The Specter Switch: The Downfall of the Democrats?

Years from now, Arlen Specter's seismic switch may well be marked as the undoing of the Democrats.

No, not the Republicans. Their cyclical demise was cemented before the 2006 election by backing the ruinous Iraq War and regarding basic ethics to be as stifling (and optional) as government regulation (see DeLay, Tom).

Karl Rove's master plan of a permanent Republican majority was predicated on the idea of playing to the base. So the GOP has blithely refused to give up the ghost of wedge issues like guns, gays and abortion, thus playing into the Dems' hands. They now have lopsided majorities in Congress not seen since Bush the Elder.

Arrogance and bombast also doomed the GOP. What's remarkable is that Republicans haven't let up, even as their base has shriveled to an anemic one-fifth of the voting public.

Not that Democrats are immune to that, although in defeat, the donkeys tend to cower, while elephants evidently charge. The Dems' power-hungry ways bought them the Republican Revolution of 1994.

Now their haughtiness about Specter could prove just as damaging.

The Republican senator, elected back in 1980, did the Democrats an enormous favor by swapping parties last week -- something that should have sent them scrambling to throw a ticket-tape parade.

Instead, it just brought out the Dems' pettiness and divisiveness, which have always their fortes. The party has popped one helluva big tent in the Senate, ranging from reformed Republican Specter to Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders. And it's not clear that that even the Democratic Party can sustain that much diversity.

Of course, there was self-preservation at work, as right-winger Pat Toomey was all but assured to obliterate Specter in the Pennsylvania GOP primary next year. But the moral outrage from the chattering classes is beyond silly. Politics is an exercise in narcissism, to some degree. When did perspiring pundits like Chris Matthews get so naive?

The bottom line is, thanks to Specter, the Democrats will have a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate as soon as Al Franken is seated. Not on every issue, as "real" Democrats have already voted against the budget and serious foreclosure reform. It's true that Specter is not a guaranteed vote on pro-union card check or health care legislation.

But historically, those who switch parties tend to vote with their new team significantly more of the time. Beats having Specter as a Republican running scared and veering to the right...right?

Evidently, no. Preening senators did what they always do: throw temper tantrums. God forbid Specter leapfrog others on committees after 28 years of service, so Iowa U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, et al., fought valiantly to strip Specter of seniority and won. Way to make the new guy feel welcome. I'm sure he'll be extra-inclined to vote on your ethanol welfare bill next time around.

The reaction from liberal activists and the blogosphere was yawningly predictable: Off with Arlen's head! Purity rituals worked so well for Republicans that the Democrats are hankering to give them a try. U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak hath been anointed the savior of progressive values (i.e. special interests) and will likely challenge Specter in a primary.

Reasonable Democrats -- say the president of the United States -- have swung their full-throated support to Specter. But what does Barack Obama know? He only overwhelmingly won the last national election. With his courting of the pro-lifers and the insurance industry, he's not really one of us anyway. Primary the popular president in '12!

Specter is the ultimate test for Democrats, many of whom are gripped with the delusional belief that the good times will roll on forever -- partly because of their own inherent awesomeness and partly because of the Republicans' repugnance. Which sounds a lot like the Tao of Rove just a few short years ago.

Lately, I've heard from several of U.S. Rep. Mark Schauer's supporters who bray that the Battle Creek Dem will be an entrenched incumbent before the GOP gets it together in 2014. The idea that a freshman -- who won a Republican stronghold with less than 50 percent of the vote -- could get knocked off next year or redistricted out of his seat for '12 apparently hasn't crossed their minds.

The pendulum does swing both ways. Those who forget the fact that America is a moderate country tend to perish.

Many centrist Republicans have voted Democratic in recent elections. But it wasn't so much a vote for the Dems as it was donning a Hazmat suit against the hard-right elements of a hostile Republican Party. That alliance is already starting to crack; note big Obama supporter Lincoln Chafee running for Rhode Island governor as an independent.

Here's a scary thought for both parties. You combine the moderate Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats and what do you get? A fiscally conservative, socially liberal party that could easily win 60 percent of the vote -- the majority that doesn't believe it's adequately represented by either party right now.

It's unlikely in our two-party system buoyed by entrenched interests on both sides. But major parties do occasionally self-immolate, a la the Whigs. And the seeds of discontent are there in abundance.

One has to wonder how much longer the majority will endure being ignored and insulted before they demand something better.

