Joe Lieberman

The Teal senator tells it like it is.
 

David

Re: Joe Lieberman

hey David,

Lieberman's probably the polititian with whom I have the clearest sense of the cultural roots of their early formative contexts. We grew up in the same neighborhood; knew many of the same families, my mom's folks shopped at his dad's store…

He's also the US Senator I'd spent the most time with while they were in office. After taping a show for cable tv in '92, and editing four or so hours of Lieberman in panal discussions and solo talks, one line from that conference stays with me to this day. “I consider the environment one of my constituents.” (JL).

I think I lucked out by having a Republican father and  Democratic mother. I wouldn't trade that view into those streams for.. well.. can't, it's part of who I've become.

One thing that helped me in gaining an historical contextualizing of american politics, at another potent critical juncture a century ago, was to check out the early issues of The Nation (yeh it's that old) from the turn of that century to the begining of WWI. There was a strand of eros, I think, vying through the progressive wing of the Republican Party which, if accepted widely, would have made the American influences of the following century (domestic and foreign) very different. (If Marcus Hannah, Elihu Root, and Teddy Roosevelt had achieved a popular traction as progressives by, maybe, 1912… What if…)

I assume a similar resonance between that period and the immediate present (re: u.s. politics) as I do with the market crashes of 1837, and 1929, particularly in how those economic events both directly preceded the founding of avant garde communities. I used to have time to explore patterns. Now it seems I've only enough time to find my place in them, and work.

K

Re: Joe Lieberman

Hey, Thanks guys for this uniquely independent perspective.

Very important…reminded me of Jim Turner's current initiative for a 'Trans-Partisan' politcal movement.

I think it is really critical that there are voices heard that are not embedded in all of these 'label identities'.

Cheers,
Doug

(PS…David, I haven't forgotten about replying back to you about my work in the Defence Industry)

Re: Joe Lieberman

Does anyone care to actually support the idea that Lieberman is 2nd tier? I don't see any evidence of that. Nostalgia is not the same thing as “integral.” He seems to think that if we just go back in time, we can find all the answers to our problems. How does being stuck 40 years in the past make his ideas integral?

I was going to go through and refute the idea based on that fantasy piece he wrote, but I realized that the burden of proof lies with the people who are making this (wildly speculative, IMO) assertion.

Have at it, guys!

Liz

Re: Joe Lieberman

Liz,

These days I have no interest in “meme-calling” and until or unless I see results of someone's Sentence Completion Test I tend to see almost all personal tier designations as speculative, or as expedient interpretations. 

David,

Based on my understanding (influenced by what I've read of what you've written) of your own sense of integrality I responded to your post in line with an impression I've had of that sense. That, say, 'where conservative and liberal are transcended, when a broad embrace is evident there may be 2nd tier lines in play'. I don't know whether that's a fair gleaning of your position or not, but, holding that impression (without trying to opine around some claim you seem to make) I wrote to you from that understanding.


Doug,

While I have yet to catch up to the most current Trans-Partisan expression I'm sure I've seen roots of it in the theory/practice of Marcus Hannah, and political articles by Norman Cousins.

As I began to go into above, there seems to be a political impulse with a deep history surfacing in new ways, and that the lables and identities have already been generally more fluid than it apears when looking only at the polar dual casting that's dominated the American scene in our lifetime, so far.

~ onward,

K

Re: Joe Lieberman

Hey, Kerry-

I'm not the one making assertions, David is. All I asked was that he back up his statements with some evidence.

As far as I'm concerned, “meme-calling” is a fool's game. It's kind of beside the point.

Liz

Re: Joe Lieberman

Okay, Liz. It will take a day or two.  :)

David

Re: Joe Lieberman

And, Doug, take your time!  :)

David

Re: Joe Lieberman

As far as I'm concerned, “meme-calling” is a fool's game. It's kind of beside the point.

Aren't levels a part of the AQAL model?


