Joe Lieberman: "I'm only a senator."

From Joseph Lieberman's interview with Salon:

Let me ask you about another vote -- your vote that puzzled me the most. That was [in June] when you were the only Democrat to oppose a no-confidence against Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. This was a vote that had nothing to do with the war in Iraq. And you are both a former Connecticut attorney general and someone who remembers the politicization of the Justice Department under John Mitchell during Watergate.

Let me reconstruct that. It was earlier in the year. I think I thought that it was essentially a political vote. And the question on Gonzales was ultimately -- he serves at the pleasure of the president. And that there was nothing but political intent to the resolution. Forgive me, I should go back and look that up.

Rather than getting into that, what do you think of Gonzales now? Do you think he should stay as attorney general?

That's the question I don't answer. Look, I will say that his credibility has really been in doubt. He has handled his appearances here -- and I must apologize by saying --

I know that you're not on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

I actually haven't focused on his appearances, so I am relying now on the media as to what actually happened.

You're on safe ground.

So based on what I have seen [in the press] and with an occasional conversation with a colleague, he did not do well and he diminished his credibility. In most administrations, the president would have asked him to leave or he would have left. So I leave it to them [the White House]. But his credibility is in doubt. And as a former attorney general, that's not a good thing. And therefore -- but I'm only a senator. To me, that's something that the attorney general should take up with the president.

This is so absurd it's worth repeating: Joe Lieberman, one of the most powerful politicians in America, won't opine on whether or not Gonzales should go because he's "only a senator." And yet he's perfectly comfortable agitating for the use of "military force" against Iran.