My instinct is not to trust this too much. I can’t help looking this gift horse directly in the mouth, through the teeth, and down the hatch.
Mary Lyon, On The Left -- World News Trust
April 28, 2009 -- Arlen Specter?!?!?! The first time I blurted that out was during an industry screening of Oliver Stone’s “JFK,” in which his name came up in connection with the rogue “magic bullet” issue. I just had another Arlen Spector blurt a few minutes ago (as of this writing, anyway).
He’s
switching? Defecting? “Coming home,” as some people on the other side
of the aisle (oops, I mean, his side of the aisle now, don’t I?) have
noted with the added word “welcome”? The newest Senate Democrat, the
Man of the Hour, has even moved the Swine Flu and his former GOP sister
Susan “we don’t need no stinking epidemic funding!” Collins off the top
of the breaking news watch.
Well, okay, I’m celebrating. I guess.
My
instinct is not to trust this too much. I can’t help looking this gift
horse directly in the mouth, through the teeth, and down the hatch. At
least he seems to be somewhat honest, openly admitting how he
recognized painfully well that he’d be eaten for breakfast by a primary
challenge from a more rigidly conservative challenger, which would
likely move his seat into the Democratic column in the 2010 election
anyway.
Specter also seems honest enough to tip his hand on
the nomination of Dawn Johnsen to the Office of Legal Counsel. Good to
know, and not particularly surprising. I remember what a rough time he
gave Anita Hill when she tried to warn us about the questionable
judgment and character of then-Supreme Court Justice nominee Clarence
Thomas. I remember him posturing on any number of issues through the
years and SOUNDING as though he was going to be as reasonable as can be
to the Democratic or liberal point of view, only to wind up back in
Republicans’ arms again when it counted.
Look,
when I’m out there blogging or in some political chat room or even
occasionally just on Facebook, I’m the first to say I’m as
Machiavellian as the next guy. I’m glad he’s one of us. Kinda. Because
I’m not sure I’ll ever be completely certain about him, and I won’t be
counting on him too much. He’s been a Republican, or at least, been in
bed with them, for far too long to convince me completely. He’s
admitted that he, too, is pretty Machiavellian -- this latest maneuver
being the most glaring example. He’s not the only one worth watching
closely, though. Looks like we’re going to see some mighty elaborate
political chess-playing in the weeks and months ahead. This changes the
game board, and there’ll be a ripple effect that will be gobsmackingly
fascinating.
Despite
Mitch McConnell’s insistence that this is strictly a Pennsylvania
story, it’s anything but. The Minnesota Senate stand-off starring the
hapless Norm Coleman now becomes ever more glaring. Pass the popcorn
and watch the ramifications start to roll out. It’s probably gonna get
GOOO-OOOOD.
This may wind up moving Governor Tim Pawlenty up in
the GOP food chain as their great white hope for the future. I strongly
suspect he secretly believes that if he’d been John McCain’s choice of
running mate instead of Sarah Palin, he’d be vice president now. How
long will he play politics with that seat and obstruct Al Franken’s
increasingly justifiable claim to the job, now that the Dems will
technically have 59 votes? Perhaps we’ll see Pawlenty staking out a
claim as party savior as their last fire door as the flames roar down
the hallway toward it? Pawlenty certainly has no motivation to hand the
60th vote to Senate Democrats anytime soon. And the longer he holds out
(and the hell with what his own state might need, with only 50 percent Senate
representation in these tough times), the bigger a hero he’s likely to
be to his party’s hardcores.
And
there’s the hardcore thing, too. The more moderates -- either civilian
or office-holder -- will continue to defect from the Republican Party as
we now know it. Specter’s move has made that all the more acceptable
and will give them cover if they were previously hesitant to stick
their necks out this far. The 13th-century minds currently in control
of the GOP, who are hellbent on pushing it as far to the right as they
can, will continue to alienate reasonable minds of every persuasion.
