comment upon the articles posted in the Joe2006.com blog "Blog of Joe".

This is AFTER the Lieberman campaign promised to allow comments, with the exception of those containing obscene words. In other words, they said they'd moderate their comments section but only delete obscene posts.

What actually happened was that Joe2006 did have a fair share of naughty words posted there (and you can still see examples that the Lieberman campaign claims was posted on it's blog located here) and the blogmaster refused to moderate the comments. So they took the comments section down.

The REAL reason they removed the comments is too many people were disagreeing with Joe's political actions and partisan philosophy, and Lieberman's people didn't like that. So rather than address these people's concerns, they did what the Republicans have been doing for years: shut down the right to free speech and pretend everything is hunky dory.

So here's your chance to comment upon Joe's daily blog entries. Be aware that we WILL moderate these comments, but only for rude behaviour, racist or threatening comments.

This is a FREE SPEECH ZONE, not a SPEECH-FREE zone.

Welcome to Joe's 2006 Blog!

Our First Post

(this is a repost of Dan Gerstein's original Blog introduction, posted on September 5, 2006)

Welcome to the debut of Joe's Blog.

As even our friends over at the Lamont campaign will tell you, this is long overdue.

The fact is, for the last several months we ceded the online debate to our rivals.

Well, that changes today.

As you may be able to tell from our new and greatly-improved website, we plan on having a much more robust presence on the Internet for Round Two of this campaign.

Our blog will be a critical part of that effort.

Beyond being a central source of useful information and commentary from our campaign, we hope this will become a gathering place for lively and thoughtful conversation for our supporters – and even our opponents.

Now we fully expect some of our over-exuberant critics to use our blog to attack and insult our candidate and our campaign.

In fact, so does the Lamont campaign. Just read this cynical post on the subject from their Internet guru Tim Tagaris:
“They are going to take whatever questionable comments might appear and pass them off in press releases to discredit our grassroots supporters who actively participate in politics online.

“They've done it repeatedly w/ comments on other blogs, and they know your disappointment in his un-yielding support for President Bush and the status quo will likely manifest itself on joe2006.

“Sure… express your disappointment. Tell him he's wrong on the issues you care about if you must. Just know he isn't listening, and anyone that crosses the line is either doing our effort no good, and I'd guess is probably even a Connecticut for Lieberman Party supporter trying to discredit you."
We found it quite telling that Tagaris did not caution his more juvenile supporters against posting their typical hate speech on our blog because it was wrong or offensive – just because it might look bad for the Lamont campaign.

Gee, that line sounds familiar. . . Oh yes, it’s exactly the same excuse the Nedster used for dropping out of his his "too-white" country club after being a member for 16 years.

In fairness, Tagaris did get one thing right. We are not going to censor comments from our opponents, unless they post obscene material.

Instead, we are going to use our free speech to point out any of the blatant lies or crude insults the Lamonsters post to call attention to the kind of negative, destructive politics that Ned and his followers like to practice.

Now that we got that out of the way, gentlemen and ladies, start your search engines. . .

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Posted by: Dan Gerstein on 09/05/2006 at 2:00 PM