Chait's guess:
In Lieberman's mind, I would submit, Obama was the heir to McGovern, and after he went down to defeat at the hands of popular maverick John McCain, Lieberman would be well-positioned to say "I told you so." He could then tell Democrats that only his brand of moderate Democratic politics could truly prevail, and the sadder but wiser party base would trudge back to his column.
2006-2011 archives for The Daily Dish, featuring Andrew Sullivan