Crossing party lines makes targets of some incumbents

Sen. Joe Lieberman gets a bear hug from proprietor Brian O'Rourke when he stops by O'Rourke's Diner to schmooze with voters.

The welcome is less warm in the booth where Khachig Tololyan and Ellen Rooney are ordering lunch. Like Lieberman, the two college English professors are Democrats. But Rooney is dismayed by the senator's support for the Iraq war, Tololyan by "just a general sense that Lieberman is too often with the Republicans."

These days, elected officials who cross party lines - a vanishing breed in today's polarized politics - risk getting squashed.

Six years ago, Democrats lionized Lieberman as Al Gore's pitch-perfect running mate. In his Senate race in 2000, Lieberman won 63% of the vote and a third term almost without campaigning in the state. There's no free ride now: Businessman Ned Lamont says that next week he'll launch a primary challenge, inspired by Lieberman's stance on Iraq.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20060301/pl_usatoday/crossingpartylinesmakestargetsofsomeincumbents

in Ads against him. Remember in this new world "you are either with us or against us" and Leiberman has shown time and time again he is not with us.

I didn't like DINO Joe in 2000, and I don't like him now. I thought he made a poor running mate, and still believe he was a significant reason that the race was close enough for W_rong to steal.

a fairly long article, and yet not a word about something that would seem to be relevant to this article. Lieberman ran for the freaking presidency less than two years ago, and was a miserable failure, and a lot of what this article discusses played into that.

until long after the 2000 election. Douchebag journalists like Susan Page think that everybody was running home to their teevees to watch Blowjob-gate every evening at 6. I had a life

He's crossing the party line... he's being "non partisan"

:puke:

fuck that. No, I don't expect politicians to vote strictly the party line, but i DO expect them to hold at least a little of the philosophy of the party