LIEBERMAN AT HIS MOST LIEBERMAN-ESQUE…. In a Bloomberg interview aired yesterday, Sen. Joe Lieberman offered some relative praise for President Obama, before getting into the details.
Lieberman told Al Hunt that he’s “pleasantly encouraged” by the Democratic president he fought so hard to defeat, adding that Obama is “off to a very, very good start in a very difficult time in our nation’s history.”
The praise was immediately offset, though, by Lieberman taking issue with the president’s position on a variety of issues, most notably Israeli settlements and the closing of the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay. Of course, as the cliche goes, Lieberman is with his caucus on “everything but foreign policy,” so these remarks were hardly surprising.
I found Lieberman’s remarks on health care more disconcerting.
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) said this weekend that he opposes a public option plan for consumers in a healthcare reform plan to emerge from the Senate.
“I don’t favor a public option,” Lieberman told Bloomberg News in an interview broadcast this weekend. And I don’t favor a public option because I think there’s plenty of competition in the private insurance market.” […]
“We have a unique opportunity, a real opportunity to do this year what we’ve been trying to do for years, which is to reform American healthcare,” Lieberman said. “I think the one thing that will stop that is pressure on the so-called public option.”
“Let’s get something done instead of having a debate,” the Connecticut Independent added.
First, reforming American healthcare without a public option is to do reform the wrong way. Second, Lieberman is just wrong about there being “plenty of competition in the private insurance market.” Third, these comments yet another reminder that Lieberman is not with Democrats on “everything but foreign policy.”
And finally, I have no idea what “let’s get something done instead of having a debate” means. What’s wrong with having a debate and getting something done?
