DOES JOE LIEBERMAN HAVE ONE MORE STAB IN THE BACK LEFT IN HIM?

The New York Times tells us that former CNBC host Larry Kudlow is serious about running for Richard Blumenthal's Senate seat in Connecticut as the Republican challenger -- and Kudlow is trying to enlist some high-profile help:

Mr. Kudlow said in [an] interview [last week] that he intended to meet and discuss the race with Joseph I. Lieberman, the former Connecticut senator and Democratic vice-presidential candidate, who ran for re-election as an independent in 2006 after losing the Democratic primary....

He described Mr. Lieberman, the last non-Democrat to win a Senate seat in Connecticut, as “a big model for me.” Mr. Kudlow said he had approached Mr. Lieberman at a recent event to seek his counsel. “I asked if I could come visit,” Mr. Kudlow recalled. “And he said, ‘Absolutely.’”

Mr. Lieberman did not respond to emails seeking comment.

It's true that Blumenthal -- then Connecticut's attorney general -- endorsed the man who beat Lieberman in the 2006 Democratic Senate primary, Ned Lamont, but he endorsed Lamont only after the primary, when Lamont was the party's nominee (Blumenthal had endorsed Lieberman in the primary). As The Hill reported in 2010, Blumenthal tried to remain on Lieberman's good side, an effort Lieberman appeared to acknowledge:

While Blumenthal endorsed Lamont in 2006, he kept the Democratic primary winner at arm’s distance and made clear his continued affection for Lieberman. Blumenthal had supported Lieberman in the Democratic primary.

Blumenthal hugged Lieberman when they bumped into each other at an event celebrating the first anniversary of the saving of the Groton submarine base, an event that took place after Lamont’s primary triumph.

Blumenthal withheld financial support for Lamont. A search of campaign finance records on OpenSecrets.org, a website that tracks fundraising, failed to turn up any evidence that Blumenthal gave money to Lamont or Lieberman that year....

Lieberman says he has a good relationship with Blumenthal despite their differences during the 2006 race.

“Sen. Lieberman and Attorney General Blumenthal have enjoyed a cordial working relationship for many years,” said Erika Masonhall, a spokeswoman for Lieberman.

This didn't prevent Lieberman from very publicly flirting with the notion of endorsing Republican Linda McMahon against Blumenthal in the 2010 Senate race. Lieberman ultimately declined to endorse either McMahon or Blumenthal. Lieberman also refused to issue an endorsement in the 2012 election to choose his own successor, in which Democrat Chris Murphy beat McMahon.

So, based on past performance, Lieberman will probably date Kudlow but not marry him -- he'll just decline to endorse in the race. Or is this time different? After all,

Mr. Kudlow ... first fired speculation about a bid against Mr. Blumenthal in late August, when he declared on his radio show that he would run for Senate if Mr. Blumenthal supported the Iran deal.

(Lieberman, needless to sy, opposes the Iran deal. He's the head of an anti-deal group called United Against Nuclear Iran.)

Well, it may not matter -- Kudlow may not quite have figured out this electoral-politics thing:

... Mr. Kudlow said he was enthusiastic about taking a small-government, antitax message into solidly Democratic bastions, including black and Hispanic communities. Mr. Kudlow said low-income voters had been victims of government programs that discouraged people from going to work.

“The eligibility for food stamps has widened and widened; welfare has been widened -- unemployment insurance and disability insurance,” Mr. Kudlow said. “These are all incentives not to work.”

That's your plan, Larry? To go into black and Hispanic neighborhoods and tell the residents that they don't want to work? Yeah, you go ahead and tell them that. I'll cook up some popcorn.