Curry Likes Recall Option; Calls Lieberman Health Care Flip-flop "Deceptive Practice"

Joe Lieberman Makes His Point - photo Chion Wolf

It was 2000, and I was doing a story for NPR’s political desk about Senator and Vice Presidential candidate Joe Lieberman.  It seemed everyone in the state was in love with Joe.  A Quinnipiac poll at the time had him at 80% approval among Democrats, and it was almost that high with Republicans and Independents, too.

Well, the decade’s up, and he’s down to about 30% among Democrats, and he’s got some in his former party calling for punishment, or even recall, over his stance on health care reform.   While some have teased Rosa DeLauro for talking about recall while it’s not allowed in Connecticut, it seems like a pretty good idea to others.  That would include Bill Curry, a regular Where We Live guest, two-time Democratic nominee for Governor, and a close advisor to President Bill Clinton.

Curry’s been quoted widely in the press since Lieberman filibustered the health care “public option” to death in the Senate.  He served in the state legislature with Lieberman, has worked to get him re-elected, and back in 2000 did something he kinda wishes he could take back.  ”I regret to say, I wrote a memorandum to Al Gore, arguing for putting Joe Lieberman on the ticket,” Curry told us today on Where We Live. Curry said he was disappointed in Lieberman’s debate performance that campaign against Dick Cheney, and his role in the Supreme Court decision that handed the race to George W. Bush – but, many in the party were still bullish on Joe until 2004.

Bill Curry Makes His - photo Chion Wolf

“I truly believe that 2004 was a turning point,” Curry said.    ”His resentment against liberals generally. His blaming the people whom he felt should have agreed with him.  And, most importantly, his beginning to question sometimes even the patriotism of people who dared to suggest that the war in Iraq might have been a mistake.”

Curry says that after losing the Democratic nomination to Ned Lamont in 2006, he shifted his position on the Iraq war to win more votes – which he did – enough to winthe general election.  He calls that “a form of lying.”  Now, he says it might be a good idea to have a law like California’s that would allow voters to recall an elected official.  Too late for Curry’s sake – he was pushing for a recall of Governor John Rowland – but not too late for Lieberman.  Curry said Lieberman engaged in ”a deceptive practice” by hiding his true position on the war, health care reform, and his support for President Obama.   “If this were a consumer transaction, he coulda gone to jail,”  Curry said.  ”Well there ought to at least be the right to revoke the contract in a Democratic process.”

Lieberman a Republican? "Not an option" yet says Chris Healy - photo Lauren House

Curry says Lieberman’s flip flop on health care may be an attempt to secure a Republican nomination for his Senate re-election campaign in 2012, ”And he knew that the price of admission to that club was in fact to filibuster the very policy that he had  been supporting since he entered politics until the day he announced the filibuster.”

But state Republican Party Chair Chris Healy says that to run as a Republican, Lieberman has to first become a Republican – and he says the Senator is still a mainstream liberal Democrat on most issues.  Healy told us that on “seminal issues” to Republicans, like safety and security and health and welfare, he’s “opposed Democratic party orthodoxy” and “shares a couple of core convictions” with the GOP.  ”But, unless he takes the pledge, and starts caucusing as a Republican, I don’t really see that as an option,” Healy said.