What's Up, My Senators?

I'd like to know WTF is up with Senators Byrd and Rockefeller.

Apparently 22 Senators still have failed to announce whether or not they support Ned Lamont as the Democratic nominee for the Senate from Connecticut. Bob Geiger has the roll call of senators and where they stand here. As a West Virginian, I find the fact that Byrd and Rockefeller are included in the group of silent senators disgraceful.

As Geiger says at the Huffington Post, there's no reason for any Democratic senator to not voice support for Lamont. Aside from the fact that he won the primary (and that's a big aside), Lieberman has betrayed the Democratic Party. I'm all for diversity of viewpoint, but when someone stabs you in the back, you cut them loose. And Joe's done worse than that, he's insulted all Democrats who oppose the Bush Administration's handling of the war in Iraq, and he's stated, along with Dick Cheney, that any Democrat who doesn't agree with Joe L. is a terrorist enabler.

Actually, its a disgrace that any Democrat has announced he'll support Lieberman against Lamont in the General Election, but I have more respect for the three senators who have done just that than I do for those senators who have remained silent.

Geiger's written them a press release, let me give them a little PR advice:

Senators, if you don't announce your support for Ned Lamont, you will be seen by both your supporters and your detractors as supporting Lieberman. You might think that by staying silent you can avoid getting caught up in controversy, but really. People are going to wonder, and when people wonder, they make up their own reasons and those reasons are seldom flattering to the person they're wondering about. If grass roots Democrats start wondering about you, and you continue to refuse to speak up, they're going to come to the conclusion that you're staying quiet because you're loyalty does not lie with the Democratic Party and the candidate chosen by Democrats in Connecticut. Unfair? Maybe, but it's also the way it is. Democrats are tired of wishy-washy candidates. You've made your choice, one way or another. Now it's time to let your constituents know what that choice is.

P.S. Is anyone else not surprised that Biden, Leahy and Feinstein are also among the 22? The Democratic Party's problem isn't extremists, it's fence sitters.