From the same folks who brought you the Kiss Float…
I was up in Connecticut a couple of weekends ago on a UHaul run (being one of those people who buys furniture on Ebay and worries about how they’re going to get home it later). Of course I had to have lunch with Ed Anderson, fellow veteran of the Ned Lamont race who is still in the business of mercilessly taunting all Republicans and Joe Lieberman in particular. Ed told me that he was headed for Minneapolis in August, where he had plans to unveil a 30 foot giant inflatable rat in honor of the Junior Senator from the state of Connecticut.
Now, most people who say such things might just be blowing smoke, but Ed has a history of making his…er…"artistic vision" manifest. Remember that Ed, along with CTKeith, created the infamous "kiss" buttons that inspired the classic float which dogged Lieberman throughout his 2006 race. He also famously showed up at a New Hampshire McCain rally sporting a sign that said "Bomb Iran! Vote McCain" before having one cocktail too many and putting Terry McAuliffe in a death grip.
So when Ed says he’s bringing a giant rat to Minneapolis, I take him seriously.
Looks like others do, too.
Some of the same Connecticut Democrats who stalked the senator on the re-election trail two years ago with the famous "kiss" float – a papier mache likeness of President Bush kissing Lieberman after the 2005 State of the Union address – are hoping to make a similar splash at the GOP fete Sept. 1-4.
If Lieberman’s detractors get their way, their prop would be a 30-foot inflatable rat, the kind unions typically use when construction workers cross picket lines.
Anderson warns Lieberman not to show up at the convention, as he’s ready to apply for permits to put the inflatable rat outside the Xcel Energy Center, the convention site.
Yesterday Lieberman appeared on the Christian Broadcasting Network and when asked about the GOP convention, he said "you might just see me there."
Go Ed (who has more on his new blog).
For nostalgia buffs, the YouTube above is from the July 4, 2006 Boom Box parade in Connecticut, where the Kiss Float appeared. Careful observers can spot CTKeith, Ed Anderson, Maura Keaney (now Jim Himes’ campaign manager) as well as me and the poodles, who were thought to be yet another float by children in attendance.
Related posts:
Spotlight
Support this site!
Subscribe to the newsletter
Advertise on Firedoglake
Send
us your tips
Make us your homepage
About Firedoglake
Advanced search
Right ON!
Lieberman is an Uber Rat.
A rat? Ummm…. A rat?
Hmmm.
Inappropriate. JMHO
The weasels were taken.
It is the horrific historical reference. Inappropriate.
Rat is particularly appropriate, imho, since RGJoe still attends Senate Democratic caucus meetings and probably runs right to McCain with any strategy Reid is dumb enough to talk about in front of him.
Lieberman is a rat in the caucus.
Go Ed!
What’s inappropriate about calling a Rat a Rat? Granted, when dealing with the Rs and Short Ride, there are so very many Rat options available.
But just as with the “Kiss Float” it seems it can be done with a sense of humor, and any negative reactions from the “Hey You Kids, Get Off My Lawn” candidate and crowd, just reinforces things and makes them look smaller and smaller.
Whoever Digg’s this post .. make sure the picture of Joe the rat is included. I am having problems right now or else I’d do it.
Poodle love!
The picture doesn’t do the rat justice.
Because Joe Lieberman is Jewish, and the Nazis constantly compared Jewish people to rats…in cartoons, in movies, etc.
It is inappropriate.
Digg this Rat..er..post
You go girl! One of my off-the-cuff ebay purchases was delivered without prior notice to me as I was providing testimony for a public hearing (planning board). The delivery guy walked right up to the dais with my antique china cabinet. I didn’t quite know how to explain.
Great trip to CT for us though, and we look forward to the coming images!
Go Jane GO!
The rat photo lookin’ good at digg. Please digg my comment, if you are so inclined.
How bout an eel?
Go Rat Go!! I can’t wait for the pictures of Liarman when he is confronted with the RAT… Oh by the way Digg this post for the Lake… It shows your support:>)
This is a vicious unprovoked affront to all fine upstanding rats around the world.
