Transcript of Remarks by Ned Lamont at La Paloma Sabanera in Hartford, January 17, 2006


Thank you guys for coming. I feel a little like Admiral Stockdale. You remember him? "Who am I and why am I here?"


Well, let me tell you why I'm here. There were two issues that really got my blood boiling over the last six months in particular. The first one was the so-called "Bridge to Nowhere." The other, of course was the war. The War to Nowhere.


The war in Iraq, as far as I'm concerned ,was an enormous foreign policy blunder for this country. It was a blunder from the get-go. We should have known better and if you want to talk later about why I think it was a blunder, I'm happy to do so. But more importantly, it was avoidable if we'd just gone in there asking tougher questions and asking the right questions going in, and we didn't do that.


You  newspaper guys... Y'know, I used to be a newspaper guy myself. I was a copy boy for the New York Times. I was editor of a paper in Vermont. These were perfect jobs for me because I just specialize in asking annoying questions. And I did that as a kid and I just couldn't believe that now I was getting paid to do it as a newspaper guy.


And we never asked George Bush the tough questions the whole leadup to the war. We never asked him tough questions when he said this battle 's going to be easy. We never asked him questions when he said were going to be greeted as liberators, that it's going to pay for itself, weapons of mass destruction, imminent threat. We didn't ask those questions along the way and our Senator, Joe Lieberman, not only did he not ask the questions, he was a cheerleader for the president every step of the way into the war in Iraq. And I think those that got us into that war ought to be held accountable.


That's then and now's now and what's important now?


It just seems to me, two and a half years later, we are sort of looking down the barrel of a bloody stalemate in Iraq. At that point I... we had some... Everybody's saying "Stay the course. Victory is our only exit." And we had some smart guys beginning to come forward, guys like Lawrence Korb, who was actually in the Reagan administration, guys like John Murtha, decorated hero and Congressman. And for once we began posing constructive alternatives to "stay the course."


They started saying, "Look, at this point, it's Iraq's war to win or lose. It's their soldiers, it's their people, it's their political system. We can't win and lose this fight for them. In fact, we may be making the situation worse. It's time for the American troops to begin stepping back from the front lines and it's time for the Iraqi troops to step forward."


And it seemed like a reasonable and constructive thing that we ought to be talking about, we ought to be putting on the table. And once again, it was Joe Lieberman and George Bush who tried to quell that debate. They said, "You're undercutting the credibility of the president." They said we're undermining the troops. And Joe Lieberman wrote that piece in the Wall Street Journal that was entitled  "The Troops Must Stay." And I, respectfully, disagree.


I think that the "stay the course" policy is not a recipe for success. I think that we ought to be looking at the alternatives, we ought to be pulling back, we ought to be putting the Iraqi troops forward. And I think it's important that we not try and stymie that debate. I think we got in this war not because we had too much debate but because we had too little. That's one of the reasons that I'm interested in challenging Joe Lieberman.


If he doesn't want to challenge the president on his policies, I will. I'd like the opportunity to do so.


Another thing about this war that gets my goat and when it comes to Joe Lieberman speaking out on the big issues of the day, it just seems to be all Iraq all the time, coming out of Washington, DC. It just seems to be sucking all the oxygen out of the policy debates that we ought to be having in this country if we want to compete going forward.


I don't hear a lot of discussion on how we win the war on terrorism and how we're doing two and a half, three years later.


I don't hear a lot about illegal eavesdropping. Where's the outrage about what's going on in Washington right now?


I don't hear on the constructive side, I don't hear much about health care.  I don't hear a lot about energy conservation and independence. I don't hear anybody talking about education reform. And we can't stand still.


Look, in my business... Y'know, I'm an entrepreneur, we build cable TV systems. That's, I've got to confess, what I've been doing most of my time for the last twenty years.  I love it. I'm my own boss. I go up against some of the biggest telecommunications conglomerates out there. I love a challenge. And we do pretty well. We've been competing against these guys for twenty years by offering an alternative, by offering better service. You know,  I love it because I've been working with a lot of guys who pull wire for this amount of time, my fellow workers.


Y'know over twenty years, you're like a family. You get the births, the deaths, the divorces, the marriages. You know we're in there together. You really see where their heart is at on a lot of the day-to-day issues. I just really have a sense that our government's failing us on this right now because we're not really attacking the issues these folks care about.


