Specter Fallout SANTORUM IN TROUBLE

American Spectator ^ | 1/24/2005 | The Washington Prowler

[AliVeritas]

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," says a Judiciary Committee staffer. "Kemerer may have a different stated responsibility, but we've been told he will be working with Specter on judicial nomination issues regardless of what his stated role is supposed to be."

More disturbing than the hiring itself was Specter's willful behavior in hiring the left-wing litigator. "I wish I could say this was a one time, freak event," says another Judiciary Committee aide. "But I don't think I can. We got the distinct impression that Specter is going to continue to hire people like this. If conservatives care, they need to mobilize now. Because it's largely out of our hands."

[O6ret]

Agree. But don't the thought die here. Go to Santorum's web site and send him an email. Let him know how we feel:

http://santorum.senate.gov

[eno_]

And the current situation, with spies in the caucus and a turncoat as chairman of a supposedly Republican-run comittee is better than a Democrat in that seat... how? It can't get any worse.

We HAD the opportunity to put up a worthy candidate, took the easy way out, and are paying for it now.

Or, look at it this way: don't keep making the same bad decision over and over just because you have a sunk cost in previous bad decisions.

[eno_]

Toomey is a fringe candidate? You ought to be more respectful of Republicans.

[BigSkyFreeper]

Problem is, Toomey isn't running for political office these days.

[Candy_nsuch]

Hello,
I thought you might be interested to know that PAT TOOMEY is the new chairman of the CLUB FOR GROWTH.
It was the Club for Growth who helped defeat Tom Daschle & who also almost defeated Specter in PA. The CLUB FOR GROWTH backed Toomey against Specter.
When I wrote, faxed and called Mr Santorum, I mentioned that every Political donation I give now will go to the CLUB FOR GROWTH not the GOP.
just an f.y.i.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Rush mention BTTT

[Flux Capacitor]

I'm going to rain on everyone's bash-anyone-who-didn't-support-Toomey parade here (what makes everyone think he wouldn't have backed the incumbent were he in Santorum's position?) and remind y'all -- because most have forgetten, if indeed they ever realized it to begin with -- that at this time last year, as the primaries were gearing up, we were facing a pretty good chance that the Democrats would take over the Senate. Thanks to high-profile retirements and troubled incumbents on the GOP side, Democrats were certainly picking up Illinois, were headed towards picking up Alaska, Colorado (they did), and Oklahoma, as well as retaining Florida, Louisiana, and North Carolina. Daschle still had the edge in South Dakota.

With all this the case, it was not an unreasonable decision to keep a crucial Republican seat by backing its incumbent -- even if he was a RINO bastard -- rather than throwing it into an open race in Ed Rendell-controlled Pennsylvania with a congressman who'd never been elected statewide. I'm sure this was Santorum's reasoning, and otherwise conservatives have had nothing but praise for him.

I detest Arlen Specter. But I don't fault Bush, Rove, or any Pennsylvania primary voter who decided that the greater evil would have been chancing the return of the entire Senate to the Democrats. In politics especially, we all make tough choices at critical junctures, between two bad options.

-Dan

[topcat54]

Thankfully, the new freshman class of Republicans (DeMint, Coburn, Thune, Vitter, etal.) should be a breath of fresh air in that place.

Santorum was a "salvation-of-the-party" freshman once.

[eno_]

Problem is, Toomey isn't running for political office these days.

Maybe Specter's head on a platter would change his mind.

[montag813]

Yeah, and if we all start blackmailing our own, before we even know it, the Democrats are back in power.

I would rather have a Democrat than Arlen Specter.

[FreedomHasACost]

Rather have a democrat.
My, I am glad you don't get to decide.

[BigSkyFreeper]

You couldn't get me to support a Democrat.

[BroncosFan]

Amen. Casey will beat him. Rick ticked off a lot of people in the primary. They will stay home, vote Casey, or vote 3rd party. Combine that with Philly, and that seat goes Dem.

[Bushbacker]

Joe Hoeffel ran against Specter as a "dry-run" for a race against Santorum...Hoeffel needed to get known outside his Philadelphia area base---and he did that.

If conservatives don't back Santorum, they will elect Hoeffel---a card-carrying ACLU member.

[jpl]

I detest Arlen Specter. But I don't fault Bush, Rove, or any Pennsylvania primary voter who decided that the greater evil would have been chancing the return of the entire Senate to the Democrats. In politics especially, we all make tough choices at critical junctures, between two bad options.

All good points you make, but what's the excuse for knuckling under and giving him the Judiciary chairmainship, which is only one of the most important posts in Congress? Because of "tradition"? That's the kind of stupidity that makes a lot of people disgusted with politics.

[eno_]

In politics especially, we all make tough choices at critical junctures, between two bad options.

Two bad decisions is Specter's favor so far. What's the plan now? Keep appeasing this a-hole? In the words of Dr. Phil: "How's that workin' out for ya?"

[Paperdoll]

>Oh, PUULEEESSSSEEEE! We was had, folks! Played like a banjo!<

In view of the flood of disturbing news these days, I am beginning to believe it. Before, it was just a sneakin' hunch.

[Flux Capacitor]

----All good points you make, but what's the excuse for knuckling under and giving him the Judiciary chairmainship, which is only one of the most important posts in Congress?----

There isn't one. That, indeed, is where my case for Specter stops.

-Dan