Sen Santorum is a reliable advocate. Understand he has to remain viable to continue in his seat. To have Sen Santorum seen as derailing Sen Specter could have unwanted repercussions. This is tactically stupid. In fact, even if specter were denied the chairmenship, Sen. Santorum should be seen as supporting him. Why put his seat in jeopardy?
When you use the word betrayal, you miss the point totally.
We need to be tactically smart. Along those lines, Freepers are doing the right thing by putting pressure on their senators. This will make the price easier to extract. In fact, not only could we extract something from Specter but perhaps from the other moderates. The key is to vote for the nuclear option. Make that a quid pro quo for keeping Specter. The senators can argue that their base is putting pressure on them to oust Specter and the only way to satisfy them is with the nuclear option. If this does not prevail then Specter could be denied the chairmanship with the rationale that the moderates had an opportunity to keep Specter but the base could not be molified with the status quo.
Joanie, I realize that I am addressing someone who has been right there on the scene. The issue is too important to let anger or frustration get the better of you. I fully appreciate how heartfelt that you feel. We need to focus on how to win the war. If Bush can get his judges through, I am totally satisfied. Obviously if the choice is simply a Specter chairmanship or not - I would say the hell with him. This decision however comes with a price. If ousting Specter results in having to compromise in a Supreme Court judge, we have lost the war.
Even though we appear to see this Santorum/Specter thing from very different points of view, I appreciate the courtesy and tact you have maintained in this debate. You are a gentleman.
With that said … :)
I believe your use of the terms ‘repercussions’, ‘viability’, ‘should be seen as supporting him’, ‘comes with a price’ … are all realistic, but unfortunate, considerations that spring from the you scratch my back/I’ll scratch yours philosophy of the modern American political process. Much of politics these days amounts to nothing more than attractively-packaged extortion.
The more emphasis a leader places on the potential political repercussions of his decisions, the more right and wrong and adherence to principle are relegated to ‘afterthought’ status.
I’d like to know your thoughts about the following:
Pat Toomey (an uncompromising Reagan-esque conservative) lost the Pennsylvania Republican primary to Arlen Specter by 1.5% of the votes cast. Most experts believe that the President’s and Rick Santorum’s endorsements of Specter were worth far more than that 1.5%. So, in effect, those endorsements provided the margin of victory -- and then some -- for Specter.
Many also believe that Pat Toomey stood an excellent chance of winning the general election as well, against democrat Joe Hoeffel.
So logic would dictate that, if the President and Santorum had not endorsed Arlen Specter back in April, Pat Toomey (a principled conservative, rather than a Republican-in-name-only) would be sworn into the senate in January, and John Kyl (yet another principled conservative) would most likely be the front runner for the chairmanship of the senate Judiciary Committee. Arlen Specter would have gone the way of Tom Daschle. The need for this debate over the prospect of Specter chairing that all-important committee would be non-existent, and I daresay both you and I would be much happier about the makeup of the senate as a whole, and the makeup of the Judiciary Committee in particular.
But that isn’t happening. Why? Because, back in April, Rick Santorum placed ‘remaining viable’, and ‘unwanted repurcussions’, and ‘the price of non-support’ before allegiance to conservative principle. Had the senator turned his back on considerations of political process, and focused instead on choosing right over wrong, all of us (he included) would be better off today.
He is now facing an opportunity to redeem himself. He can either (once again) bow to politics as usual (with its intrinsic spider web of exigencies), or he can do what he knows is right and support for election to the chairmanship from the members of the Judiciary Committee a man who has the best interests of America, and uncompromising reverence for the Constitution, at the forefront of any decision he makes. Rick Santorum, and you and I, know that Arlen Specter is not that man.
When concern for appearances and convenient alliances with acknowledged ideological enemies cloud the decision-making process to the point where the ultimate goal (i.e., the preservation of life, liberty, and sovereignty) is compromised, such political considerations become toxic – not only to the decision-maker, but to those who elected him to represent them.
I don’t know what, if any, religious beliefs you embrace. But scripture is replete with admonitions against compromise of principle. Isaiah 33:15 assures us that he who walks righteously and speaks what is right, who rejects gain from extortion, and keeps his hand from accepting bribes will prevail. Veiled, but powerful, forms of political extortion and bribes permeate the process we are debating here. And I would hope that a man of Rick Santorum’s strongly-voiced Christian character would rise above it all, and place his faith in doing what he knows is right, rather than what is politically expedient (yet again).
~ joanie
Specter himself created the firestorm of discord amongst both his peers within the GOP, and conservatives.
It is HE who crossed the line and disgraced HIMSELF by violated political protocol, insulting his constituency, and openly plotted to invoke his own will and agenda upon the President, his party, and a majority of American voters.
Heck, if this reptilian political transvestite -- Arlen Specter -- is the key to Republican nirvana and appointing Supreme Court justices, why aren't we celebrating his re-election as President right now instead of Dubya?
Specter's presence in the Judiciary Committee at this point would be poison. Dubya knows the score, Santorum knows the score, even so-called "moderates" Chafee, Collins, and McCain not only know the score, but know political hari-kari when they see it. Fortunately, the GOP has 54 other Senators in the bullpen.
NOT ONLY would the status of conservative GOP SC judge appointments be jeopardized by the erratic Arlen Specter infecting the Judiciary Committee, but the subsequent backlash by betrayed pro-life party organizers and soldiers will immobilize and flatten the GOP's momentum in the near future.
The choice SHOULD be easy for both Dubya Bush and Rick Santorum this time around, and the GOP will be stronger for it.