Joe Lieberman Out

This is good news…

WASHINGTON — Joe Lieberman will not run for reelection in 2012, Connecticut Democratic sources tell HuffPost, ending his four-term Senate career. Two prominent House Democrats, Chris Murphy and Joe Courtney, are eyeing a bid, with Susan Bysiewicz, a thrice-elected former secretary of state, also jumping into the race.Lieberman, who lost a 2006 primary to netroots insurgent Ned Lamont, will announce his retirement on Wednesday. “Senator Lieberman made a decision about his future over the holidays which he plans to announce on Wednesday,” a Lieberman spokesman said.

In 2006, Lieberman ran under a party he created called Connecticut for Lieberman. Anti-Lieberman activists, however, have since taken it over.As Lieberman deliberated, the new chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Sen. Patty Murray D-Wash., told HuffPost that the party would consider supporting Lieberman if he returned to the fold.”This is first a Connecticut decision. Its a Joe Lieberman decision and well work our way through all of that,” Murray said. “He and I have chatted a number of times.”

Lieberman serves as a repository for the anger progressive Democrats have for centrists in — and out of — the party, and some would like little more than to unseat him at the polls. The feeling of ill will is mutual: Lieberman said during the health care debate that one reason he opposed a Medicare buy-in compromise was that progressives were embracing it.

Liebermans participation in the race would have drawn national attention — and money — to the Connecticut race, leaving his political adversaries hoping that he would run.

via Joe Lieberman Out.