You are where you belong, Arlen.

B_starinvestor

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Many times people partner with those that share the same qualities, characteristics, objectives and integrity.

Arlen Specter is one of those people.

FYI:

"I am staying a Republican because I think I have an important role, a more important role, to play there. The United States very desperately needs a two-party system. That's the basis of politics in America. I'm afraid we are becoming a one-party system. I think as a governmental matter, it is very important to have a check and balance"

-Arlen Specter March 17, 2009.

Good riddance.

His principles fit in nicely with his new party. Self interest is the only interest. Principles are a non-issue.

Words mean nothing. Lie, twist, pander...anything to get a vote. And then turn your back on the very people that provided your ascent.

I'd rather the Dems had 95% of Congress, than have one worm like Arlen Specter in my camp.

Once again, good riddance.:wave:

Nice legacy. Bet the grandkids are proud.
 

B_VinylBoy

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You're losing more moderates to the other team, and you're saying "good riddance"?
Seriously, how many more people need to leave your party before you actually understand why the Republican base is dissipating?
 
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deleted15807

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Ahhh are our little feelings hurt? Keep up the good work!! Heckuva job star!!! No schoolyard name like you chanted when 'Colon Powell' endorsed Obama?

You're losing more moderates to the other team, and you're saying "good riddance"?
Seriously, how many more people need to leave your party before you actually understand why the Republican base is dissipating?

uhhh no............
You might think, perhaps hope, that Republicans will engage in some soul-searching, that they’ll ask themselves whether and how they lost touch with the national mainstream. But my prediction is that this won’t happen any time soon.

Instead, the Republican rump, the party that’s left after the election, will be the party that attends Sarah Palin’s rallies, where crowds chant “Vote McCain, not Hussein!” It will be the party of Saxby Chambliss, the senator from Georgia, who, observing large-scale early voting by African-Americans, warns his supporters that “the other folks are voting.” It will be the party that harbors menacing fantasies about Barack Obama’s Marxist — or was that Islamic? — roots.

Why will the G.O.P. become more, not less, extreme? For one thing, projections suggest that this election will drive many of the remaining Republican moderates out of Congress, while leaving the hard right in place.

-Paul Krugman Nov 3, 2008


Note the date. It's all coming true. And this hard right is where star amoung many others live.
 
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B_Nick8

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The splinterization of the republicans continues. In catering to the far right they further polarize the party and now isolate themselves from any moderating influences whatsoever. They'll be left with a tiny core base of the most rabid ideologues at this rate. You think this is a good thing, star? You're trying to stand on "principle" here? Don't be a fool.
 

B_starinvestor

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Its like a popular local Democrat says, "We'll take anybody."

Indeed you will.

No need for integrity, principles or consistent conduct. Anyone with a heartbeat and a registration to vote...come on down.

You need a pack of cigarettes? No problem. Here. Now you're a Democrat.

When you have given up, lost ambition and abandoned your goals and dreams...the Democrats are there to embrace you.

And make sure your bills are paid.
 

B_starinvestor

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The splinterization of the republicans continues. In catering to the far right they further polarize the party and now isolate themselves from any moderating influences whatsoever. They'll be left with a tiny core base of the most rabid ideologues at this rate. You think this is a good thing, star? You're trying to stand on "principle" here? Don't be a fool.

Nick, what is your deal with bringing up the far right all the time lately? How many people do you know on the far right? How many people here on LPSG are on the far right?

As I've said before, inferring that the Republican party is dominated by the far right is exactly the same as inferring that the dem party is dominated by lazy, multi-generational welfare recipients.

Specter is a vote-whore. Nothing more, nothing less. If a Dem defected to the republican party to whore votes, I would kindly ask him/her to get the f*ck out and watch the door on his way.

If you can't figure out where you're at by the time you are 70..WTF?

One more reason why I can't stand politicians. Their morals end where their paycheck begins.
 

Bbucko

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Since March 17th? How so?

Not since the 17th, no. But in an article from TheHill.com which I linked to in another thread (and with which you are obviously familiar), he is quoted as saying this:

“I’m staying a Republican because I think I have a more important role to play there,” he said. “I think the United States very desperately needs a two-party system. … And I’m afraid that we’re becoming a one-party system, with Republicans becoming just a regional party.”

Leaving aside the fact that he still considered himself a Republican and denied any party-switch (obviously subsequently reconsidered), his point of the GOP becoming a "regional party" shows that he understood how stiffening harder to the right has cost his party not just votes, but entire regions and demographics.

