Johnson over McKinney -- Ok, so at this point I guess that I'm one of those "ABC" types: Anybody But Cynthia. I'm not thrilled by Johnson's platform, but at least he doesn't come across as an unstable tinfoil hat wearing lunatic. At least he doesn't seem to be an embarrassment to the people of his district and the state of Georgia in general. And at least he has demonstrated that he can be civil towards conservatives and work with them, given his appeal to conservatives for help in his campaign to unseat McKinney. I have hopes for him in a similar to what I had for Majette back when she unseated McKinney -- at least don't be a laughing stock. At least he appears to be sane, articulate, and someone who we can work with. Unfortunately, like last time, I rather suspect that we haven't seen the last of her Cynthia-ness. She'll be back next time around -- especially if Johnson pulls a Majette and decides to run for higher office, leaving a vacancy.
Lamont over Lieberman -- Much has been written about this one. I'm of the impression that this is a short term victory for the netroots gang, as they have seemingly successfully purged themselves of a Dem who refused to completely march lockstep with their narrow vision. But in the long term, this will come back to bite them, hard. For various reasons that have already been pointed out, I think that Lieberman has a really good chance at winning that race in the general election as an independent. And that will cost the Dems not only a seat in the Senate, but will be a big PR loss as well. The message they have sent is that it is not permissable to deviate even a little bit from the netroot, Deaniac line or be purged. And with that they divorce themselves even further from the center, moving even that much farther towards the fringe left. And that is the way to lose. I personally feel that this attitude and strategy of the Dem party and its netroots center of power has pretty well yanked defeat from the jaws of victory on this one -- they had a chance to tip the ballance of power in congress this general election, but the way that they treated Lieberman has just killed it. Centrist leaning Dems are liable to stay home now, and without their support I believe the Dems are gonna get killed at the polls.
)by his own party EXCEPT for this 1 issue. It speaks volumes about the "supposed" tolerant party as to their agenda and farther left movement. This will ultimately give plenty of ammo to the Republicans as a civil war erupts in the Democratic party and they turn on each other.