And I'll tell you one other thing as an entrepreneur is if you're not moving forward, you're falling behind and you can't stand still. If you're standing still as a small business guy in this big world right now, you're going to get crushed.


Right now I feel like our country's falling behind a little bit. We're not going forward. We're not willing to take the risk. We not modifying, we're not showing the progress that we need on some of these issues. And again, I don't know if it's the war in Iraq that's sucking away all the energy and the confidence that we should have as a country to address these issues.


I tell Senator Lieberman to stop by Bridgeport on your way back from Baghdad sometime. You're going to see a lot of folks who are hurting and they're hurting bad, a lot of folks who are wondering whether their job's going to be there down the road. They see China and India moving forward and we're standing still. A lot of folks whose health care costs are just going through the roof. And what are we doing about that?


One of the things that gets me going on the health care issue is that I think it's something that can bring labor and management together. As a small businessman, I can tell you that health care costs are drowning  us the same way its drowning a lot of folks who are trying to pay for their own health insurance. And it's the cost of health care...You know, I lose a bid as a cable TV guy, I'm losing it to some fly by night company that doesn't even offer health care.


I can sort of empathize with General Motors and others who are losing market share to countries where the health care is being provided and they don't have to build it in to the price of a car.  And one of the things we need our government to do is level the playing field, give everybody a chance. Give us a chance to compete so that we can build a better future for ourselves. And it just seems to me that our government's going in the wrong direction.


Instead, they're cutting back on Medicare, they're cutting back on Medicaid. There's no commitment to the safety net that keeps a lot of people afloat. I think we should expect more than that.


They tell me, "Okay, well we have to do this to help balance the budget."  Well, you have to do that to balance the budget 'cause you're paying for the war in Iraq, you've got a lot of illogical tax cuts that are bleeding the economy, and also you're paying for this "Bridge to Nowhere."


Y'know, Swanee [Tom Swan, Lamont's political advisor] says 'Why are you so hung up on this "Bridge to Nowhere?" But to me it's so symbolic of the sort of lazy corruption that's going on in Washington, DC, right now.


As you probably know, the "Bridge to Nowhere," the bridge to this empty island in Alaska, was part of the Omnibus Transportation Bill. Hundreds of billions of dollars, it included 6,371 "earmarks" -- those are special favors to favored Congressmen. Congressmen who have been in office most of their professional lives. There's a lot of back scratching going on. And it's symptomatic of , like I said, a lazy corruption in Washington, DC, right now.


As Mike Kinsley said, "It's not the illegal stuff that's so bad in Congress, it's the legal stuff." And it's one of the things we have to address. To me... Okay, the "Bridge to Nowhere," it's 238 million dollars or something and it's about twelve hours of the war in Iraq.


But, if we can't get a bridge right, it sort of discredits government a little bit. It discredits it in the eyes of people for whom government can be such a force for good. And they say, "If you can't get a bridge right, I'm not sure I want you dealing with my health care. I'm not sure I want  you dealing with my education reform."


And that's why to me it's so important to stand up against the abuses in Washington. To earn people's respect that we can deal with these bigger issues going forward.


Reagan used to say, "Government's not part of the solution, it's part of the problem." That seems to be true when the Republican's are in office.


One of the things I'm going to do as an outsider, one of the things I can do as an insurgent, one of the things I can do as an entrepreneur and a businessman, is I think I can come in from the outside. I'm not afraid of a challenge -- clearly.  I'm not afraid to go after the status quo in Washington and I'm not afraid to try and start circulating some new ideas going forward.


There's nothing worse from my point of view as an entrepreneur and as a politician to be than "stay the course." We can always do better than stay the course. We always ought to be asking those tough  questions. And right now I just don't think Joe Lieberman is asking those tough questions. I don't think he's challenging the status quo and I hear him loud and clear on the war in Iraq and I don't hear him on the other issues that I've tried to discuss.


If nothing else, I'm going to make sure that you guys hear those issues. I'm going to surface them. I'm going to challenge the president of the United States and I'm going to challenge Joe. And I hope for it we're  going to have a better process and I really could  use your support.


That's my pitch! The first time I've given it, by the way.