His positions haven't changed, but as the Republicans fall ever-harder into Palin/"Joe" the "Plumber" territory, where the organizers of national protests seemed oblivious to what "teabagging" actually meant, where there is no room in the platform for marriage equality for all Americans or any reasonable consideration of climate change and where Michelle Bachmann goes on record suggesting that there's some connection between Democratic presidents and Swine Flu outbreaks, I don't blame him for folding his napkin and crossing the aisle.

Yeah, the party's not a big tent anymore.
 

B_VinylBoy

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Since March 17th? How so?

No... the change started way before that.
It started before the 2008 Election.
It started before 2006 when Democrats regained a small majority in Congress.
It started before Bush II got into office.
It even goes before Bush I.

Get the picture yet? Somewhere between Ford and right now, your party lost its focus and became a party that spoke of traditional values but didn't act anywhere in coherence to it. Everything you said about Arlen can be applied to most modern day conservatives.
 

rawbone8

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He'd been targeted by the far right for the crime of heresy and they planned to contest his seat in the next primary. Avlon has an interesting analysis that is not very complimentary toward Specter, but it also criticizes the shift of power in the GOP and nails the issue of the right alienating the centrists within their party.

Specter's Shocking Defection - The Daily Beast
John P. Avlon said:
But it’s not all due to President Obama’s broad popularity outside the conservative base. It’s due to Sen. Specter’s increasing isolation in the Republican Party. Centrists have been forced to the margins in the Party of Lincoln, even as the party itself has been forced to the margins of American politics. The two dynamics are directly connected.

A decade ago, Republican Congressmen dotted the party’s historic home of New England. Now there are none. The trend is continuing across the Northeast, exacerbated not only by Bush-era red-state policies that alienated the moderate majority of voters, but by the party’s penchant for pitting conservative primary challengers against centrist incumbents that ended up aiding only the Democrats. Specter offered up a litany of such self-inflicted losses, from Lincoln Chafee to Wayne Gilchrist to Heather Wilson. “They don’t make any bones about losing elections so long as they purify the party,” he said. “I don’t understand it…There ought to be an outcry.”

Specter was facing another primary challenge from the leader of one such heretic-hunting group, Club for Growth chairman Pat Toomey. The conservative calls for Specter’s head turned to howls when he worked with Maine Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe along 16 Democratic centrist senators to cut $118 billion of pork from the stimulus bill, enabling its ultimate passage. Seeing the absurdity of the centrist Catch-22, and motivated by his own political survival, Specter realized that he had a better chance of winning a general election than a low-turnout, hard-core partisan primary. And so he leaped.
 

B_starinvestor

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No... the change started way before that.
It started before the 2008 Election.
It started before 2006 when Democrats regained a small majority in Congress.
It started before Bush II got into office.
It even goes before Bush I.

Get the picture yet?

Yah, I got the picture. Specter make a rah-rah republican speech on March 17th, dipshit. That's why I asked what's changed since then.

Somewhere between Ford and right now, your party lost its focus and became a party that spoke of traditional values but didn't act anywhere in coherence to it. Everything you said about Arlen can be applied to most modern day conservatives.
Oh really? Somewhere between Ford and right now? Were you rolling at a rave for the first half of this decade when the repubs were the party of choice? How long does that ecstasy last anyway?
 
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deleted15807

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Yeah, the party's not a big tent anymore.

Other than the 'Big Tent' on display at conventions were they ever the 'Big Tent'? If it weren't for the Deep South they would never have won a single presidential election since the 60's. The South went republican after the civil rights laws of the 60's were passed and hasn't looked back since.
 

Hotrocker

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"I am staying a Republican because I think I have an important role, a more important role, to play there. The United States very desperately needs a two-party system. That's the basis of politics in America. I'm afraid we are becoming a one-party system. I think as a governmental matter, it is very important to have a check and balance"

-Arlen Specter March 17, 2009.

http://www.lpsg.org/131882-the-scourge-of-democratic-ideal.html
 
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B_starinvestor

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Not since the 17th, no. But in an article from TheHill.com which I linked to in another thread (and with which you are obviously familiar), he is quoted as saying this:



Leaving aside the fact that he still considered himself a Republican and denied any party-switch (obviously subsequently reconsidered), his point of the GOP becoming a "regional party" shows that he understood how stiffening harder to the right has cost his party not just votes, but entire regions and demographics.

His positions haven't changed, but as the Republicans fall ever-harder into Palin/"Joe" the "Plumber" territory, where the organizers of national protests seemed oblivious to what "teabagging" actually meant, where there is no room in the platform for marriage equality for all Americans or any reasonable consideration of climate change and where Michelle Bachmann goes on record suggesting that there's some connection between Democratic presidents and Swine Flu outbreaks, I don't blame him for folding his napkin and crossing the aisle.

Yeah, the party's not a big tent anymore.

A couple points, Bbucko.

Many on this site love to fantasize about the Joe the Plumber and Sarah Palin movement. Its grossly inaccurate and incorrect. It is a liberal fantasy. Period. Great soundbite.

Marriage equality is a big deal to a tiny, far right fringe of the republican party. Its not even an issue in terms of losing members of the party.

Michelle Bachmann is a fucking publicity whore dipshit. No one listens to her - even in the republican party. She's embarrassing. You get that kind of shit in Minnesota, i.e., Jesse Venture, Al Franken, and so on.
 

B_starinvestor

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B_VinylBoy

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Yah, I got the picture. Specter make a rah-rah republican speech on March 17th, dipshit. That's why I asked what's changed since then.

Fuck you, star. For once, I tried to be nice and you call me a dipshit? Fine.

I'll just sit here and laugh at your sorry ass as I watch your ideals and dreams go down the toilet. You toot the rhetorical horn of the conservatives, and everyday your numbers get lower and lower. You don't even understand that everyone has figured out just how big of a hypocrite the GOP is. They talk about how the party welcomes all and loves everyone, yet do more and more to scare off those who aren't exactly like themselves.

That's why Colin Powell left.
That's also why Arlen left.
And it's probably why Steele wasn't invited to "tea bag". But I digress... :rolleyes:

This goes BEYOND the typical politics that everyone can see on the surface. When someone who has been a Republican for over 40+ years, elected 5 times to office as a Republican, and thinks he needs to become a Democrat in order to win? SOMETHING IS FUCKED UP WITHIN YOUR PARTY. And sadly (or laughingly, whichever you want to choose), you STILL can't see it.

Oh really? Somewhere between Ford and right now? Were you rolling at a rave for the first half of this decade when the repubs were the party of choice? How long does that ecstasy last anyway?

Sorry bitchinvestor, I don't do drugs. I haven't even smoked weed. Even at a rave. I bet you can't claim that and you probably never been to a rave, now can you? :rolleyes:

And BTW, just to remind you AGAIN... I voted Republican in 1994. That's because there was at least ONE governor in Massachusetts that actually had a head on his shoulders, didn't just go along blindly with the GOP's tired moralistic rhetoric yet STILL maintained his party affiliation. Can you say that you EVER voted Democrat despite your preferred party affiliation? Once??!? That's something else you probably can't claim either, now can you? :rolleyes:

Perhaps if you had more Fords and Welds speaking for your party and not as many Limbaughs, Hannitys, Palins and Becks, people would take your sorry asses seriously. But go on and be a whiny bitch, too proud to admit that the GOP has lost its way and is losing people that could actually save them. I'll be waiting for 2010 when the GOP loses even more seats.
 
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D_Ireonsyd_Colonrinse

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Read a couple of quotes that are being reported today surrounding the Arlen Specter defection:


Former congressman Tom Davis, a Virginia Republican: “The party has become more of a private club centered in the South and rural areas. It’s not a hospitable place at this point. Other moderate lawmakers look at this and wonder, ‘What are we doing here?’”

Arlen Specter: "As the Republican Party has moved farther and farther to the right, I have found myself increasingly at odds with the Republican philosophy and more in line with the philosophy of the Democratic Party....Social conservatives in the Republican Party have made no bones about their willingness to lose the general election if they can purify the party.... There ought to be a rebellion against them. There ought to be an uprising."

Moderate republican Olympia Snowe: "Many Republicans feel alienated and disaffected from the party.... Ultimately, we're heading to having the smallest political tent in history. If the Republican Party fully intends to become a majority party in the future, it must move from the far right back toward the middle."

Democratic senator John Kerry: "This is now officially a Republican Party where moderates need not apply."

--------------------

There are multiple signs that the republican party is shrinking. That they are pushing out both moderate lawmakers as well as moderate voters.

Instead of a bit of honest reflection on Specter's words that the party is moving further and further to the right, there was an e-mail circulating today on Capitol Hill among republican congressmen.

The e-mail circulating read "Swine Flew".
 
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