A better analogy for Lieberman would be the Tidy-Bowl Man, since he floats around waiting to clean up after McCain’s droppings.
Done Did Digg this Post and of course the “Rat” is the picture of choice… How could it not be included??
LS, I can assure you that the rat was chosen NOT to dismiss his heritage but to best describe his behavior. “Dirty Back-stabbing Jerk” is so much harder to create visually, so they went with “RAT”.
Hey, I have “rat” in my name….
Go Ed, go! And the rest of the CT crew. We got yer back!
Calling Lieberman a rat is unfair to rats, like calling “Otto” stupid is an insult to stupid people. The London Underground is not a political movement and Joe Lieberman is not a Democratic, “independent” or otherwise. He’s just like McCain: willing to do anything to stay in the limelight. As they say, if you hear a rat there’s a hundred; if you see one, there’s a thousand. So Holy Joe appearing at a Gooper convention is about right.
The large inflatable rat is a frequently used by Unions in our labor actions against illegal or improper actions. I, for one, think that using the rat as a symbol of what is bad about Leiberman is appropriate, and not intended as an anti-semetic symbol. Just sayin’
It appears from the audio that we have plenty of cowbell. We do, however, need more poodles.
Aside from what it is intended to mean, how do you think it will be interpreted?
I’d say Congress is full of rats of all kinds of relgious persuasion, why there might even be atheist rats.
If any are to object, then it should be the rats, for they are the ones maligned if this particular comparison …
And, if weasels is out ’tain’t much left but moles or voles.
Would you object to ’slime’ or ’scum’, ‘cockroach’ or ‘polecat’ (now that has a long ‘Murkan tradition)?
No one is suggesting anything regarding Lieberman’s future except that he ought, for everyone’s sake, to find another line of work …
If he wants to find a conscience, well, that’s up to him.
Need to put a bunch of bombs around him and one in each hand
An analogy too far. Like cockroaches, rats’ adverse relationship with humans long predates a single German government from the mid-20th century, no matter how heinous its behavior toward Mr. Lieberman’s co-religionists.
Conversely, it would be harmful to define his co-religionists by Mr. Lieberman’s neocon beliefs about war as a substitute for foreign policy, and his desire to suppress civil rights in favor of abject submission to the executive.
Joe Lieberman longer a Democrat. Now just a ‘rat.
And also a “single issue” guy, that issue being war, more war, bombing Iran, staying in Iraq, and more war.
People, people! This is my city you’re talking about. We were already preparing ourselves for an infestation of rats in August. Now we have the Mother of All Rats descending on us, too? I hear the signature dish for the convention is Ratatouille a la Joe. Bwahahahahahahaha!
I guess he thought you had a cabinet position in the government.
damn Jane, thought I was gonna have to wait for PatriotFest08 to see the Rat – thanks for the preview !
damn I love these nutmeggers
uh-oh, this post was double dugg, so your comment doesn’t show when you click at the digg atop the post, mebbe you should comment there, too.
and we know you aren’t a rat, jacqrat
Hi, Ed!
I like to think of Graham and Lieberman as gerbils who occasionally emerge from McCain’s backside to whisper sage counsel in his ear.
Bwahahahahahahaha. That is perfect. I do so hope that rat bastard shows at the GOP convention.
http://www.spectator.co.uk/ste…..iend.thtml
Now THAT is a “Rodent Of Unusual Size.”
That looks like only a 12 foot tall rat. A 30 footer will be more than twice a tall.
ratfood;
That is damn fine.
It …LOL …707 …LOL is an image … that will forever be stuck in my mind.
Rat on! ratfood!!!
Ah. Rat envy.
there are not words for how much I love this idea.
Go, Ed!!!
Rattlesnake might be more appropriate
Thanks, it would also help explain McCain’s awkward gait.
Unfair to rodents
As a Jew, I’d say that calling Lieberman a rat is more of an insult to rodents than to us.
Lieberman himself is an insult to Jews, Democrats, Connectiicuttians (I hope I just coined that), Americans, and the human species in general.
