Maybe Obama thinks enough people will be pissed off that Liberman won't survive his next election.

Obama needs to tell Lieberman, "I'm your Daddy". You do ANYTHING I don't like, and I will take your gavel. And anything else I feel like taking.

And, by the way, forget re-election. You're done. If you're lucky, Ambassador to Alaska (after Moose Lady and Trapper Todd secede).

Beltway Democrats have no principle except expediency and calculation. Having principles is an implicit reproach to then and so they hate the grass roots and net roots. No wonder the Democrats in Congress are seen as weak and craven. Lieberman will continue to stab Democrats in the back and those Senators who voted for him and Obama will deserve it. His democratic friends campaigned for him during his senate race. He repaid them with betrayal. How did that work out. Now he is supposed to change. Not likely. Sometimes doing whats expedient and calculating does not have good results.  

With nearly all votes counted, Begich leads by 3,724 (1.18%)

Obama has come this far, thanks to the liberal bloggers, and now, just as he is about to take office in a couple of months, despite the advice, clearly and freely blogged for his benefit, he chooses to FAIL by doing something different.

Jesus, he pisses me off sometimes.

First, there's really no evidence to support an assumption that Lieberman will feel either constrained or in debt now that Obama's allowed him to keep his gavel. Why?

LIEberman did the ultimate betrayal and paid absolutely NOTHING for it. The ONLY message one could ever get from that is: 'do whatever you feel like' because there ARE NO CONSEQUENCES. Obama has fomented one of the worst conditions of the bush reign of terror and destruction: radical irresponsible behavior without accountability.

People on blogs who kept wondering if obama was being aggressive enough and what not, now think they still know more about politics than he does.

i'm going to put my money on obama's read of the situation more than any of the top bloggers...well, because he became president.

My own feeling is that Lieberman is unwell mentally, and will soon seek to draw attention to himself in ways that will require his final expulsion.  We have merely deferred action that will eventually be necessary.

First off, I am going to trust in Obama and the Pro-politicians.  They make much better horse-traders than I.  I chose the best, by far, of the lot to support (Obama) and things are looking pretty damned good right now.

As for Lieberman, I think Reid and Obama played "good-cop/bad cop" on him.  Reid played him hard in their meeting, making Joe get all sick in the stomach and having a press conference to say his gavel was paramount.  Then Obama comes out saying he wants Lieberman in the caucus.  Lieberman is "saved" by Obama, gets to save face, gets a CHANCE to do his damned job right, and OWES the Prez. a big one.  And I think Joe knows this is going down.

Add to it that whoever really is pulling Joe's strings, his donators and financial supporters, must have cut a deal with Obama.  Joe will walk the line now or face the TRUE consequences of the people who really support him...(and that ain't the Senate).

Sadly, in a way, Joe always saw the Repubs as being the more powerfull force in politics over the last 9 years.  He slowly warmed up to and helped the Repubs, in his own way, to get onto what we all thought would be the McCain/Lieberman ticket, his idea of a dream left/right team (and McCain wasn't getting any younger, so odds were good it could have been prez. Lieberman).  This was his one shot to get back into the White House.  But it all fell apart with Palin and then McCain cratered his campaign...ugh.

Nope, Joe is going to play straight because ANYTHING else is as bad as him slitting his own throat, and he will NOT do that. The Dems are going to be the major party, with the "new" power for at least the next 8.  If Joe wants a part of that, he has to go back to being a good little Dem.  

And...if he double-crosses a popular Prez, the ordinary public will want his head, and Obama will have set him up to make him give it to him.

All in all, really SMOOOOOOOTH of Obama.  A chance to rehabilitate a wayward Dem or a chance to give him enough rope to PUBLICALLY hang himself in a way that keeps Obama's hands clean of dealing with a real weasel.  Slick.

If the deal did not keep Holy Joe of the TV it is not a good deal.

Joe Lieberman does not speak for Democrats.  It is annoying that the media present him as if he does.

Kicking Lieberman out is so not worth it.  If we had done this, for the next four years any time any Republican wanted to filibuster a Democratic initiative, they'd bring it up.  Any time anyone from our side calls for bi-partisanship, they'd bring it up.  It's way too useful of an object lesson for people who are looking to thwart the new President: "He calls for bipartisanship, but clearly that only goes one way.  Look at what he did to Lieberman".  Put that in mouth of John Boehner, Dan Burton, Rush Limbaugh, anyone.

Now the reverse is true, at least as far as Lieberman goes.  You can expect him to be his usual self, but he'll look like an ingrate.  It will be harder for him to undermine good ideas, and that's all that matters.  I don't care what happens to him.  I don't particularly want him to suffer or be humiliated.

"Policy" vs "Process" huh? Do you mean strategy versus tactics, or are these new words with a subtle difference in meaning?

hopefully we can credit Obama with more intelligence and insight than to think for a second that LIEberman would be ever be beholden to Obama for Obama's [misplaced] magnanimity in rewarding LIEberman for his anti-Democratic actions.

Like most posters I was very angry about the caucus vote, "angry unto death" as the prophet Jonah said. But upon reflection, I realized this is not only smart pragmatic politics, but, might I dare say, even  the morally right thing to do.   As a devout Jewish secularist I'm not exactly a WWJD type of person, but Matthew 5:43-44 is not an inappropriate text for this case:
"Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you"
People talk about wanting to change politics. Well, isn't this a change from the spiteful, vitriolic destructive personality centered diatribes of the past decade? As another preacher once remarked, in a world ruled by an eye for eye and tooth for tooth, everyone will end up blind and toothless.
So if this helps change the political culture it's a major plus. There's really not much of risk to it.  Lieberman is basically a very weak character with a powerful need for approval.  If he really was a principled son of a bitch he would have jumped to the GOP caucus last year, which would have given the Republicans control of the Senate via Cheney's tie breaking vote. Anyway, he's really in no position to cause much trouble. If he jumps to the GOP now, or even supports them overly much, he's boarding the Titanic after it hit the iceberg.

Is this really where you want Obama to use all his political capital?

Fighting the majority of Democratic senators (only 13 in the caucus voted against Lieberman in the secret ballot) in order to publicly punish Lieberman?

I'd think Obama's capital might be better 'spent' on getting green legislation and decent health care.

If Lieberman gets to sit in his gilded office for the rest of his term (assuming Connecticut doesn't try a recall - has that ever been done?), too bad.

Now Lieberman owes Obama, and Obama's reaching 'cross the aisle.'

Think about it please.