Sneering From Kemp's Grave

A simplistic attack on Sen. Specter in the form of a eulogy for Jack Kemp:

The spirit of Kemp stands for principle over power. The specter of Specter glorifies solely the principle of power.

"Solely?" I don't think Kemp would have agreed.

Come Home, Arlen and Kirsten

On the Hugh Hewitt radio show on Monday, President Nixon's elder grandson, Christopher Nixon Cox, expertly game-planned the GOP's renaissance in New York state -- and if Republicans can make it there, they can make it anywhere. His segment starts about 11 minutes in. Executive summary: If the party were playing its cards right, Sens. Specter and Gillibrand would both be Republicans.

How About "The Arlen Specter Party"?

He may be talking himself out of being a Democrat, too.

Cheap Shot?

An odd column setup by Matt Towery:

As many know, it was an ambitious lawyer named Arlen Specter, working on the Warren Commission inquiry into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, who is credited with having conceived of the "single bullet" theory that somehow established that Kennedy's only assailant was Lee Harvey Oswald.

Careful, there. Oswald was the only assailant. If Specter was the one who understood the evidence well enough to prove it, all power to him, his party affiliation notwithstanding.

Frightening Specter Of A Looming Snowe Drift

Soon, all the snorting about Arlen Specter will be over. Those seeking the holey grail of a Reagan-Goldwater renaissance (despite the likelihood that pining for a 21st century facsimile of the former will almost certainly bring about a candidacy with the general election prospects of the latter) will eventually tire of saying good riddance and questioning Specter's motives.

Those who think that Specter's defection is good news because having all this power means the Democrats inevitably will fail -- this cohort will have had its say and will go back to sitting around and waiting for something to go so horrifically wrong in the country or world that the Republicans (all 21% of them) can rise from the ashes.

And then there are the Democrats who don't seem especially happy about the new kid, either, perhaps because they fear that his influence and that of other moderates and independents will make it easier for the Democrats to dominate the center but at the expense, undoubtedly, of elements of the left-liberal agenda. They too will eventually move on to other distractions.

And then Republicans will be left with this calm statement of an unavoidable and irreducible truth, as stated this morning by Specter's friend and fellow moderate, Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine):

Senator Specter indicated that his decision was based on the political situation in Pennsylvania, where he faced a tough primary battle. In my view, the political environment that has made it inhospitable for a moderate Republican in Pennsylvania is a microcosm of a deeper, more pervasive problem that places our party in jeopardy nationwide.

I have said that, without question, we cannot prevail as a party without conservatives. But it is equally certain we cannot prevail in the future without moderates.

In that same vein, I am reminded of a briefing by a prominent Republican pollster after the 2004 election. He was asked what voter groups Republicans might be able to win over. He responded: women in general, married women with children, Hispanics, the middle class in general, and independents.

How well have we done as a party with these groups? Unfortunately, the answer is obvious from the results of the last two elections. We should be reaching out to these segments of our population — not de facto ceding them to the opposing party.

Talk About A Specter

As Pennsylvania waxed Democratic, Sen. Arlen Specter was facing another primary challenge from the right. He probably would've prevailed, but at 79, why bother? Why battle in a rightward-tending party for the privilege of representing your constituents and honoring your centrist principles? So today, he switched parties.

Lots of Republicans will say good riddance. Ed Rollins hinted last year that a John McCain defeat would be good for the GOP, since being relegated to the wilderness would accelerate the party's return to its true, Goldwater-Reagan roots. So I imagine Rollins is among those exulting today as the wilderness express picks up steam. Assuming Sen. Al Franken (that was hard to type) is seated, then President Obama and the Democrats will have the makings of a filibuster-proof majority. Yessir, Ed -- we've got 'em right where we want 'em now!

Even the smartest conservatives seem to have trouble seeing what's happening, such as Josh Trevino, who writes today at The New Nixon:

Specter’s party switch is the latest in a long trend of ideological party-sorting, in which the Republicans get the conservatives, and the Democrats get the leftists.

Uh, no. The Specter move means that the Republicans are keeping the conservatives, while the Democrats are keeping the liberals and getting the moderates. Let's do the math together.

Moderately Victorious

How Sen. Arlen Specter triumphs while maneuvering between left and right.