A Few Thoughts on CT

So the race is over, and what I thought to be the most likely result transpired, with Lieberman losing by about 4 points. As expected, Lieberman has already announced that he intends to continue the campaign to hold onto his seat by running as a "petitioning Democrat," or Independent, if you prefer. Daily Kos has declared war, pushing its supporters to contact Democrats (especially Harry Reid) to have them essentially disown Lieberman and fully back Lamont. Things are about to get nasty.

So, my prediction still stands. Lieberman will win in November without too much difficulty. There will be some who voted for him tonight who decide that Lamont is the rightful Democratic nominee, and so switch sides. No one will go from voting for Lamont to Lieberman. The result? Lamont will gain in support amongst Democrats from the primary to the general. However, any Republican with any brains at all will be supporting Lieberman all the way in November, especially considering how incredibly uninspiring the Republican nominee is. Lieberman should be able to put up a solid winning total with those numbers.

This is a huge victory for Republicans, because it is exactly the scenario that they needed to keep Democratic time and money locked up. The big four embattled Republicans are breathing a little bit easier tonight (although they have a ton of work to do regardless). The next three months will be as nasty for Joe Lieberman as any race that I've seen.

A few more predictions: 1.) most of the major Democrats will get solidly behind Lamont, and do their best to help him win in November; 2.) Harry Reid will NOT strip Lieberman of his committee assignments, because Reid is pragmatic enough to realize that that is the one thing that could drive Lieberman to the Republican party (or at least the caucus), and Lieberman is the likely November victor; 3.) Daily Kos and other far-left bloggers will waste so much time on this race that Max Baucus and Jim Talent will wriggle off the hook and win in November. Santorum and DeWine won't be so lucky.