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Let the voters Decide
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Business New Haven
9/18/2000
By: BNH
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Let the Voters Decide
In this remarkable Millennial year, U.S. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman has had the opportunity - a highly unusual opportunity, at that, to advance the cause of democracy for his Connecticut constituents. He has failed.
It's been quite a year for New Haven's Joe Lieberman,. he might even become the first Jewish vice president in American history.
That's no sure thing, however, so just to be on the safe side, Lieberman decided he would remain on the U.S. Senate ballot in Connecticut, where he seems a safer-than-safe bet to fend off challenger Philip A. Giordano.
Wanting to have one's cake and eat it, too is a pretty common human characteristic. And the solons who control the Democratic apparatus in Connecticut have said Lieberman's remaining on the Senate ballot is fine by them. Only a lonely Fairfield University professor has argued that Lieberman's presence on both ballots violates the rules.
Whether it does or not, Lieberman's choice is just wrong, plain and simple. We're not the first to make this observation: a number of the state's major media outlets, including the Hartford Courant, agree with us on this.
Why? Because it violates the most cherished principle of our democracy, which is that voters alone decide who will represent them in Washington. Should Lieberman win the vice presidency, his Senate successor will be chosen by a single voter: Gov. John G. Rowland.
Even if Lieberman, confident of his and Al Gore's national prospects as Election Day looms, withdraws from the race at close to the last moment (he has until October 27, just 11 days before the vote), his successor on the Democratic Senate ballot - be it Attorney General Richard Blumenthal or U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro or someone else - will be chosen by a small cabal of state Democratic insiders.
That's not democracy. Joe Lieberman should decide which job he really wants, do everything within his power to earn it - and then let the voters decide.
It's the American way.
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