The Nojo Party

Our spineless, feckless, worthless Connecticut State Democratic leaders are backing down from the promise they made to censure Creepy Joe™ Lieberman and asking him to resign from the Democratic Party.

In Greenwich, the Democratic town committee did just that. But even in cities where the town committees have passed resolutions of criticism and censure (most recently New Britain), the committees have largely backed-down from asking Lieberman to skedaddle. Some town committees are avoiding the subject altogether before the State Democratic Party meets next month. Here in Middletown, the December meeting of the party, which meets monthly, is not happening. And it must be remembered that although town committee chair Dan Russo, while he campaigned vigorously for Barack Obama, supported Lieberman over rival Ned Lamont in the primary and in the general election for the senate seat two years ago. Which leads me to believe that he will avoid Middletown's part in any censure at all costs.

In September when they felt feisty, and Lieberman was hot off the podium at the Republican Convention, the State Democrats wrote a resolution of censure which crescendoed with an invitation to leave the party:

Resolution To Censure Joseph I. Lieberman Whereas Joseph I. Lieberman sought re-election in 2006 as an independent after losing the Democratic primary; and Whereas he has publicly endorsed and actively campaigned on behalf of Republican Presidential candidate John McCain, among others; and Whereas he has attended and addressed the Republican National Convention thereby undercutting the election campaigns of Democratic candidates all across America; and Whereas support of right-wing Republicans cannot be reconciled with the ideals and values of the Democratic Party, nor with the best interests of the people of America; and Whereas these actions exhibit extraordinary disloyalty to the countless Connecticut Democrats without whom his career as an elected official would never have been possible; Therefore, be it hereby resolved, that we, the undersigned members of the Connecticut Democratic State Central Committee, delegates to the Democratic National Convention from Connecticut, and Connecticut Democratic public officials publicly censure and repudiate the words and actions of Joseph I. Lieberman, and ask of him that he resign as a member of the Democratic Party of the state of Connecticut.

But being spineless Democrats, they decided to put off the vote until after the election, and they'll actually vote on it this week, on December 17.

Of course, Barack Obama's gone all concilatory with Lieberman, and state leaders are feeling the pressure to scold Creepy Joe™ but not punish him. Awww. While one can forgive Obama for his stance, and we can even understand (well, not completely), the sense of conciliation in the Senate, it's impossible to understand how local Democrats can forget how deeply Lieberman shoved Connecticut Democrat's noses in the pile of political dog shit.

In fact, Nancy Dinardo, another Lieberman sycophant, who was really angry in September, is now talking about "a modification" to the censure resolution.

Sure, if you dislike Lieberman you can sign the online petition for censure, like some 273 people already have, but the groundswell is missing, and the leaders are falling back on their worst instincts.

I think we should take a page from Lieberman himself. When he couldn't get the party to do what he wanted, nominate him as Senate candidate, he started his own party.

We need a new Democratic party in Connecticut, the Nojo Democratics. If I bump into Susan Bysiewicz at Brewbakers this morning, I'll ask how I can get it going. She seemed helpful when Lieberman wanted to start his own, and she didn't even demand that he quit the Democrats. So that means you can belong to the official Democratic party in the state and the Nojo Democrats.

I got my Nojo working.