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Allow me to point out a little fallacy on Jeff Jacoby's part here. Jacoby takes Lieberman to task for what he believes to be a flip-flop or abandonment of a key element of Lieberman's strongest suite ... his faith and mention of it in the campaign.

He points out Joe's 2000 speech at the Fellowship Chapel in Detroit in which he quoted George Washington: "George Washington warned us never to `indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion."

Jacoby then relates his experience when Joe spoke with his Boston Globe writers:

During a visit to The Boston Globe last week, he was asked again about that 2000 speech. Did he really mean to assert that religion is necessary for morality?

He could have answered "yes," and observed that just as medicine tends to make society more healthy, religion tends to make society more ethical. He could have explained that Judeo-Christian teachings are a well-spring of the civic virtues a sound democracy requires. He could have pointed out that even Thomas Jefferson, skeptical deist though he was, considered religion "the alpha and omega of the moral law" and used government funds to underwrite the religious services held in the Capitol and other federal buildings.

But he didn't. Instead of defending the stance he had articulated with such apparent conviction in 2000, Lieberman scuttled away from it.

That quote of Washington's had been "taken out of context," he told his questioner. The "remarkable" thing about the American system "is that while the Declaration says that we get these rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as an endowment from our Creator, one of those rights is to not believe in the Creator."

As for the notion that religion is a mainstay of morality, Lieberman was having none of it. "All of us" know people who are religious but sleazy, he said, and other people, "totally religiously not observant," who lead "extremely moral and decent" lives. "I think that context was left out of that quote from Washington, which is the way I believe he meant it."

Actually, it's pretty much the opposite of what Washington meant. It's also pretty much the opposite of what Lieberman meant when he quoted him. Why the about-face? Because this time he was talking not to worshippers in church but to journalists at a newspaper? Because in 2003 he is trying to woo liberal voters in Democratic primaries, while in 2000 he was appealing to moderates and conservatives in the general election?

Both are plausible. But so is this: Voters are unlikely to repose much faith in a candidate whose views on everything -- even faith -- can always be changed in the interest of winning at "Twister."

It'd be damaging ... if only it were accurate.

Thy Neighbor?s Faith
Jacob Sollum already hit on this one before the 2000 election. If only Jacoby had read it, he might have a better understanding of this:

Washington?s actual words were not quite that strong. "Let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion," he said in his 1796 Farewell Address. "Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that National morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."

Washington thus allowed that the intellectual elite--those with well-educated "minds of peculiar structure"--could be moral without being religious, but he believed it was unwise to expect such a feat from the general population. In this respect, his attitude was similar to that of contemporary conservatives who rarely go to church or synagogue themselves but praise the virtues of religion for the masses.

...

In other words, religion should be valued not because it is true but because it is useful. It helps keep people moral, which in turn helps keep them free.

Although Joe Lieberman is an observant Jew, he took a similar tack when The New York Times asked him about the Anti-Defamation League?s criticism of his remarks in Detroit. In a society where the government does not closely regulate individual conduct, he said, "it?s helpful to have other sources of good behavior," and "religion is one of those."

Lieberman emphasized that religion is not a sufficient or a necessary condition for morality. "I know religious people who I consider not to be moral," he said, "and I also know people who are not religious who I consider to be extremely moral. So, you know, I?m talking about probabilities."

So there you have it, Jeff ... lo and behold, Joe's been rather consistent, after all.