David

Re: Joe Lieberman

I know virtually nothing about Lieberman, but on the subject of “meme-calling”, I'd tend to agree with Kerry that, unless based on a detailed psychograph test, making statements like “so-and-so IS [insert altitude]” is speculative and largely pointless.

At most, we can look at a person's words and actions and analyze those in terms of levels and lines (and quadrants and so on). But extrapolating from that to say that person “is” a certain altitude is, at best, a gross oversimplification. Knowing a person's altitude can certainly be useful in some situations (although a detailed psychograph would be much more useful in a wider range of situations), but speculating about it doesn't seem to me to be particularly helpful in any situation.

We can take, say, Lieberman's policies and ideas and talk about them in terms of what altitude they could be coming from (not necessarily what altitude they are coming from), since that would help us to frame the ideas and to talk about them in relation to other ideas. But if we then make the jump in logic and say that, because many of his ideas seem “tealish” (assuming they do, and again I have no idea if they do), he must be Teal, too, that would be making all sorts of assumptions about the man that may or may not be at all accurate.

I mean, in the case of a politician, maybe with the right support staff and in a general effort to put your best foot forward in the eyes of the public, you might dip into, say, Teal now and then, or maybe even frequently. But I would tend to think that if your best public face is Teal, you're probably not at Teal stably or as a solid CoG. Personally, I'd expect someone actually at Teal to look more like Turquoise (or higher?) when trying to be on their best behavior and with the help of a good support staff.

So yes, levels are obviously a part of the AQAL model, but one of the main potential pitfalls of the model is pigeonholing and oversimplifying, and it seems to me that labeling a public figure as any particular altitude (without a psychograph test) isn't the most effective use of the model.

I've just finished reading the article you linked to, David, but I'll post a separate message to give my impressions about that.

Cheers,
~G

Re: Joe Lieberman

Hi, David. I meant beside the point politically, but also, I find the labelling of a particular person or group or whatever as counter-productive and reductionist. Sure, we can use these terms as a shorthand to communicate. But over-use tends to obscure the fact that people aren't easily categorized that way, and once you get to a certain level, it all breaks down. Anyone who is near me or above me will be difficult if not impossible to categorize. As you know, the level above you looks much like a level below, and there are all kinds of reasons it's a bad idea to fall into the habit of “meme-calling.” (Love that phrase, BTW!)

Liz

Re: Joe Lieberman

Response to post: I align with you, Grey and Liz. I'm pretty passionate in cautioning about the tendency to label an entire person as one color, especially without intimate knowledge of that person. It's beneficial, IMO, to discuss what color a behavior MIGHT be (depends on motives and invisible stuff, really) or what words might be, but a whole person…..

Too often those who seek to label are just seeking oversimplification. It's definitely not an Integral practice, LOL !!!!!

Blessings, OM Bastet

Re: Joe Lieberman

Agreement on all the diceyness and ambiguity of labeling.   Besides which, someone can have teal or turquoise cognition and be a complete moral monster - or at least be serving decidedly sub-integral values.  For example, Ken Wilber has described Karl Rove on numerous occasions as a genius with turquoise cognition  doing the “darth vader” move.  Also, someone can be operating at integral altitude - in whatever line(s) - and make huge mistakes.  Or create systems or technologies that will be used in a destructive way by people who are not even integral cognitively.

For what it's worth, I read the original article that was linked to and nothing about it struck me as even remotely integral. 

spirals,
Arthur

Re: Joe Lieberman

I don't know enough about Lieberman, political history or politics generally to analyze this article in detail, but reading it, I don't get a “teal vibe” at all.  There's a lot of us vs. them talk and labeling and categorizing and putting America above all else that feels a lot more Amber/Orange to me.

So if we were to talk in terms of labels, we might say that Lieberman is a Democrat talking a lot like a Republican, but does that mean that he's seeing both sides of the issue from a Teal altitude or that he's just somewhere in between “being” Republican and Democrat? A right-leaning Democrat? Or a left-leaning Republican who calls himself a Democrat? I don't know, but does it matter? Is it helpful to label him one way or the other?

