Lieberman Is No Washington Saint

by David Corn

The Senator from Connecticut was hailed far and wide. The Reverend Jerry Falwell praised Leiberman's "impeccable character." NBC's Forrest Sawyer described him as "widely regarded as a man of high moral standards." Senator Arlen Specter noted his "integrity." GOP virtue czar Bill Bennett bleated, "He is a great guy. I'm going to offer to do a nominating speech." The Gore campaign was so enthused by Bennett's opinion it put out a press release highlighting his remarks. A Washington Post news story described Lieberman as "a two-term lawmaker with a reputation for truth-telling." And Democratic consultant Peter Hart cheered the Lieberman selection as a clever way for Gore to attract those honesty-in-government nerds drawn to Ralph Nader's candidacy. Lieberman, Hart maintained, "is ethically clean and sort of stands for purity, which is what I think the Nader vote is."

Let's conduct an exercise. Suppose that Gore had chosen, say, Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota -- another Jew -- to join his not-yet-excellent adventure. How might Wellstone, a feisty progressive populist from Minnesota, have been described by the chattering class? A far-left Democrat? A confrontational retro-liberal? An "Old Democrat" throwback?

It's doubtful he would have been cast first and foremost as a man of sound character and firm principles -- even though his integrity has not been questioned and he speaks his mind more forthrightly than most pols. Some commentators might mention that he has been a persistent and high-minded advocate of political reform. But he would not be celebrated as a moral compass in a suit.

Why was Lieberman beatified? Much of Lieberman's image as a man of rectitude is due to the statement he delivered on the Senate floor on September 3, 1998. As the media has reminded us a thousand times, he slammed President Bill Clinton -- the leader of his party and a friend who had been a Liberman campaign volunteer in the 1970s -- for engaging in intern-sex. "Such behavior is not just inappropriate," Lieberman asserted. "It is immoral. And it is harmful, for it sends a message of what is acceptable behavior to the larger American family, particularly to our children."

As the first major Democrat to scold Clinton -- which he only did after Clinton publicly confessed -- Lieberman sealed his rep. So much so that when Gore desperately thumbed through the Yellow Pages for "moral authority," he apparently found only one listing: Joe Lieberman.

Is whacking a White House adulterer for lying the best test of moral mettle? What of Lieberman's own involvement in the degradation of the political culture? Without apology, he pockets large sums of money from corporate special interests and promotes legislation that favors them. He is a leading recipient of funds from Big Insurance -- over $197,000 so far in this campaign cycle. And -- coincidence or not -- he has pressed for health care measures the industry desires and that consumer advocates criticize. He has opposed permitting patients to sue negligent HMOs for punitive damages. He supported product liability reform, which would make it difficult for consumers to sue businesses that manufacture and sell defective and dangerous products. Lieberman is a hardass on presidential responsibility, but permissive regarding corporate responsibility.

Isn't it reasonable for a citizen to look at this set-up -- money in, legislation out -- and wonder whether Lieberman deserves the title of Mr. Integrity?

He wallows in institutional sleaze of Washington -- $91,000 from the pharmaceuticals industry; $211,000 from the securities industry -- as much as most members of Congress. Lieberman also chairs the Democratic Leadership Council, a pro-business outfit financed largely by corporate lobbyists who do their best to squeeze special treatment out of Congress. These lobbyist-funders generally do not hesitate to place their interests ahead of the public interest when necessary. Where's the moral leadership in hanging with this crowd?

Money-and-politics, of course, is not the only factor in assessing morality in public affairs. Has Lieberman chastised Clinton for other lies? He supported Clinton's decision to bomb a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan in 1998 as retaliation for terrorist attacks against the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. But when it turned out the evidence linking the plant to terrorist Osama bin Laden was not solid -- even though Clinton had maintained it was -- Lieberman did not stride to the well of the Senate to protest an excessive (and arguably unconstitutional) use of force against a country with which the United States was not at war. Where was his outrage over this Clinton lie?

How else can political morality be judged? Lieberman's wife, Hadassah, is the daughter of Nazi concentration camp survivors -- a fact that both she and Tipper Gore spoke of during the campaign rally where Gore officially named Lieberman his sidekick. Her connection to the Holocaust will surely be discussed repeatedly in the campaign ahead. But how did her husband respond to a more recent genocide? In 1994, when ethnic mass killings were under way in Rwanda, Lieberman appeared on CNN's "Crossfire" and advocated sending in US bombers to support the Bosnian army against the Serbs. "What about the genocide in Rwanda?" Bob Novak inquired. "Do we ignore that?" Lieberman did not propose taking action there. Instead, he argued that "we have strong historic, strategic, and cultural ties to Europe." And a Nexis search produced no references to Lieberman urging Western intervention to halt the nightmare in Rwanda. Lieberman, a hawkish member of the Senate armed services committee, is entitled to play realpolitiks in determing which ethnic massacres warrant an American response. But that sort of geostrategiic calculation does not befit a moral leader.

In his now-oh-so-famous speech, Lieberman wailed that "the decline of the family is one of the most pressing problems we are facing." He argued that because the president is a role-model for the nation his "private conduct" cannot be separated from his public position. Words like those have earned him the traditionalist tag, and Lieberman's DLC has called for altering divorce laws to make it harder to dissolve a marriage. Yet Lieberman himself is divorced. As a man who now seeks to be the understudy to the president -- a role-model -- should he have to explain the details of his own divorce? As he noted, the president "sets standards of behavior for the people he serves." Do such standards only apply once you inhabit the Oval Office?

It's probably tough to be regarded so highly. If you play the role of public moralist, you are an easy target for a hypocrisy charge. Consider this: in the mid-1990s, Lieberman partnered up with culture cop Bill Bennett to bemoan freefalling standards in the entertainment field. The two focused much of their fire on rap music, and they succeeded in hounding a major record company into dropping a rap label. But they have not led a similar campaign against the violence-celebrating World Wrestling Federation. Why all the anger against one form of entertainment and silence about the other?

Lieberman, a Gore official declared, is "uniquely positioned" to cleanse Gore of his Clinton-related stain. Perhaps, but only by Washington's loose standards. The Senator lashed out at Clinton, often refers to God in public, and selectively decries cultural smut. Sounds like Pat Robertson.

But that's enough for Lieberman to be annointed holier than the average politician -- despite his less-than-holy acceptance of the S.O.P. of Washington. The laurels for Lieberman indicate the chatterers have a much too narrow view of morality. In the land of Clinton, it doesn't take much to be a saint.