Comments

[RickCoMatic]

I feel certain Specter's recent tunneling under the aisle and emerging on the Democratic side was a "One Man Only" defection intended to save himself from being plucked-out of his GOP Seat and replaced with any GOP-Backed challenger to his seat.

[regroupthink]

Democrats will only loose power if they follow the Republican's sad attempt at fooling the public with obvious Propaganda. If their ideas don't work, they are capable of adjusting instead of insulting our intelligence with a Fox News or Talk radio.

[SurrealPumpkin]

Let's be honest, the Democrats would have a hard time mustering a 60 vote majority if we had 100 seats in the Senate.

We need the Arlen Specter's of this world. We may not agree with them, but we need them.

[WorkingClass]

Forget about Specter. The senate will be better off when he is gone. The Democratic party is going to split. The new party will be a Labor Party. It will organize and mobilize the working class. The old corporate Democrats will join with Republicans to continue corporate rule. The new Labor Party will totally crush any and all opposition.

SOLIDARITY

[mredder4]

LOL, that's the funniest thing I've read all day.

[DocTwain]

Baloney. On economic issues this is a left-of-center country, and the longer the class war against American workers continues, the more left it will get.

Proof?
A majority of Americans want single-payer health care.
A majority of physicians want single-payer health care.
Yet the so-called "Democrats" are so far to the right of the general public--and former, real Democrats like Harry S Truman--that they won't even talk about single payer, much less fight for it. Instead, the question is whether they'll kill a an open-enrollment public plan, or so handicap it that it can't do what any real public plan could do--blow the health insurance cartel out of the water.

The electorate only seems as "centrist" on economic issues as you imagine because there's no sunshine between most Democrats and the Republicans on issues that affect the bottom line of the cartels. If the Dems actually showed a difference and started acting like progressiv­es--cappin­g credit card interest rates at 12.5%, for instance--voters would become Democrats in droves.

Don't you understand that American workers have been hurting and that only progressive policies will end the plutocratic class war against them?

The Democratic party has no room for Specter, or Chris Dodd for that matter. They are well to the right of voters on the issues that effect the cartels and the plutocracy. We need to replace them with representatives of workers, not agents of the cartels.

[WorkingClass]

Agreed.

[Liberal2]

Duh. So there will be a "filibuster-proof" majority on legislation that is essentially meaningless. But important legislation, legislation that would save the middle class and the nation, will be filibustered until it's watered down to uselessness? That's your Idea of moderate?

[Scalawag]

I agree. I feel that Democrats are in real danger of making the same mistakes that are destroying the GOP currently. Of course, I would like to see the entire 2 party system done away with. Maybe if both the Dems as well as the GOP self-destruct, this can be achieved.

[christopherflynn]

Just having specter as a democrat is the real reason for the downfall of the democrats...He's a wolf in sheep's clothing...or maybe the other way around... :)

[AngelaQuattrano]

Since Specter has declared he's not going to vore Democratic, what does it matter which party he nominally belongs to? If the Democrats get nothing in return, we owe him nothing.

[bliznik70000]

I wish guns wouldn't be listed as a republican "wedge issue". Real progressives stand up for gun rights. If main-stream Democrats were to finally embrace the second amendment, I believe it would drive the final nail into the right-wing coffin and we could be done with them once and for all. The constitutional right to freely defend yourself should never be questioned by Democrats. Anybody remember 1994? We probably could have avoided the whole Bush fiasco if we only stood up against the silly "assault weapons" ban. I mean, Al Gore lost his home state because of this!

[SurrealPumpkin]

As long as people define the "right to bear arms" to include assault weapons the Dems will be against it.

[mredder4]

This isn't 1776, sir. We're not repelling invaders or driving out savage Indians. With the Army, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard and National Guard, the defensive needs of the country are maintained. Citizens don't need assault weapons, unless they have some kind of need to be able to kill a lot of people who would be unable to defend themselves against that assault weapon. "Gun rights" are a vestige of an outdated past, and our country needs to evolve that appendage OUT of the DNA.

[BusGreg]

Specter will only make the democrats filibuster proof if all of them vote for cloture and only after Senator elect Franken finallygets to go to work. Specter has already stated that he won't be a loyal democrat. His latest vote on a banking bill and stand on the EFCA prove that.
What troubles me more is Jeff Sessions who is now on the Judiciary and has plenty of opprtunity to make President Obama's life miserable when it comes to judicial appointments / confirmation. Session's anti choice views among others are as retrogressive as it gets!
While Specter comes up for re-election next year, Sessions is not up for re-election until 2014!