Just looking at what he's saying in this article and how he's saying it, I wouldn't categorize those ideas as coming from Teal. But like I say, I'm no political analyst and know virtually nothing about Lieberman.

FWIW (and just trying to get back onto the topic that started this thread)

~G

Re: Joe Lieberman

Kerry, sorry I didn't respond to your initial post earlier. I've been busy. That's so cool you got to hang out with Joe! I'm amazed by all the people you've hung out with—Roshi Bernie Glassman, Lex Hixon, Joe—you're a regular Forrest Gump!  :)


Well, I certainly agree that the color scheme is just a shorthand, something that allows us to speak in broad strokes but misses a lot of detail. For example, even if we conclude, after all sorts of testing, that so and so is Orange, say, what will that mean? It will mean that perhaps 50% of his or her responses will be at Orange, maybe 20% each at Amber and Green, and then a few peaks and lows beyond and below that. And that doesn't even consider different lines, types, and states. Also, no one likes to feel pidgeonholed and put down, so we should be very careful how we use them—I agree with all those points.

If we were going to try to determine somenone's value sphere and cognition, which would of course be something we would want to try to do before we decided to vote for someone, how would we do it? How would we, for example, determine the value sphere and/or cognition of Joe Lieberman? Let's say we want to know if he's Teal and want to analyse it further and find out, given what's available to us. For one thing, we would want to find if he were able to succesfully integrate Green, Orange, and Amber. If he could authentically put forth the value spheres of those three memes and balance them in some way, we might decide in the end that he appears to be integral. Of course, even then, one person's integral is not necessarily another person's integral. For example, as Ken has said, one can be integral and have been for or against the Iraq war. But if you're Green, Ken has said, then you're simply against the Iraq war, period. So we know that Lieberman is not Green, because he has always been for the war. But is he integral or just Orange or Amber or even Red?

Some people will say that he is simply taking a hard-line stance in the Middle East because he is Jewish. This does complicate things, but let's just say, for the sake of the discussion, that has transcended his ethnic bias. Of course there are a lot of non Jews who take the same stance as him, so it isn't particularly fair to accuse him of ethnic bias, any more than it is fair to accuse a particular individual of ethnic bias in voting for Clinton or Obama. Also, Joe has took the same stance on the Balkwan war and has supported missile defense and other defense spending that has not been popular with Green, so we don't need the Iraq war or Israel/Palestine to prove he isn't Green.

So, we know, using Ken's criteria, that he is not Green—so the first thing we would want to do to see if he deserves the exalted title of integral is to see if he has any Green credentials. If he is differentiating from Green, taking a stance on issues that Green does not like but at the same time integrating a number of Green issues, then we can at least say that he is either Orange moving into Green or truly integral. I believe he does. Here are a few things pasted from his website (one or two we might say are Orange or both Orange and Green, but I will include them to establish his Orange credentials as well):
  
 

Empowerment Zones. Senator Lieberman was an early and vocal advocate of empowerment zones and enterprise communities as a means of lifting up economically depressed areas and expanding economic opportunity. He sponsored one of the first bills based on these ideas, and played a leading role in getting this measure included in the 1993 Clinton Administration budget. He has continued to back program improvements and support. In addition, his efforts were critical in ensuring that New Haven's designation as an Empowerment Zone

 

Homelessness. On any given night, an estimated 5,500 Connecticut residents are homeless. Senator Lieberman is committed to addressing this crisis. The cornerstone of federal homelessness policy is the McKinney-Vento Homelessness Assistance Programs. In 2006, Connecticut organizations were awarded $25 million in McKinney-Vento funding, and nearly 8,000 Connecticut residents received shelter at beneficiary organizations. But McKinney-Vento funding levels have remained relatively constant in recent years, and Senator Lieberman has called for additional funding for the programs. Additionally, he is an original co-sponsor the Community Partnership to End Homelessness Act of 2007 (S. 1518), which would make the programs more flexible, performance-based, and accountable - so that they can better prevent and end homelessness in Connecticut and across the country.

International human trafficking. Human trafficking for the purposes of forced labor, prostitution, or other forms of exploitation is a criminal activity and a severe human rights violation that is of great concern to Senator Lieberman. Human trafficking is also one of the leading criminal enterprises of the early 21st century, affecting every country around the globe. Official U.S. estimates are that some 2 to 4 million people are trafficked across borders and within countries each year. However, there are even higher estimates, ranging from 4 to 27 million, for the total number of forced laborers around the world. No human being should be victimized in this way; and human trafficking should be condemned, prohibited, and combated with the full force of American foreign policy.

Fighting Global Poverty. Senator Lieberman has long supported sensible debt cancellation measures that enable impoverished nations to redirect savings to important poverty-fighting measures. He believes debt cancellation is an essential component of the US development assistance strategy and a required component to facilitate achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. To that end, he is a sponsor of the Jubilee Act of 2007 (S. 2166), which would make up to 25 additional impoverished countries eligible for debt cancellation by the US, World Bank, and IMF, beyond those are already eligible for the World Bank/IMF's Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative. To prevent a continual and wasteful debt/forgiveness cycle, the Act would establish a framework for responsible lending in the future.

Animal Rights and Wildlife Protection

Senator Lieberman believes that the government has a responsibility to protect our non-human friends, as well as our citizens and residents. He has consistently supported legislation that seeks to end the abuse of animals in all circumstances and was proud to receive the Humane Appreciation Award in 2005 from the Humane Society of the United States recognizing his leadership and advocacy on animal protection issues. The Humane Society has given Senator Lieberman a 100-percent rating for his record on animal protection issues during the 108th and 109th Congress.

In the 110th Congress, Senator Lieberman has worked hard to ensure that businesses protect the rights of animals and treat them in a morally responsible manner. He has cosponsored the Horse Protection Act (S. 311), which permanently prohibits the butchering of horses for human consumption, and the Downed Animal and Food Protection Act (S. 394), which will require the humane slaughter of livestock that are too sick or injured to stand or walk. Senator Lieberman has also cosponsored a bill to prohibit dog fighting ventures (S. 1880) and the Animal Fighting Prohibition Enforcement Act (S. 261), which strengthens prohibitions against animal fighting.

Senator Lieberman has long championed legislation to protect endangered species and wildlife and in the 110th Congress he was named Chairman of the Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee's Subcommittee on the Private Sector and Consumer Solutions to Global Warming and Wildlife Protection. In July 2007, he introduced the Multinational Species Reauthorization Act (S. 1832) which will reauthorize previous conservation acts and provide increased funding for the Multinational Species Conservation Fund. In March 2007, Senator Lieberman introduced the Great Cats and Rare Canids Act (S. 1033). This bill supports conservation efforts to sustain 13 species of imperiled great cats and rare canids outside of North America. Senator Lieberman also supports the Polar Bear Protection Act (S. 1406) and the Endangered Species Recovery Act (S. 700).

Recycling

During the 110th Congress, Senator Lieberman has signed on as a cosponsor of the Recycling Investment Saves Energy (RISE) Act, which was introduced by Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME). U.S. rates of recycling have become stagnant or are declining in some instances, resulting in shortages for U.S. manufacturing facilities. The purpose of the RISE Act is to invest in, and thus preserve and expand, the U.S. recycling industry. S. 1587 is currently pending consideration by the Senate committee on Finance.

Senator Lieberman has also been the sponsor of legislation which established a National Recycling Day to encourage public awareness about recycling. The goal of “America Recycles Day” was to increase demand for the sagging market values of recyclables by encouraging Americans to buy recycled products and to educate all Americans about the environmental and economic benefits of recycling.

