America Elects a Democrat as Vice President!

Yesterday, Senator Joe Lieberman was elected de facto Vice President of the United States and President of the United States Senate!

Although the one loss I truly mourn from yesterday's elections was Ned Lamont, there might be a silver lining here - Dick Cheney has now become as irrelevant as a freshman back-bencher for the Republicans, and former Democratic Senator and Vice Presidential nominee Joe Lieberman, though now technically an independent Senator from Connecticut, now assumes the Article I powers of the U.S. Constitution, and then some!  The argument can be made that we now have a Democratic Vice President - bear with me here...

Article I of the Constitution confers upon the vice President one of his/her two constitutional powers - the power to break a tie in the Senate.

That power now belongs to Senator Joe Lieberman, and we really need to recognize this fact.  Once Allen concedes, and the Senate is gavelled into session January 3rd, Joe Lieberman becomes the tie breaking vote in the Senate on any straight, party-line vote.  Should we (the Dems) welcome Joe back into our fold, letting bygones be bygones, and should Joe be able to recover from his wounds, Joe will have the same powers in the Senate as he would have had as Gore's Vice President - six years late, but better late than never.

On the other hand, if Joe is courted by the Rethugs, he can throw his vote the other way, joining the 49 plus Cheney, in a 51 vote majority.

Sure, under Article II, Cheney is still a heartbeat away, but in the mean time, he's Rove's assistant in a bad mood in the White House and the Jr. Senator from East Bumfuckistan.