The Lincoln Coalition

I’ve never been a fan of Arlen Specter. He is a time-honored member of the Republican good-ole-boy network who has been involved with some very shady eminent domain land deals in his home state, not to mention his attempt to get the federal government involved with the New England Partiots spygate controversy.

But I have a new respect for Senator Specter, as he has crafted the most brilliant plan to destroy the GOP by leaving and joining with the Democrats where he will be free from inner-party discrimination and his career will remain safe for good. With the inevitable confirmation of Al Franken looming in the near distance, the addition of Arlen Specter to the Democrats’ arsenal will give them the 60 votes they need to block a Republican filibuster.

The Republicans have only themselves to blame for the mess they’ve put themselves in here. Specter is an unapologetic moderate, and has recently criticized the GOP for being too right-wing. Because of this, Specter was formally challenged in next years’ mid-term primary by anti-tax advocate Pat Toomey. Given that more people show up to see William Hung at your local mall than vote in mid-term primaries, it gives Republicans a good chance to oust the Senator from his spot and put up a “real” conservative instead.

Specter was given full seniority as part of the deal he struck with Democrats. The only Democrat that has been a Senator longer than him is Patrick Leahy of Vermont, making him the #2 ranking Democrat in the Senate and putting him only a heartbeat away from becoming the judiciary committee chairman. In the meantime he will head up a very important appropriations subcommittee. He will have more power as a Democrat to appropriate funds to his home state than he did as a Republican, which in turn should buy him enough votes to ride out his Senate seat for the rest of his life.

As my friend Skippy Stalin from Postcards of the Hanging points out, it seems as if the Republicans didn’t learn their lesson the last time this happened in 2001, when Vermont Senator Jim Jeffords left the Republican Party and became an Independent. The Senate was split 50/50, and Dick Cheney had the tie-breaking vote which he actually used a few times. Jeffords spoke out against the Bush tax cuts, so the Republicans decided to “punish” him by denying him earmark funding for some of his pet projects. Jeffords then left the Republican Party, giving the Democrats temporary control of the Senate.

Fortunately for the GOP, Bush was able to gain control of the Senate again in the next mid-term election, if only for the fact that he had the nation’s 9/11 sympathies on his side. The Republicans were somehow able to hold on to their majority in the Senate for another four years, before the 9/11 honeymoon wore off and the people started to realize that Bush had used a national tragedy to dupe us all into an illegitimate war.

Ironically, guess who was rather vocal about the loss of Senator Jeffords, which resulted in him temporarily losing his position as judiciary committee chairman at the time? He even proposed a ban on party-switching.

Arlen Specter has no spine, this is why he is such a brilliant politician. He has manged to rise above the stink of what’s left of the GOP, preserved his own career and ensured that he’ll maintain his position until he’s ready to retire. His move has done more than just leave the GOP in shambles, he has brought upon them their worse nightmare. He has given Barack Obama a bulletproof Senate to push his own agenda, unchecked. Had Specter allowed loyalty and personal feelings to get in the way, he’d either be out of a career, or selling his soul to the GOP like John McCain did last year, and look how that turned out for him.

Specter claims that the President cannot count on him to vote yes on everything the President wants him too, but the Democrats really only need him for cloture purposes. After that, he can safely vote yes or no on anything he wants, without having to worry about what effect it’s going to have on his voting record. The Democrats should be able to muster up enough votes to pass whatever they want.

Obama’s had a rough first 100 days in office, and Arlen Specter just threw him a rather meaty bone. While I don’t agree with many of the Democrats’ policies, I can’t help but smile when I think of how Republican stupidity has caused the party to implode. This move may have put the nail on the coffin for the GOP, whom I see going out the way of the Whig party. In the upcoming mid-term election, I expect the GOP will lose even more seats, and unlike 2002, they (hopefully) won’t have a national tragedy to cash in on.