On the first annual Recycling Day in 1991, Senator Lieberman joined Jolie Jones and the Take It Back Foundation in releasing a videotape and public service campaign on recycling, starring Bette Midler and Charlie Daniels. He encouraged schools to sponsor educational activities and communities to conduct training sessions on how recycling can help us preserve the Earth's natural resources. Senator Lieberman was pleased that former President Clinton played an important role in promoting recycling by issuing an Executive Order requiring federal agencies to buy recycled material.

Arctic Refuge

Arctic Refuge. Senator Lieberman has led several successful fights on the Senate floor over the last fourteen years to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drilling. He aggressively fought against drilling proposals in 1991, 1995, 2001, 2003, and he is the lead sponsor of legislation to protect the Refuge permanently by designating it as wilderness. 
 

Clean Air

Clean Air. Senator Lieberman played a significant role in drafting the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments. This law has helped to reduce smog, acid rain, and other pollutants that foul our air. The Sierra Club recognized his important role with a “Friend of Clean Air” award. Since that time, he has been a stalwart defender of the laws protecting Connecticut and American citizens from harmful air pollution. Most recently, he has also joined former Senator John Edwards (D-NC) in opposing regulatory changes proposed by the Bush Administration that would ease restrictions on large industrial polluters.

Environmental Oversight

Ensuring that the Federal Government Fully Implements the Nation's Environmental Protection Laws. In April 2007, Senator Lieberman led four Senate colleagues in writing the US Secretary of the Interior to oppose draft changes to the regulations that implement the Endangered Species Act. Their letter noted that the draft changes would reduce dramatically the current scope and positive impact of the Act. The letter posed fifteen detailed questions about the draft rule changes and requested that the Department not move any closer to promulgating any revisions until it answered the Senators' questions.

In April 2006, Senator Lieberman placed a hold on the nomination of William Wehrum to the post of Assistant Administrator of the US Environmental Protection Agency. In explaining his decision to block the nomination, Senator Lieberman noted that, during Mr. Wehrum's tenure in EPA's Office of Air and Radiation, he had played a central role in some of the most environmentally destructive decisions that EPA has made, from gutting the Clean Air Act's New Source Review program to revoking the promise of mercury controls at every coal-fired power plant to weakening limits on carcinogenic emissions. Mr. Wehrum acknowledged his central role in carrying out those initiatives.

Senator Lieberman played a significant role in drafting the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments. That law has helped to reduce smog, acid rain, and other pollutants that foul our air. The Sierra Club recognized his important role with a “Friend of Clean Air” award. Since that time, Senator Lieberman has been a stalwart defender of the laws protecting Connecticut and American citizens from harmful air pollution.

Anti-Torture Policy. Senator Lieberman has consistently opposed the cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment of those in the custody or under the physical control of the United States . He strongly supported Senator McCain's amendment, which prohibited the “cruel, inhuman, or degrading” punishment of anyone-including detainees-held in custody by the U.S. government. Senator Lieberman was deeply disturbed by the events that took place at Abu Ghraib, and participated in several Senate Armed Services committee hearings where testimony was taken from a variety of Defense Department officials regarding the Abu Ghraib prison and actions taken there. 


 

Corporate Accountability

Corporate Accountability. When the financial markets were rocked by corporate scandals in 2001 and 2002, stripping many investors of their life savings, Senator Lieberman, then Chairman of the Governmental Affairs Committee, launched a wide-ranging inquiry into the independence and effectiveness of those responsible for overseeing the nation's financial markets. The goal was to determine where the watchdogs went wrong in the Enron debacle so that we might prevent a similar disaster from recurring.

The full Committee held a series of five hearings on a range of topics, including 401(k) retirement account security, the role of the Wall Street analysts and the credit rating agencies in Enron's collapse, and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's oversight of Enron's energy deals. The Committee exposed patterns of lax oversight - either the result of outright negligence or entrenched conflicts of interest - and recommended immediate reforms to restore investor confidence.

