The Plank

by Walter Alarkon - 05/21/08 9:22 AM ET

Barack Obama did well in his victory speech to reach out to Hillary Clinton’s voters and include lines appealing to patriotism, writes Franklin Foer. That, plus the casual way he invoked “sportsmen” and “churchgoers,” is “politically promising,” Foer adds. Sen. Joe Lieberman, who criticizes Obama in a Wall Street Journal op-ed Wednesday, continues to go through “Zell-ification,” even if he isn’t yet a “raving lunatic” like former Sen. Zell Miller (D-Ga.), who bashed his own party at the 2004 GOP convention, writes Jonathan Chait. Lieberman has gone from being a Democrat with “weak partisan attachments” to being “essentially a partisan Republican,” Chait adds.

Tags Barack Obama Hillary Clinton