Secret ballot for me but not for thee, apparently. Senate Democrats will vote on whether or not Joe Lieberman will keep his chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee by secret ballot.

Senate Democrats will vote by secret ballot on Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman ’s fate this week, according to North Dakota Sen. Byron L. Dorgan .

The caucus is due to meet Tuesday to decide whether Lieberman, a Democrat-turned-independent from Connecticut, should be punished for his aggressive support of Sen. John McCain , R-Ariz., for president. …

Lieberman is expected to speak to the caucus during its first post-election meeting. If the vote follows the form of a leadership election, senators — with no staff — will sequester themselves, one Democrat will ask for a vote and another will second the motion.

Lawmakers will write their vote on slip of paper, those papers will be collected and counted, and the final tally will be read aloud to the caucus. Lieberman, then, will be able to know how many of his colleagues stood with him but will not know their identities.

Gee, I wonder why they’d want to do that. Maybe so they don’t feel pressured to vote a different way than they actually want to? Yet most Senate Democrats have publicly agreed to vote for the so-called Employee Free Choice Act, which strips workplaces of the free ballot and forces employees to state publicly whether or not they support organizing their workforce.