Complementing these public inquiries, the Committee issued three reports: one detailing failures at the Securities and Exchange Commission and among private sector analysts and credit raters; a second summarizing Enron bankers' contacts with credit rating agencies and government officials; and a third probing oversight failures at the FERC. The reports offered concrete recommendations that government watchdogs should take to restore fairness, transparency, and integrity to the markets.

In the wake of the mutual fund scandals in the fall of 2003, Senator Lieberman has also addressed the lapses of market gatekeepers in protecting mutual fund investors. In November of 2003, he wrote Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman William Donaldson about the SEC's failure to detect and prevent widespread malfeasance in the industry and he cosponsored legislation to bring comprehensive reform to the industry by making it more open and accountable to the average investor. Senator Lieberman also introduced the Small Investor Protection Act of 2004, which sought to reorient the regulation of the country's financial markets to better serve the interests of small individual investors, for whom investments in the market have become an increasingly large part of their economic security. This bill would have a created a division within the SEC to provide for a permanent and institutionalized advocate for the interests of ordinary investors; required that mutual funds provide investors with a brief, easy-to-understand summary of the characteristics of the fund; granted formal legislative recognition to the SEC Office of Risk Assessment and institutionalized its proactive mission of gathering and analyzing data on new trends and risks and identifying areas of potential concern; and required that the SEC, whenever it considers requiring significant disclosures to investors, consider empirical evidence (from surveys, focus groups, etc.) in determining whether the proposed disclosure is likely to improve the understanding of ordinary investors.

Gay rights

In 2004, Lieberman scored a rating of 88 out of 100 by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), one of the largest civil rights organization working to achieve gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality.”^[47]

Lieberman voted no on a constitutional ban of same-sex marriage.^[47] In 2003, in response to the Massachusetts ruling that sanctions gay marriage, Lieberman stated, “although I am opposed to gay marriage, I have also long believed that states have the right to adopt for themselves laws that allow same-sex unions,” and “I will oppose any attempts by the right wing to change the Constitution in response to today's Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling, which would be unnecessary and divisive.”^[48]

Gun control

Lieberman received an “F” rating from the National Rifle Association and a 90% from the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence.^[58] He has sought to ban guns in schools and places of worship. He has voted against prohibiting most lawsuits against gun manufacturers, but cast another vote that would immunize gun manufacturers from lawsuits over gun violence. He has voted to require background checks at gun shows and against allowing guns to be sold without trigger locks.^[59]

Reparations for Japanese Latin Americans

Lieberman cosponsored The Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Latin Americans of Japanese Descent Act in the 110th Congress which would establish a commission that would determine the facts and circumstances involving the relocation, internment and deportation of Japanese Latin Americans.^[9

This was the Democratic Party that I grew up in - a party that was unhesitatingly and proudly pro-American, a party that was unafraid to make moral judgments about the world beyond our borders.

Two interesting things in there. “Unhesitangly and proudly pro-American”—of course, we know that the value sphere Ken Wilber has chosen to call “Green” is the exact opposite of this, at least according to Ken Wilber. In more than one Integral Naked discussion in the last year or so, Ken has talked about how ironic it is that, in his words, “Green candidates” will “hate”  the U.S. and at the same time ask U.S. citizens to vote for them. Of course this “hate” will resonate with others in that value sphere, but will not appeal to unabashedly pro American Amber and, to a lesser extent, Orange.

The other—“unfraid to make moral judgments about the world beyond our borders.” He is referring, of course, to the moral relativism of Green. They don't want to think anyone is worse or better than anyone else, especially not anyone of another ethnicity, so it is simply against their religion to make such a moral judgements, especially ones that could lead to war. That is just atrocious to the relativistic mind. What right do we have, Green will ask, to make such a judgement? In some cases, we even saw people after 9/11 arguing against the invasion of Afghanistan. They simply don't want to think that another person or another culture is less developed than another, even when there is abundant evidence that this is the case.

