Dan Frisa
Friday, March 30, 2001

That's the only possible explanation for their mock horror at the announcement that President Bush will move beyond the seriously flawed Kyoto Treaty.

Signed on behalf of the U.S. by Al "Junior" Gore in 1997, the U.S. Senate unanimously rejected the treaty by a vote of 95-0.

Done. End of story, right?

Wrong.

Now all of a sudden comes a political uprising by the left charging that somehow the president is reneging on a commitment to the Kyoto Treaty, an ill-conceived attempt by environmental extremists to hamstring industrial nations such as the U.S. while allowing China and North Korea, among many other nations, to proceed unfettered – all for the supposed purpose of stopping global warming.

It was wrong-headed thinking then and it makes no more sense today.

That the treaty was rejected by the Senate without a single vote in favor should say all that need be said about the wisdom of the document named for the city in Japan where the 1997 meeting was held.

Ah, but there's the rub.

The left and its lapdogs, such as Sen. Joe "I wanna be president" Lieberman, D-Conn., see an opening for a little Bush-bashing, and the mainstream media is having a field day obliging them.

Where was Lieberman – and why didn’t he speak up then – when he and his Senate colleagues voted against the treaty?

And why didn't he stand up then and hold a press conference taking himself to task?

Lieberman should have berated himself and announced an investigation into his own actions at that time, just as he did yesterday at a press conference attended by the highly paid professional environmental lobbyists. You know, the ones who spend millions of dollars in unregulated, evil soft money to lie about Republicans every election cycle.

That's precisely what's so Klintonian about this kooky Kyoto non-issue.

Lieberman sold his soul as veep candidate last year. (See Junior and Joe in the Garden of Evil.)

So it shouldn't be any surprise that the self-anointed – get this – "conscience of the Senate" has pulled another flip-flop to gain a few headlines in a feeble attempt to kick-start his 2004 presidential bid.

Expect four years of the same from the man who knows no shame, Joe Lieberman.

E-mail Dan: danfrisa@newsmax.com.

Read Dan's previous column: Roberts' Rules of Ego

Dan Frisa represented New York in the United States Congress and served four terms in the New York State Assembly.

See more columns by Dan Frisa.