"Paid-for Thuggery"
I am just as astonished as anyone else watching reports from today’s event in Meriden fly around the blogosphere at break-neck speed. I’ll be honest, at first I was a bit skeptical. I had heard stories of behind-the-scenes desperation and frustration from the Lieberman camp, but I still couldn’t bring myself to believing the stories from Meriden. Then I got these photos sent to me…
A large man, around 50 years old or so, then started screaming at Ned, “Are you an Al Sharpton Democrat, or a Bill Clinton Democrat?” Ned was trying to answer, and the gentleman kept yelling.
Then the pictures. The first photo was when Ned first walked in. Enlarge and look at the left side of the shot—you can see that a few LieberKidz had already removed their tops, exposing their Lieberman gear.
So the man got Ned’s attention, and as always, he tried to be respectful, but the large man got even more animated. Again, enlarge.
You can see at that point, another LieberKid at the bar heard his cue and turned around, exposing his shirt.
At that point, Ned tried to talk to some of them. You know, like a human being. By enlarging you can see the Lieberman shirts in the back, and even the LieberKidz at the counter with their “vote joe” shirts on.
And another… reporters might recognize a few of the folks at the counter. More Lieberman shirts revealed.
So fearing for their safety do to the agreesive nature of some of the LieberKidz, Ned left with staff and met in the parking lot. Here’s Lamont Blog’s take:
Ned attempts to talk with a 90-year-old WWII veteran pilot from Virginia who wanted to discuss his opposition to the Iraq war. The Lieberman kids scream accusations about Ned’s patriotism, spewing right-wing bile accusing him of not caring about our troops, and questioning whether he would (not verbatim) “let our citizens die again,” assumedly a reference to 9/11.
That’s the 92 year old WWII hero that was acosted for supporting Ned. Real classy.
Stoller finishes the story, and discusses motive:
Picking a fight and then blaming it on the people you picked a fight with is an interesting tactic, and an extremely high risk move to get the reporters to do a feeding frenzy on the movement behind Lamont. The Lieberman campaign is hoping that the press will pick up their narrative, and begin to express the same outrage that Lieberman feels at his challenger, and the people of Connecticut who are unhappy with their Senator. How dare they?was always the unstateed campaign message, and now, apparently it’s also the new field strategy.
I can’t wait to see Dan Balz two page story on the topic tomorrow, right?
- by Tim Tagaris | 08/03/06 21:30:00