I was a Democrat before I became a Democrat
A major shift in political power has occurred on Tuesday, April 28. Conservatives in the Republican party look upon the shift with scorn, but Democrats are welcoming the change with open arms. They should – their ability to slam legislation through the Senate could be within reach. Good things for liberals, not so good for those
Jacob Heilbrunn reports for The Huffington Post that one of President Obama’s biggest accomplishments thus far could be Senator Arlen Specter’s defection from the Republican Party to the Democratic Party. Does this mean he will support the president’s plan to overregulate no fax cash advance and installment loans?
Oh what a relief it is
How much of a success Specter the Democrat will be to the anti-filibuster movement will depend upon whether Al Franken wins his court challenge in Minnesota and comes to join as the 60th Democratic senator. With 60 votes in the Senate, the Democrats will be completely unstoppable against the Republican minority.
Now, Specter’s move may not be based on ideals as he would have us believe. In politics, it doesn’t matter if you’re a liberal, conservative or somewhere in the middle. The bulk of your actions are padding your back in some way. And Specter wants to be reelected. He won’t be if he remains with the Republican Party, so this is a fortuitous move for him.
But his rhetoric is different
What Arlen Specter the Democrat is saying in public is that the Republican Party has gone too far right for his comfort. I has happened for both parties before. As Heilbrunn reminds us, “Democrats used to say that they hadn’t left the party but it had left them, so reasonable Republicans can no longer remain a part of an ossified party that continues to lurch toward the right.”
The first big sign of Specter’s move was his opposition to the Bush administration’s unprecedented power grab post 9/11. In an essay written not long before his defection to the Democrats entitled “The Need to Roll Back Presidential Power Grabs,” Specter expresses worries that President Obama will rely on “state secrets” privilege to suppress lawsuits that would “challenge controversial policies like warrantless wiretapping.” Now a Democrat, Specter will be in a position to help push legislation in a majority Congress that will, in his words, allow “Congress and the courts to reassert themselves in the system of checks and balances.”
Where do Republicans go from here?
Heilbrunn puts it perfectly – Obama has won a major battle “without firing a shot,” and in doing so is well on his way to “destroying the Republican party that has existed for the past several decades.” Surely the Republicans will have their day again, but it may have to be more of a moderate incarnation. Until then, Heilbrunn predicts more defections…
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This is unexpected, but not a huge surprise. Assuming, for the sake of argument, that Specter isn’t switching parties solely to make it easier for him to get re-elected, it isn’t that surprising. He is a Republican of a fairly liberal stripe, and he has broken with a lot of his colleagues over a lot of issues. Well, really there isn’t any shame in that, if he votes how he sees best to serve the American people (that IS their job, not to kow tow to their own parties’ opinions, after all, and especially not to their figureheads, like Rush Limbaugh), and it seems like they are pushing the moderates out.