Posted on 05/03/2009 6:32:56 AM PDT by leftyontheright
When he announced the other day that he was switching to the Democratic Party, Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter offered to return campaign donations from any contributors who might take offense.
Turns out that includes a lot of his Senate Republican colleagues who lent money to the cause.
Georgia Republican Johnny Isakson was first in line -- asking Specter to return his $5,000 leadership political action committee contribution. Other Republicans requesting refunds on behalf of their PACs: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky ($10,000), Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander ($5,000), Texas Sen. John Cornyn ($5,000) and Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker ($5,000).
"They gave that money to elect a Republican. They did not give that money to strengthen [Democratic Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid's majority," National Republican Senatorial Committee spokesman Brian Walsh told the Washington Times. "I expect a lot of people will be looking to have their money returned."
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Isakson Truth File PING
If you want off or on let me know
At the end of the day, you hve a lot better chance of a Democrat voting with Dingy Harry then you do a “Republican”.
They gave money to elect republicans. And that’s how Specter beat Toomey. Now, if they’d give money to elect conservatives we’d all be better off.
i can’t believe these people gave him money to start with!!
i hope everyone tries and gets their money back
Hey, maybe he can be sued out of office...?
Oh, never mind. If politicians could be sued for breach of promise, we’d have no politicians at all.
” I'm pretty sure I sent you $100, please send it back”
Mail to Billy-Bob voter at ( your address here ).
Let the bastard spend the next year sorting them all out.
They likely don't even have records on the small donors.
You say, “They gave that money to elect a Republican.
I think this says it all... So what about values and principles...let’s just elect “Republicans”. Conservative are sick of this game, are we not?”
Let’s face it - the Pubs have to start thinking like the Libs and watch out for their own - that is what is now called Politics! It is high time that the Repulicans start backing their own instead of turning on them like a pack of wolves every time the media cries foul. You don’t see the Dems demanding that Kennedy leave office after his drunk driving conviction or that Jackson leave office after cash was found in his freezer. Instead they huddle around their own and wait until the press fades (which since we are talking about Dems is almost immediately). In the case of Jackson they even made the issue about the METHODS used to catch up with him in order to divert attention from the real crime committed. But let there even be a smell of (usually media created) scandal around a Republican - and the rest of them turn on him/her and demand that they resign. It is time Republicans get a backbone and watch for REAL issues instead of made-up ones that the press keeps coming up with.
Those of you who don’t feel that there is room in the Republican Party for anyone but conservatives should go form your own party.
I say good riddance to Specter. This is one of those few win-win scenarios that ever arises in politics. Everyone is ultimately better off with him being a Democrat.
But as a staunch supporter of former President Bush, essentially right down the line, the knuckleheads on this site who have no patience for anyone but what they believe to be a true conservative are relegating the Republican Party to permanent minority status.
If you are losing as badly as you have been lately, shouldn’t you be asking yourselves questions like these:
If McCain was so bad (and I agree that he was), why can’t conservatives put a better candidate in front of our own party?
Do conservatives have no interests beyond 2nd amendment rights, pro-life, and smaller government?
And so forth. Really, I come to this site and all I read is complaining. What really was so bad about President Bush that conservatives were so willing to throw him under the bus? What hope do conservatives offer as alternatives? What affirmative measures can conservatives advance?
And I am not defending Specter. I am criticizing those who whine incessantly and yet can’t point to one plausible candidate who they can put up instead, or one book or intellectual platform simply stated that provides any kind of foundation for moving the party forward. Fred Thompson? Please. Mitt Romney? Not reliable and lots of baggage. Who then?
OK, flame away!
“They gave that money to elect a Republican.
I think this says it all... So what about values and principles...let’s just elect “Republicans”. Conservative are sick of this game, are we not?
Yes we are!
No, no and HELL NO. It’s not conservatives that have moved right, it’s the Republican Party that has moved LEFT. What’s wrong with complaining about the Democratic-Party-Lite that has crept in to our system?! Nothing!!