I’ve tried to have conversations with them myself, and they seem
determined to avoid getting the message. Whether it’s some
congressional staffer in a hardline GOP representative’s office or my
pleasant but misguided neighbor down the street, there’s a surprisingly
prevailing feeling that they lost in November either because they
didn’t package their positions effectively, or they weren’t
conservative enough.
These
poor souls have spent a couple of decades by now trying to move the
country to the right, and then prematurely proclaiming that America is
a center-right country philosophically. Well, they’re wrong. Arlen
Specter’s decision just puts a period on the end of one of the
sentences here.
Liberal principles have been under assault
since the dawn of the Reagan era, but majorities in America STILL
support a woman’s right to choose. The last eight years of horror -- on
the GOP’s watch -- have been enough to convince solid majorities of
voters to give Barack Obama an absolute mandate --not the
house-of-cards pretend version Republicans boasted nonstop that George
W. Bush had earned. Overwhelming adversities, especially those that
cross state lines, ranging from Hurricane Katrina to the foreclosure
crisis and Wall Street mess and now the spreading Swine Flu, are waking
people up to the value and need of a strong and able federal government
-- and the fact that these kinds of necessities cost tax money. Look at
Texas Governor Rick “maybe we just oughta seceed” Perry desperately
scrambling for help from the CDC only days after excoriating federal
spending and priorities, with the Swine Flu now infecting his state.
Yes, it’s true, freedom isn’t free, but neither are all those
government services and programs you don’t want to admit you really do
want and can’t live without. Much of what’s left of the GOP just
doesn’t get that. And they won’t. It’s simply not in them.
The
Specter Switch will mean that BOTH parties have to look at themselves
and at their future. Personally, I’d dearly love to see the dreams of
Karl Rove and Grover Norquist turned upside down and inside out -- and
forever if possible! The carefully-engineered “great political
realignment” of Rove’s design appears ready to morph into perhaps a
generation of Democratic control. Norquist’s long-cherished goal of
shrinking the federal government so small that it could be drowned in a
bathtub shrivels by the day into near-nothingness itself. I know all
about the arguments in favor of a two-party system and checks and
balances and all that. But the one-party rule that we just barely
survived as a nation during most of this decade inflicted so much
damage, some of it of the gravest kind on our poor country domestically
and in all corners overseas, that we’re in desperate need of strong and
decisive reversal and a whole lot of it. The Republicans and their
increasingly radical political philosophy have hurt and divided this
country so profoundly that they deserve to wither on the vine -- while
the rest of us clean up their many messes.
Democrats
now have to make sure their own burgeoning majority is protected and
nurtured, and keeps its integrity so it survives for many years. There
should be more of us on the Democratic/liberal/progressive end of the
spectrum, anyway. After all, the multiple disasters that Republicans
and extremist conservatives left behind, everywhere you look, will
require an increasingly large clean-up crew anyway. And, Senator
Spector, since it’s your now-former crowd that screwed everything up
and left us in all this wreckage, it’s only fair that you be one of the
first to grab a broom and some scrub-brushes.
***
Mary Lyon is a veteran broadcaster and five-time Golden Mike Award winner, who has anchored, reported, and written for the Associated Press Radio Network, NBC Radio "The Source," and many Los Angeles-area stations including KRTH-FM/AM, KLOS-FM, KFWB-AM, and KTLA-TV, and occasional media analyst for ABC Radio News. She began her career as a liberal activist with the Student Coalition for Humphrey/Muskie in 1968, and helped spearhead a regional campaign, The Power 18," to win the right to vote for 18-year-olds. She remains an advocate for liberal causes, responsibility and accountability in media, environmental education and support of the arts for children, and green living. In addition to World News Trust, Mary writes for Huffington Post, OpEdNews, Democrats.us, WeDemocrats.org's "We! The People" webzine. Mary is also a parenting expert, having written and llustrated the book "The Frazzled Working Woman's Practical Guide to Motherhood.