Why is Lieberman still tolerated by the Dems?
 

And Fifth is entirely correct, the Quisling is gonna be campaigning for some Republicans this coming election:
And the dipshit's also promising to join the Republicans/conservative Democrats in a filibuster of the health care (article from Politico) bill if it includes a public option.

So I'm wondering, except for wanting to have 60 seats in the Senate for the Democratic caucus, why the hell do the Democrats tolerate Lieberman's brazen (insert your own description of Joe's idiocy) dickness?

There was a scathing review in the Huffington Post yesterday wondering why they let him keep his leadership positions in the Senate that the Democrats gave him in exchange for working with them. Personally, I don’t think he’s holding up to his end of the bargain.

Calling him dickless is kind of missing the point. It's not like he wants to do the right thing but isn't out of his fear of whatever. He pretty much just hates the fuck out of everyone, loves making people pay attention to him, and doesn't give a shit if tens of thousands of people continue to die for the sake of his spite and egomania.

Yeah pretty much what I was going to say. He's not so much dickless as, well a dick.

This is actually exactly what I was gonna say except I decided to be wordy about it.

Re: the title question I think he's the Dem's safety valve for when there's no other possible way to fail at doing their jobs. That and you know, generalized terror at the thought of voters deciding elections.

Lieberman's ability to back any position which will give him a political advantage and not get called on it come election time is pretty amazing, though. He got elected last time by splitting the Democratic vote, he'll probably continue to do this by pretending to be fiscally conservative but not socially conservative (although by not backing the public option he is being conservative in both arenas by definition, as much as the Republicans like to pretend it is only a fiscal issue preventing them from having a public option when it is actually a social issue of some people not having enough money to pay for healthcare via social constraints).

Like here in PA I'm not sure if I should vote for Arlen Specter, who for many years maintained several liberal positions but also many conservative ones before finally switching to the Democratic party, or Joe Sestak, who has been a Democrat since the beginning. There's one thing to say for party loyalty but another thing to say for individual political belief. Hopefully fiscally conservative Democrats realize that Lieberman doesn't really have any individual political beliefs, however, and is instead insistent on going against the majority of his constituents for personal advancement and is not "Independent" but instead simply an unaffiliated Republican OR an unaffiliated Democrat as the need for political advancement takes him.

One of many reasons I'm registered Green
 

I don't even keep up with it as well as some of you, and I know Lieberman is bad.
 

I think I should weigh in here as I'm from the state that Lieberman represents

Let me start by saying...we tried to get rid of him oh God how we tried. He didn't even get the democratic nomination last time but he ran as an independent and then old people voted for him and well we all know how much old people love voting

I'm sure we'll get him next time

In any case...

Lieberman is probably some kind of secret genius...he gets to fuck the Dems over and still get elected...he gets to hang out with the rich Republicans...and he gets to keep his interests in Israel safe...I'm no anti-Semitic in fact far from it, but Lieberman is just so pro-Jewish interests that insane...If they want him to do something he does it. We give more foreign aid to Israel than any other country and he is a large part of that...and they don't need the money as much as say...Africa or any third world country...I mean Israel can pretty much handle themselves at this point...hell they did during the 7 day war back in the 70's and every country that hates them were in on that. Though to be fair it a factor in the victory was all the in fighting between those different countries trying to coordinate their attack...oh and Israel had tanks and nukes and the backing of the US government.

The point is Lieberman hasn't been serving his state or country for quite some time now...

Oh and Chris Dodd kind of sucks too...he's been up to some bull shit of his own...but he got cancer so I guess it kind of evens out right?

Oh and Magus as a part time resident of PA myself might I say: Go with Arlen Spector

DBS

Emphasis mine.

I mean, I have no opinion on this particular issue - having largely ignored it - but you have to understand how much you undermined your own point there.