I have said this for a long time and many of my liberal friends have accused me of not being a liberal any more for doing so. Today at Opinion Journal Lanny Davis who is certainly more liberal than I am, and certainly has at least more public liberal credentials than I do writes about some of the liberal bigotry he has witnessed.

Excerpt:

On “Lieberman vs. Murtha”: “as everybody knows, jews ONLY care about the welfare of other jews; thanks ever so much for reminding everyone of this most salient fact, so that we might better ignore all that jewish propaganda [by Lieberman] about participating in the civil rights movement of the 60s and so on” (by “tomjones,” posted on Daily Kos, Dec. 7, 2005).

• “Good men, Daniel Webster and Faust would attest, sell their souls to the Devil. Is selling your soul to a god any worse? Leiberman cannot escape the religious bond he represents. Hell, his wife’s name is Haggadah or Muffeletta or Diaspora or something you eat at Passover” (by “gerrylong,” posted on the Huffington Post, July 8, 2006).

• “Joe Lieberman is a racist and a religious bigot” (by “greenskeeper,” posted on Daily Kos, Dec. 7, 2005).

And these are some of the nicer examples.

and it doesn’t end there:

One Sunday morning on C-Span I debated Nation editor Katrina vanden Heuvel on the Lieberman versus Lamont race. Afterwards I received a series of emails–many of them in ALL CAPS (which often suggests the hyper-frenetic state of these extremist haters)–that were of the same stripe as the blog posts, and filled with the same level of personal hate.

A friend of mine just returned from Connecticut, where he had spoken on several occasions on behalf of Joe Lieberman. He happens to be a liberal antiwar Democrat, just as I am. He is also a lawyer. He told me that within a day of a Lamont event–where he asked the candidate some critical questions–some of his clients were blitzed with emails attacking him and threatening boycotts of their products if they did not drop him as their attorney. He has actually decided not to return to Connecticut for the primary today; he is fearful for his physical safety.

Good for Lanny Davis who is a proud Democratic partisan for calling out the people who give the Democratci Party a bad name.

Mr. Lamont and all other liberal Democrats should remember the McCarthy era and not fall into the trap of the hypocrisy of the double standard–that it’s not OK when Ann Coulter dispenses her venomous hatred, but it is OK when our side’s versions of Ann Coulter do.

This may be the first time Lanny Davis has seen it up close and personal but the hate filled vitriol from the left is nothing new.

***Update***

The NewsBlog cries foul denying that any left wing blogger has spewed the vile comments Davis cited in his article. Before we go any further lets acknowledge that the comments Davis cited were indeed from commenters on the Huffington Post and The Daily Kos not from the authors of those blogs. However the following is directly from Steve at The News Blog:

Vince Foster. Remember him, Lanny. Remember how the WSJ editorial page drove him to suicide

Lanny Davis should be ashmed of himself. Running to the people who drove his friend to blow his brains out. Remember how Bob Bartley smugly went on TV to wash his hands of the whole affair. Now, to save your friend Joe Lieberman, you run to their warm embrace, skipping over the puddles of blood of your late friend, well darkened spots after all this time.

Those are your words aren’t they Steve?

They come across as pretty vile to me. Did you really intend to use as you acknowledge Mr. Davis’ dead friend as a political prop?

You are a blogger are you not?

You are correct about one thing. Mr. Davis did fail to cite an actual blogger’s comment in his article. Maybe he can revise it with your post today. To use your own words you should be ashamed of yourself.

Wait I forgot you have no shame. Aren’t you the same Steve Gilliard who posted the infamous photoshopped image of Rep Senatorial candidate Michael Steele in blackface on your blog?

Oh and wasn’t it blogger Jane Hamsher who has been supporting, even filming and driving the Lamont campaign around who put the photoshopped image of Joe Lieberman in blackface up at the Huffington Post?

nah you would never demonize your political opponents with vile attacks would you?

**update**

Blue Crab Boulevard says Davis’ lament rings hollow:

What rings hollow here is that Mr. Davis has a book due out soon decrying “gotcha politics”. I’ve mentioned before that I saw a noted increase in that form of politics led by the Clintons during that eight year presidency.

This feels like another one of those blogosphere scandals that is going to get bigger before it goes away.

***Update***

You might have been wondering what The Daily Kos’ reaction was to all of this.

Lanny Davis, it turns out, was a frat brother of George Bush’s and was branded with a burning cigarette by Bush when pledging DKE. He also sits with Ted Olson (of the Arkansas Project) on Bush’s b.s. “privacy board”. So it’s suddenly much clearer why he’s so desperately smearing Lieberman’s opponents and lobbyist friends. Steve Gilliard has more.

Wow he had us fooled all those years working for Bill Clinton, Lanny Davis was really a Republican.