This ad is currently running in Connecticut against freshman Congressman Chris Murphy:

The ad is being aired by an ultra right wing organization, Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Not shockingly, Joe Lieberman is one of their “distinguished advisors.” Jane Hamsher reports:

Republican attack ads pressuring House Democrats to capitulate on telecom immunity started running in Connecticut against Chris Murphy and Joe Courtney this week. They’re funded by an organization called the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and they’re exceptionally dishonest even by Republican standards.

Take a stroll over to the Advisory Board of FDD. Who’s on it? That’s right. Your good friend and mine, Joe Lieberman. He’s a “distinguished advisor” of an organization running attack ads in an election year against Democrats for supporting a core Democratic position in his own home state.

If the Democrats take the Senate by even so much as one more vote this year, the screeching to have this guy stripped of his seniority and kicked off his committee assignments is going to be deafening. I hope everybody knows that.

The FDD has some other Democratic (read: real Democratic) members on their Board. Senator Chuck Schumer and Rep. Eliot Engel have had their names removed in the last few days. Today, Democratic operative Donna Brazile did the same, issuing this statement:

 As a member of the Board of Advisors of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, I strongly condemn their misleading and reckless ad campaign. The organization is using fear mongering for political purposes and worse, their scare tactics have the effect of emboldening terrorists and our enemies abroad by asserting our intelligence agencies are failing to do their job. I am deeply disappointed they would use my name since no one has consulted me about the activities of the group in years.

When I first joined the foundation several years ago, it was a bi-partisan organization that was committed to defending democratic values and protecting the nation against threats posed by radical Islamic terrorism. Unfortunately, due to the influence of their funders, in the last few years, FDD has morphed into a radical right wing organization that is doing the dirty work for the Bush Administration and Congressional Republicans. I have made it clear to the organization that these types of lies undercut our national security and serve only to divide us. Furthermore, I reiterated to FDD that I no longer wish to be affiliated with such a group and have asked them to remove my name from the Board. In this post 9/11 world, Americans should not be attacking other Americans, we should be standing together to make this country safer and stronger against the real threat of terrorism.

To my knowledge, Joe Lieberman has been silent on the attack ads being run against Chris Murphy and Joe Courtney. On paper, Joe Lieberman remains a member of the Democratic caucus in the Senate. Democrats from Connecticut are being savaged by an organization Lieberman advises. At best, Lieberman is sitting on his hands. But we all know “Short Ride” Joe is capable of much worse than sitting on his hands, so nothing would surprise me given how far this man has fallen from the levels of collegiality he so frequently clutches at when he perceives Democrats doing him wrong. I don’t expect Lieberman to step forward and try to stop these ads.

Here’s CT Bob’s remix of the ad, though: