Specter's Defection and Souter's Replacement
A number of people are suggesting today that Arlen Specter's defection to the Democratic Party will actually make it harder for Obama to secure confirmation of his Supreme Court nominee. The reason is that Senate Judiciary Committee rules require the vote of at least one member of the minority in order to end debate. Specter, the argument goes, was the most likely Republican to give in and cast this vote, thereby allowing the confirmation vote to proceed. Now that Specter's a Democrat, Obama's going to have to find some other Republican on the committee to break ranks.
This isn't a very compelling argument, though. If Specter was still a Republican, his chief concern would be positioning himself to beat Patrick Toomey in next year's primary. The Republican base is going to get itself worked into a lather over this confirmation battle. The last thing in the world Specter would want to do is be the one Republican on the committee to vote for Obama's nominee. He would be kissing any hope he had of beating Toomey goodbye.
Now that Specter is a Democrat, he'll have every incentive to support whoever Obama chooses. If he were to vote against Obama's nominee, he might as well kiss his hopes of winning a Democratic primary goodbye. Someone like Joe Sestak would run against him and win.
While the minority vote rule does create a potential roadblock for Obama, I really doubt that even this Republican party is obnoxious enough to attempt a prolonged committee filibuster. They'd ultimately lose that fight and look bad doing it. And even if they won, Obama would just nominate someone else with similar views.
Republicans will undoubtedly throw a royal hissy fit over whomever Obama chooses, but I would be shocked if they actually succeeded in blocking confirmation.
posted by A.L. at 11:04 PM
8 Comments:
Exactly what incentive will he have?
Spin aside, he is a reliable republican vote. Nothing has indicated an idealogical change.
And the democrat party has asked him for nothing.
In fact they said he wouldn't even face a primary candidate. This bastard who has built his life on ripping rights away from certain groups of people is now embarrassed by the democrat party. fuck them all.
Stop reacting to political events as if you're a child.
Well . . . that was certainly a low quality comment, Noc.
Low quality aside, it also made no sense. Was there a point there somewhere?
It's very likely there was some back-channel negotiation with lots of public posturing up front. My guess is that Specter will eventually lean a little more Left than his early pronouncements suggest.
His attitudes will also shift slightly simply by exposure to a new group of people - that's quite normal. Plus he really needs to position himself early as "his own man" to resist the Turncoat label which the Right will attempt to stick him with. Also, Obama offered to stump for him - that had to have been discussed ahead of time, almost certainly with strings attached.
Please, Arlen Spector is always on your side until you need him. He has already crapped on the Democratic agenda. He made it very clear that the only reason for his shift is that he didn't want to face a primary challenge.
Here's the contact page for Joe Sestak. Urge him to run against Spector. Remember Anita Hill? Loving Clarence Thomas? Vote Spector out.
Mike
Anonymous,
I hope Joe Sestak does run, and I hope he wins. But that doesn't mean it's not a good thing that Arlen Specter switched sides. