Democrats show leniency towards Lieberman

SENATE DEMOCRATS have voted to allow Independent senator Joe Lieberman to remain chairman of the homeland security committee …

SENATE DEMOCRATS have voted to allow Independent senator Joe Lieberman to remain chairman of the homeland security committee despite his strident support for Republican John McCain in the presidential election.

Mr Lieberman, who was the Democratic vice-presidential candidate in 2000, will lose his place on an energy subcommittee as punishment for his harsh criticism of Barack Obama during the campaign. The Connecticut senator told colleagues that he regretted some of his remarks during the campaign and spoke of the hurt he felt when he lost the Democratic nomination for his Senate seat in 2006.

Mr Obama had urged Democrats not to strip Mr Lieberman of his committee chairmanship and Senate majority leader Harry Reid said that, although he was very angry at Mr Lieberman's actions during the campaign, it was time to look forward.

"This was not a time for retribution, it was a time for moving forward on the problems of this country," Mr Reid said.

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The Democratic caucus voted 42-13 in a secret ballot to approve a resolution condemning statements made by Mr Lieberman during the campaign but allowing him to keep the homeland security committee chair. Mr Lieberman acknowledged that he had crossed the line in some of his remarks during the campaign but said it was now time to move on.

"This is the beginning of a new chapter, and I know that my colleagues in the Senate Democratic caucus were moved not only by the kind words that Senator Reid said about my longtime record, but by the appeal from president-elect Obama himself that the nation now unite to confront our very serious problems," Mr Lieberman said.

Mr Obama has made clear since his election that he wants to heal campaign wounds, not only among Democrats but also among Republicans. The president-elect met his former Republican rival, John McCain, this week and he is considering former Democratic rival Hillary Clinton for the post of secretary of state.

Senior aides to Mr Obama have suggested that, although the president-elect plans to close the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay and to end the torture of suspected terrorists, his administration will not prosecute officials who conducted or authorised interrogations that used torture.

Mr Obama is expected instead to create a commission to study interrogations, including those using waterboarding and other forms of torture and to ensure that future interrogations are indisputably legal.

"I have said repeatedly that America doesn't torture, and I'm going to make sure that we don't torture," Mr Obama told CBS News this week.

"Those are part and parcel of an effort to regain America's moral stature in the world."

Senate judiciary committee chairman Patrick Leahy, who has been a harsh critic of the Bush administration's conduct of the "war on terror" said last week that there was no question of US officials being tried for war crimes. "In the United States, no," he said. "These things are not going to happen."

As Democrats voted to forgive Mr Lieberman yesterday, Republican senators postponed a decision on whether to expel veteran Alaskan senator Ted Stevens for failing to disclose gifts from an oil contractor.

Mr Stevens, who was convicted of seven felony counts last month, is in the midst of a recount for his Senate seat with Democratic challenger Mark Begich, the mayor of Anchorage.

South Carolina senator Jim DeMint called last week for a vote to remove Mr Stevens from the Senate Republican conference, saying the party needed to clean up its political house after Democrats won the White House and made big gains in Congress.

Yesterday, however, Mr DeMint issued a statement saying he would postpone action.

"After talking with many of my colleagues, it's clear there are sufficient votes to pass the resolution regarding Senator Stevens," he said.