He’s right up near the top of the list of People I’d Like To Hit With A Custard Pie (strictly kosher).
The Rat is a good start, but this I think is better metaphor.
Now, now, some of us are becoming too rat-i-cal, the next thing we know someone will mention the rat-l-cal rat, and rat-wing religion’s role in rat-i-calizing the rat-eous among us and rat-away things will become rat-diculous and and we will be plagued with those who become rat-iously indignant about such rodential disparagement, besides RATional discussion is difficult enough under most circumstances without the added burden of gRATutitous misunderstanding.
I remember when punaise upped the ante on ants, just this morning …
This is hilarious!
Honey, when you’re rat, you’re rat.
So sad. Instead of doing anything positive eg holding rat candidate Obama’s feet to the fire over his disgusting performance in a** kissing at AIPAC, his about turn on leaving so-called ‘enduring bases’ behind in Iraq, and therefore making his much touted withdrawal more like a quick feint before thrusting US jackboots further into the ME, so called humanists get hot under the collar at has been Lieberman who for all his scungy, low life acts at least stuck to his guns, unlike this year’s messiah.
When are you people going to realise that democrats are the biggest obstacle to progressive change in the US? In 2000 Gore appears to have been run for the sole purpose of spoiling Ralph Nader’s hopes. As soon as it was apparent Nader had lost Gore refused to press home his own claim to the presidency.
2004 by running the unelectable Kerry, dems once again spoiled the chance for any committed honest member of the left, without putting up a serious case for the election of their own candidate who was little more than a slightly less damaged member of the elite than Shrub. People who ‘respect’ the sons of the rich are always gonna vote for the richest son ie Shrub.
This election the dems are seriously expecting to cast themselves as different to the other mob when for the past two years the democrat controlled congress (where Obama served as senator and lick-spittle to Wall St) has rubber stamped every attack on the constitution, transgression on other nations’ sovereignty and grimly resisted every attempt to bring war criminals Bush, Cheney and co to task.
When are you going to wake up and see the real world?
That video clip would finish McCaint were it to have serious play on the MSM.
But then, the Republic par-tay, as personified by the large gray actor, doesn’t come off smelling like roses either.
;~D
:~D
Oh, honey, rules here call for a spew alert before you say things like that. My latte is all over my monitor.
http://www.oldfashionedamerica…..ricks.html
I think I need to go back to bed and get up again. Must have wandered into some other universe.
One can only hope they’re able to make the final product look as much like him in the face as possible. Jane, you’re so lucky to know Ed personally. :-)
It’s my firm belief the Lurking Mod purposefully lets one slip under the fence occasionally just for the entertainment value.
Thanks for putting up my LiebercRAT picture, Jane!
The Germans used any number of words to describe Jews — they called them dogs, bacillus, and a variety of other names we can’t print here. Just because Liarman is a Jew doesn’t mean we don’t get to call him a rat. We here in the US have a tradition as well, and a Rat Fink is someone who sells out his friends.
At this moment, I can’t think of a nicer or more appropriate word for JoeBoy.
The LiebercRAT picture tells the story.
I want to see that picture of Peanut and the Poodles that Christy posted a year or so ago. Jane walking around like a float at the parade with her poodles reminded me of that picture.
Yeeks! Well, off to Windex my keyboard, monitor, computer, wall and ceiling. “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” taught me that Windex can clean up any mess. Whoa! Could we send a fleet of Windex-bearing tankers to D.C.??? Just askin’. Toodles.
How is Lieberman a rat? He is just aggressively representing his constituentcy…….Israel.
Awful!
For one, Israel is less secure since the Neo-Cons took over.
Second, the dual allegiance crap is just that, — crap.
I remember a Democratic Party that embraced him as our V-P in 2000. And it is that embrace that Joe is selling out in his quest for a McCain presidency and cabinet seat.
Shame on Joe! And shame on those who’d suggest Lieberman is basing his decisions on anything other than his own sense of what’s the best foreign policy.
fwiw…
Thanks for the belly laughs.
Ratatouille should sue for damages on the grounds of ‘guilt by association’.