Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

According to a Hartford newspaper , this is the kind of remark, made by Senator Joe Lieberman on a “Face the Nation” broadcast, that has “infuriated” a lot of his critics: “"If we leave precipitously - if we say we're going on X day, everybody's getting out - as bad as things are, they will get worse. There will be an all-out civil war in Iraq. Iran will surge in to control large parts of that country. There will be a wider regional war. And al-Qaida and similar radical Islamist terrorists will use Iraq as a safe haven from which to attack us and others." Some of Lieberman’s hot-headed critics are easily infuriated. Now, the first thing we should notice about the infuriating remark is that it is predictive rather than descriptive. Lieberman is saying “If A happens, B, C, and D will follow. There are only two ways to answer a prediction: You may wait until an event happens and then view the consequences to see if the prediction is true; or you may use your intelligence...