This is of not much value but it is sure nice to see Lieberman get a symbolic pushback.
Joe Lieberman may have been wondering if his colleagues’ respect for him went out the same window that he tossed the public option and the Medicare buy-in compromise that was to replace it.
He got an answer of sorts Thursday afternoon as he came to the end of a floor speech, and ran out of time.
"I’m sorry. The senator has
spoken for ten minutes," Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), as the chamber’s presiding officer, told Lieberman. Customarily, senators ask unanimous consent for a bit more time, consent that is always given. "I wonder if i could ask unanimous consent for just an additional moment," Lieberman said.
"In my capacity as the senator from Minnesota, I object," said Franken, in what appeared to be a dramatic departure from the long and stifling tradition of Senate collegiality.
"Really?" responded a stunned Lieberman. "Okay. Don’t take it personally. I will ask unanimous consent that the remainder of my remarks be included in the record as if read."
Franken was okay with that. "Without objection," he said.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) rose to his friend Lieberman’s defense.
"I must say that i don’t know what’s happening here in this body, but i think it’s wrong. And so I — it’s fine with me that it be 10 minutes, but I’ll tell you, I have never seen a member denied an extra minute or so, as the chair just did," said McCain, whose presidential campaign Lieberman backed in 2008.
Franken spokeswoman Jess McIntosh told HuffPost that nothing personal was meant and that Democratic leadership is asking every presiding officer to enforce the 10-minute rule for both sides.
