Bill Kristol’s “A Joe of His Own?” in today’s Times is priceless, particularly as it comes on the heels of an interview with Representative Peter King of New York on Fox News last Friday.  King and Kristol both believe that the best possible Republican Vice Presidential candidate would be lifelong Democrat Joe Lieberman.  As King put it explicitly if ungrammatically:   “because the overriding issues facing our country today are Islamic terrorism. And nobody — nobody — is stronger than Joe Lieberman, both as far as the overseas threat and the threat right here at home and seeing the interrelationship between the two.” To make sure that no one missed the point, King referred to “islamic terrorism” three times in what must have been a three minute interview.  Killing Muslims apparently trumps all other issues.  Joe can be counted on to shoot them over there and to lock them up over here… What more would you want in a Vice President?

Kristol puts it more subtly, describing Lieberman as a “bold choice” and a “country first” selection, not even mentioning that a Lieberman-McCain alliance would no doubt quickly bomb the hell out of Iran and Syria before reopening the Cold War with Russia.  That is precisely what Kristol would like to see, so why state the obvious?  Kristol pooh-poohs Lieberman’s liberal voting record, writing “…he is pro-abortion rights, and having been a Democrat all his life, he has a moderately liberal voting record…”  An interesting description, making it appear that his Democratic party ties somehow coerced Joe into voting against his conscience.  And, in reality, Lieberman is much more liberal than that except on foreign policy issues.  NARAL Pro-Choice America rates him at 100% on pro-abortion voting while in Congress and the gay advocacy group Human Rights Campaign (HRC) gives him an 87% on homosexual issues.  The NAACP gives him an 86% favorable rating on affirmative action.  Not exactly a normal Republican, is he?