Wednesday, July 26, 2006

A True Believer

I am listening to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki address congress. When he passionately described how the Iraqi people faced death as they went to the ballot box and always made the choice of Democracy and freedom and proved that as they waved their ink stained fingers, Congress began to clap, but who was the first to stand?

It was Joe Lieberman.

Who can not admire the Iraqi people for risking their life to vote? You can disagree with the war. You can believe that this administration manipulated intelligence. But how can one not think that what the Iraqi people did by voting was not courageous?

I thought that the showdown between Lieberman and the extreme left in his primary would be interesting. I thought that if Lieberman lost then it would prove once and for all how far the Democrats had let the extremists of their party win. I thought it would help us in future elections to point to that primary as how out of the mainstream the Democrats really are and how the leadership is supporting it. But after seeing the look on Lieberman's face of a deep felt belief in what he thinks is right, I am rooting for him. I hope he wins. I now hope that his primary will prove that the Democrat party still has people that truly care. That it rejects a radical agenda of unfettered abortion, a changing definition of marriage, and the belief that America is the problem instead of the answer.

I hope he wins, not just because he is a true believer in what is right, but because I am still not completely convinced that the party of my father and the party of my youth is lost forever in extremism.

I can't believe it myself. I am rooting for a Democrat.