So here Joe is clearly seeing the relativistic value sphere. It is something that is in his field of awareness, that he understands, and has yet transcended. We wouldn't see this if he were Orange moving into Green; he wouldn't be able to see Green so clearly if he were just moving into it. And yet at the same time he is including, and has included for a long time, a number of the causes championed by that group, enough so for Al Gore to want him to be his vice president. In fact, as you can see in the list above, he has proposed legislations to turn this value sphere into law. There are a few–such as the Arctic Refuge and corporate environmental regulation—that we just wouldn't see with Orange unless they were doing it to please their constituents or the party.


 

This worldview began to come apart in the late 1960s, around the war in Vietnam. In its place, a very different view of the world took root in the Democratic Party. Rather than seeing the Cold War as an ideological contest between the free nations of the West and the repressive regimes of the communist world, this rival political philosophy saw America as the aggressor - a morally bankrupt, imperialist power whose militarism and “inordinate fear of communism” represented the real threat to world peace.

It argued that the Soviets and their allies were our enemies not because they were inspired by a totalitarian ideology fundamentally hostile to our way of life, or because they nursed ambitions of global conquest. Rather, the Soviets were our enemy because we had provoked them, because we threatened them, and because we failed to sit down and accord them the respect they deserved. In other words, the Cold War was mostly America's fault.

Democratic Party to reverse these developments, and reclaim our party's lost tradition of principle and strength in the world. Our band of so-called New Democrats was successful sooner than we imagined possible when, in 1992, Bill Clinton and Al Gore were elected. In the Balkans, for example, as President Clinton and his advisers slowly but surely came to recognize that American intervention, and only American intervention, could stop Slobodan Milosevic and his campaign of ethnic slaughter, Democratic attitudes about the use of military force in pursuit of our values and our security began to change.

This happy development continued into the 2000 campaign, when the Democratic candidate - Vice President Gore - championed a freedom-focused foreign policy, confident of America's moral responsibilities in the world, and unafraid to use our military power. He pledged to increase the defense budget by $50 billion more than his Republican opponent - and, to the dismay of the Democratic left, made sure that the party's platform endorsed a national missile defense.

Re: Joe Lieberman

Hi David,

I like the case for Joe's tealness that you've made. In the inexact science of broad strokes the guide lines you've used are probably a worthwhile excersize.

Speaking of lables and identity…  thank you for associating me with the pre/trans poster-boy Gump.  LOL!   ( integral is as integral does )

Being t/here,

K

Re: Joe Lieberman

Hi Kerry,

Thanks. Actually I never saw Forrest Gump except for a snippet or two on television. I thought the theme was that he ran into famous person after famous person and affected history and such. I just read the synopsis, and I'm not sure if that's exactly it, though.

Met any other famous people?  :)


David

Re: Joe Lieberman

Forest couldn't stay on topic either.

But there's hope. And help. The Spring 2008 Journal of Integral Theory and Practice,(aka AQAL Journal) Vol 3 #1 is out/up.

The article, On Operationalizing Aspects of Altitude: An Introduction to the Lectical(tm) Assessment System for Integral Researchers, by Zachary Stein & Katie Heikkinen, may offer us inroads on our calling-'em-as-seen aspirations.

This current issue is the first of two on Integral Research. Very exciting!

K

Re: Joe Lieberman

Sidenote re Forrest Gump:

I don't recall the film in detail, but would say wrt the mention here that it's a portrayal of the archetype of the innocent bumbling seeming-fool who has the EFFECT of wisdom. Similar character to the one Hanks also portrayed in The Terminal: the innocent bumbler who actually spreads a lot of healing Love.

Blessings, OM Bastet

Re: Joe Lieberman

Just so you understand where I was coming from when I said, “The Teal senator tells it like it is”—it was meant to be the start of a discussion, not the end of one. In formal debates, they begin with something like, “Resolved: Senator Lieberman has integral consciousness.” And then people argue both sides, and it was in that spirit that I wrote that. It was meant to inspire a discussion.


David

Re: Joe Lieberman

A former Bill Clinton confidant makes the case for Joe Lieberman as McCain's running mate and makes a few insightful remarks about Obama's choices as well.