Posted on 02/23/2012 2:47:27 PM PST by Qbert
In an amazing moment in last night's debate, Rick Santorum suddenly found himself under attack by Mitt Romney -- for seeing to it that the Supreme Court had two conservative justices.
As usual, the moment was turned upside down by the media. In 2004, Santorum, then Pennsylvania's junior Republican Senator, famously supported Arlen Specter for re-nomination over the conservative Pat Toomey. To anyone paying attention in the day, it was crystal clear that Specter, if re-elected, would be the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, a longtime goal of the one-time Philadelphia District Attorney. Toomey, a businessman, would not only be a freshman if elected, he wouldn't be sitting on the Judiciary Committee.
The dilemma for Pennsylvania Republicans was clear...
[Snip]
...Santorum, at considerable risk to his own Senate seat and after confronting Specter on the subject, endorsed his senior colleague. Two years later, Santorum did pay the price. His famous 18-point loss came at the hands of not just angry liberals but angry Toomey supporters seeking revenge.
[Snip]
Specter did as promised, skillfully wielding the gavel, barking back at an aggressive Ted Kennedy -- and getting both Roberts and Alito confirmed. Where to this moment the two sit as a solid core of the conservative majority on the Court.
[Snip]
Lost in the gotcha moment last night, in which Romney said that Obamacare -- the Son of Romneycare -- was made possible by Santorum's support of Specter, was the unspoken fact of the Supreme Court.
[Snip]
The fact that Romney seems clueless to the point is only one more indication that were he to be trusted himself with a Supreme Court nomination -- trouble.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
The Boston Globe is slapping Romney over the fact that 3/4 of his own judicial nominees were democrats.
And if ANYONE thinks that somehow we’d get a better SCOTUS appointee from Romney than Obama ... wanna buy a bridge? At least the GOP would filibuster Obama.
C’mon Rick. You gotta do this for America.
Santorum 2012
I bet 100% were leftists.
Yep, so much for the argument that, “You have to vote Romney to save the Supreme Court.”
Bingo!
Go Rick!
AND
Folks, please give the BIG $$$ to his Super PAC!
Nate Silver@fivethirtyeightReply
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Actually not that much of a SuperPAC gap in Michigan. Romney’s SuperPAC has spent $2.4M, Santorum’s $1.7M. http://bit.ly/xhsFg0
Actually, this is one area where I think Romney would be okay. Bork is one of his main advisers on judges.
From the little bit of the story I read it said that he actually passed over republicans to pick the democrats.
Agree. Am giving Rick what I can.
Republican Presidents gave us Earl Warren, William Brennan, Harry Blackmun, John Paul Stevens, David Souter, and other equally outstanding justices. Does anyone doubt that these are the kinds of people Romney would nominate?
"This article makes no sense."
The proof is in the pudding. Roberts and Alito are on the Court.
Specter bolting years later and becoming a Dem was due to the inept GOP leadership at the time, and Specter's slipperiness.
Romney was apparently critical of Santorum for supporting Spectre.
Apparently to the author this is being critical of Santorum for supporting Roberts and Alito.
Quite a long chain of non-causality from one to the other!
I’m sure Rick supported him because he was returning the favor for getting Specter’s endorsement for himself. To me that would have been maybe a better answer. Say that Specter helped him in his run and he made a promise to do the same for him, and couldn’t go back on his promise even though he disagreed with him on some issues. And for that matter throw in that he doesn’t consider an endorsement a big deal because he trusts the voters to make up their own minds. Just look at how Romney’s endorsements in South Carolina, Minnesota, etc. worked out.
What’s wrong, Willard? Can’t you handle conservative judges? Actually Constitutional judges?
Go away, Willard, go away!
I didn’t read the story. I had heard the statistics before. I’m just saying that I suspect that regardless of party affiliation, Republican or Democrat, 100% of the judges were left wing statists.
This is quite a stretch of an article.......
I mean, really.......
Romney’s point, such as it was, was that Santorum was responsible for Obamacare because he endorsed Specter and Specter was the deciding vote for Obamacare. The headline would have been more accurate if it said “Romney Attacks Santorum for Supporting Obamacare.” It was a terrible stretch by Romney and a lousy response by Santorum, who could have just said he had no way of predicting that Specter would switch parties years later.
Well, actually, Santorum backed Specter for three reasons:
1) Because Rove and Bush twisted his arm, and said that Toomey couldn’t get elected.
2) Because Bush said that he needed Specter to confirm his SCOTUS choices. Don’t underestimate Specter on that; I don’t trust the guy any further than I can kick him, but he was very skillful at that sort of job. And he succeeded. The Democrats had enough Senators to filibuster, as they have often done to block appointments, but Specter put the pressure on them—before he went back to his usual crazy ways.
3) Santorum endorsed Specter because Specter had endorsed him. It wasn’t easy for a conservative to win in that state, so Specter’s “centrist” endorsement of a conservative was valuable. Rick returned the favor.
Rick later lost in 2006 for a number of reasons. I would chiefly blame Bush and Rove, who won in a landslide in 2004 and then proceeded to blow it by disappointing the base. Few conservatives won in 2006. It was a Democrat landslide. And Rick was further handicapped by a popular opponent and by the stupid Toomey supporters who stayed home in a snit. Good work, guys, putting Casey into office.
I don’t really know or care. I do know that I’ll be voting for Santorum here in Michigan regardless of who he endorsed in the past.
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