Free Republic

On an otherwise quiet day on the Hill, 100 journalists and jostling photographers jammed the Senate TV studio yesterday for a sighting of that most exotic and endangered of species: a moderate in the United States Senate. Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) seemed amused that he was the object of so much attention. "Must be a slow day in Washington," he said during a burst of camera clicks. But as a prominent Republican senator taking on his president, his party leaders and conservative interest groups -- as Specter did in a meeting Wednesday with Washington Post editorialists -- Specter...

President Bush would be wise to "pick up the phone" and consult with Democrats before choosing a new Supreme Court justice. "The advice clause in the Constitution has been largely ignored." If there is a vacancy on the high court, "the far right is going to come hard at a nominee if it is not a nominee of their choosing. But I think there's a much broader base in America than the far right." Changing the Senate rules to prohibit filibusters of judicial nominees -- the "nuclear option" -- could have deleterious short-term effects and run the long-term risk of...

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter warned on Thursday that an impending showdown over President Bush (news - web sites)'s judicial nominees could lead to turmoil in the Republican-led Senate. Specter said if fellow Republicans invoke the "nuclear option" by changing the Senate's rules to ban procedural hurdles against the nominees, Democrats could as promised retaliate with other moves of their own to "screw things up." "If we have a 'nuclear option,' the Senate will be in turmoil and the Judiciary Committee will be hell," Specter said. "We can take an extended foreign trip, all of us."...

United States Sen. Arlen Specter (R., Pa.) has announced that he has been diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease, in a press release from his office Wednesday afternoon. In a press release, Specter, 75, said he had experienced persistent fevers and enlarged lymph nodes under his left arm and above his left clavicle. The statement said Specter received testing on February 14 at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia. The testing involved biopsy of a lymph node and biopsy of bone marrow. The lymph node was positive for Hodgkin's disease. The bone marrow biopsy showed no cancer. A follow up PET scan...

You may recall the controversy that arose when Elaine Jones, the head of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, was revealed to have asked Ted Kennedy to delay the confirmation of some of President Bush's judicial nominees in order to affect litigation in which her organization was involved. Jones ended up resigning during that controversy. Now Arlen Specter, in one of his first acts as chairman of the Judiciary Committee in a Republican Senate, is hiring one of the NAACP's top lawyers. Specter wanted Hannibal G. Williams II Kemerer, who has been the group's assistant general counsel, to handle nominations for...

Carolyn Short, one of the chief litigators in Reed Smith's Philadelphia office for more than a decade, has left the firm to become general counsel for the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, which is now chaired by Arlen Specter, R-Pa. Short resigned last Tuesday from Reed Smith, her professional home for the past 16 years, and was sworn in Thursday. Short said she only views it as a temporary position, being that she and her husband, former U.S. Constitutional Center executive director and Democratic congressional candidate Joseph Torsella, live with their four children in Flourtown. She said her chief motivation for...

On Friday Republican staffers in a number of Senate offices were holding meetings to discuss how to proceed with Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter and his recent hire, Hannibal G. Williams II Kemerer, who until recently was the NAACP's assistant general counsel. Kemerer was hired by Specter against the advice of senior Republican Judiciary staff and was to serve as a key vetter of Bush Administration judicial nominations. As word of Specter's hiring decision leaked off Capitol Hill, Specter is said to have shifted Kemerer into a job that would not deal with judicial nominations. "That is not true,"...

Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter went back on his word to Republican caucus members and conservative groups alike when he recently hired Hannibal G. Williams II Kemerer, who until recently was the NAACP's assistant general counsel. Specter hired Kemerer against the wishes of his senior Judiciary Committee staff. "We warned him this was going to cause trouble, but Specter said it was his committee, we are his staff, and he's going to do what he believes is right," says a Judiciary Committee staffer. Kemerer was a protégé of Elaine Jones, who three years ago, as head of the NAACP...

Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter went back on his word to Republican caucus members and conservative groups alike when he recently hired Hannibal G. Williams II Kemerer, who until recently was the NAACP's assistant general counsel. Specter hired Kemerer against the wishes of his senior Judiciary Committee staff. "We warned him this was going to cause trouble, but Specter said it was his committee, we are his staff, and he's going to do what he believes is right," says a Judiciary Committee staffer. Kemerer was a protégé of Elaine Jones, who three years ago, as head of the NAACP...

From Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: "The best argument for his staying on is his seniority, which puts him in line to be the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. In that capacity, he would be in a position to block some of the ideologically extreme federal judges likely to be nominated by President Bush in a second term, some of them for the Supreme Court. Before the Post-Gazette editorial board, he promised that no extremists would be approved for the bench."

Specter haunts Judiciary Sunday, November 07, 2004 NEITHER PRESIDENT George W. Bush nor Republicans in the Senate should allow Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania to become chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Mr. Specter, by virtue of seniority, is in line to become chairman of the committee in January. But his views and record on judicial matters are not in line with those of the president, nor with those of the majority of the voters who supported Mr. Bush. Most infamously, Sen. Specter was the Republican who cast the key vote in 1986 to deny a federal judgeship to Alabamian...

GRASSROOTSPA EXCLUSIVE: BOMBSHELL: SPECTER SLAMS CONSERVATIVES IN CAMPAIGN LETTER, ATTACKS PRO-LIFERS, CHRISTIANS Read The Letter HereSome choice quotes: -"I will not give up our Party to radical extremists without a fight." -Calls Pat Robertson, Ralph Reed, and Pat Buchanan "extremists". -"I resent people like Pat Robertson, Ralph Reed, and Pat Buchanan trying to give litmus tests to determine who can be a Republican candidate." -"I want to strip the strident anti-choice language" from the GOP party plank. -"Will you stand up to the far-right fringe that demands that legal abortion be banned?" -"We must demonstrate that the Republican Party is...

Specter Retreats: Specter denied yesterday that he threatened Bush on judge nominees. Don’t buy it. Specter knows that he got too arrogant and stepped into a hornets nest. Specter’s statement that, “I have never and would never apply any litmus test on the abortion issue,” just is not true. Specter has made it clear that he considers Roe v. Wade as Constitutional as the First Amendment. When the rubber hits the road, this is a litmus test for Specter. A few token votes to save his behind doesn’t change that a bit. Never forget what he did to Bork. In...

My apologies if a thread already exists. I did a search on "Toomey" and found nothing. I arrived at my polling area (suburban Philadelphia) at 6:45 am to hand out palm cards. The weather is terrific this morning, but turnout (I thought) was light (I had to leave at 9:15, but will be back). Actually, I have a good feeling about Pat.

<p>If you want to know why the legislative process in Washington is practically paralyzed, just look at what U.S. Rep. Pat Toomey is trying to do in Pennsylvania.</p> <p>The three-term Republican lawmaker is challenging U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter in a primary this week on grounds that the incumbent lacks pure conservative credentials.</p>

AP: Toomey May Knock Out Specter By Lara Jordan, AP Writer Press Release Thursday, April 22, 2004 WYOMISSING, Pa. - Fourteen months ago, a conservative congressman set out on a seemingly quixotic quest to retire four-term Sen. Arlen Specter. The challenger had little money, scant name recognition and no support from party leaders. Now, with less than a week to go before the state's April 27 Senate primary, Rep. Pat Toomey has come within striking distance of defeating Specter in what has become one of the nation's most closely watched GOP contests this year. "I really believe we're going to...