Bob Kerrey: newest Liebercrat

Seems like former senator Bob Kerrey plans to stump for Lieberman this fall and I'm not surprised.

Word from the campaign is that Bob Kerrey has offered to stump for Lieberman in the fall, which should, if nothing else, allow Lieberman to paint his coalition of political supporters as Republicans -- whose professions of admiration Lieberman can't seem to get away from -- and "independent-minded" Democrats.

Why am I not surprised you ask? Well Kerrey (like Lieberman) was one of the biggest fans of the idiotic social security phase-out plan which included private accounts (Kerrey and Social Security goes back many years). He and Lieberman were also co-sponsors of the Iraq Liberation Act and cheerleaders for Ahmad Chalibi. Kerrey was also on the nortorious Committee for the Liberation of Iraq.

The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq was the quintessential modern front group, built on a diverse membership, international connections, a broad and unifying statement of purpose, and internal disciplines. Scheunemann, CLI's executive director, was like Jackson a board member of the U.S. Committee on NATO; and he was at the core of the early efforts in Congress and within the Republican Party to support the Iraqi National Congress (INC). Almed Chalabi, INC's chieftain, was a wealthy Iraqi expatriate who gained favor with neocons and hawks during the 1990s but was distrusted by the State Department and the CIA. In his position as national security adviser to Senator Trent Lott, Scheunemann had drafted numerous legislative bills shaping Washington's Iraq policy. One of these bills, the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998, authorized $98 million to the INC - funds that were never fully disbursed by the Clinton administration, partly because of serious infighting within the INC.

Most CLI board members were prominent neocons, such as Robert Kagan, Richard Perle, William Kristol, and Joshua Muravchik. 4 But the success of the CLI as a front group stemmed from its ability to incorporate Democrats and Republicans outside the politically incestuous circle of neocons, including former Senator Bob Kerrey, former Congressman Steve Solarz, Will Marshall of the Progressive Policy Institute (an offshoot of the center-right Democratic Leadership Council), Sen. John McCain, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, and former Secretary of State George Shultz, who served as honorary chairman of the CLI advisory board.

In other words, Kerrey and Lieberman are like-minded politicians in many ways.