We’re just asking the R party to come back to it’s roots, not go somewhere new. It’s the so called moderates (aka Dem-Lite) that need to move.
And occasionally we do find a person of worth, and then the R party lets the Dem press destroy them! We are fighting an enemy of our country right now and it is our own citizens. (sad)
Pogo: we have met the enemy and he is us
And beyond complaining about it, what do you have to offer? What do any conservatives have to offer?
I ask this as someone who considers himself a conservative (though I would no doubt flunk several litmus tests).
The Republican Party has moved far to the left? Truly? Is Arlen Specter MORE to the left than he once was? Olympia Snowe? Were the Rockefeller Republicans further to the right than today’s moderate Republicans?
I guess I don’t see it. I think the “moderate” Republicans have always been around.
All I see is conservatives whining about Harriet Meiers instead of Alito and Roberts. And about prescription drug benefits rather than health savings accounts. (By the way, Bush was TOTALLY right on PDBs.)
Instead of the shining city on a hill and optimism and moving the country forward, all I see from conservatives these days is doom and gloom.
Well, i can’t disagree in any way with that post!
btw, I have actually never been a Republican. In the beginning it was because I couldn’t stand the label, but for many years it’s been because they stood by and allowed too many liberals to hijack the party.
What really was so bad about President Bush that conservatives were so willing to throw him under the bus?
________________________________________________________
By 2005 he had increased the percentage of federal spending by almost twice as much as any president in the nation’s history. That increase culminated in the stimulus package we were presented with just before he left office.
I believe that Obama will pass Bush up but that does not excuse the amount that Bush grew the government.
Having said that, He did a great job on the ‘War on Terror’ stuff.
I agree that the Republican Party has let too many liberals hijack the party.
Let’s examine why. My hypothesis would be that liberal Republicans are often the “marginal” voters, meaning that they are disproportionately the swing/deciding votes on close calls in the House and Senate.
These folks are entitled to their positions, and being middle-of-the-road and stuck with only two parties, they have every right to be centrists. Why hate on them? Why force them into the arms of Democrats?
So how to deal with them? I have some ideas. First, don’t systematically cave. Second, set expecations for deference and respect for party colleagues — to apply both to moderates and to conservatives. These include an abundance of deference and respect for party colleagues and positions, even when we disagree. Etc.
I guess my larger point is that I despise A. Specter not because of the moderate positions he holds, but because he’s a dis-loyal, look-out-for-#1 d-bag who dis-respects the Party and gets his way far too often.
And where I fault conservatives is that they attack his positions (which he is entitled to hold, of course, of course) rather than his character, temperament, and behavior.
If Republicans are going to rebuild their party, we need to do better making distinctions such as these.
Well the R had better do SOMETHING different, because the wussy way they conduct themselves is not working!!
And ok, ok, I agree with everything in this post too. Darn you, I’m going to be taking your side if we don’t watch it!
Thanks for the posts and now i will say “keep ‘em coming”!
On please
Not that anyone cares, but let me elaborate with two specific examples: Robert Bork and John Bolton. Two absolutely great, powerful, compelling conservative minds. And at the same time whiners whose input on many matters of overriding importance ends up counterproductive.
I write specifically of Bork’s writings around H. Meiers and Bolton’s writings around Bush policies on Iran. After it was increasingly apparent that Bush would withdraw the Meiers nomination, Bork published an Op-Ed piece in the WSJ that was so over-the-top critical of Bush, and on issues having nothing to do with Harriet M, that I lost all respect for him as an individual. He ended up being a tool of the Left (Republicans ‘eating their own’ etc etc).
Same thing with Bolton. Bush expended a lot of political capital bringing him in to his Administration, and since leaving Bolton has been unrelenting in his criticism of Bush and somehow unable to draw any meaningful distinctions between Bush and Obama. Again, the MSM points to Bolton both as a right-winger and as evidence that Republicans are at war with each other. So while I hang on every word that Bolton says and writes, I think at the same time that he’s a menace. Not to be trusted. Working against the best interests of the party. Bad news.
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