A Democratic Specter

U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, who has served since 1980, is switching parties — a move that has some Democrats giddy.

The 79-year-old is considered a moderate, but his voting record over the years has always belied that label. Yes, he is to the left of much of what now passes for the Republican mainstream, but much of his liberalism has come in the form of words and not deeds (the pro-choice Republican rarely opposed Republican judicial appointments, for instance).

That said, a Democratic Specter would give the party 59 votes — with No. 60 only waiting on the resolution of litigation in Minnesota. That would put the party at the magic number — the vote total needed to invoke cloture and end a fillibuster. This assumes, of course, that all 60 Democrats can be corraled and made to support the party leadership.

The reality, however, is that party unity has never been the Democrats’ strength. In fact, getting Democrats to follow any particular party line is like herding feral cats — I guess it can be done, theoretically, but I wouldn’t bet on it and I wouldn’t get too close.

It’s also important to note that the Blue Dog caucus — conservative Democrats like Evan Bayh of Indiana and Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas — have balked at some of President Barack Obama’s economic plans, citing the need to balance the budget, and other liberal proposals. Keeping them in line, therefore, will become an important focus of Democratic strategy, meaning that party leaders will have to make concessions that will water down some of the more progressive efforts likely to be proposed.

At the same time, I don’t want to minimize the switch — it offers another example of how out of step the national Republican Party has become, how the party billed in 1992 as a “big tent” has become nothing more than a regional outpost for kooks and extremists.

I’m no fan of Specter, as should be obvious from my criticism above, but he is a moderately liberal Republican in the Rockefeller mold (think the elder Tom Kean or Millicent Fenwick or, more recently, Bill Baroni and Jennifer Beck, here in New Jersey).

That Specter — like Jim Jeffords and Lincoln Chafee — no longer finds himself at home in the GOP says pretty much all that needs to be said about the state of the Republican Party at the end of the first decade of the 21st century.

Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie. View all posts by hankkalet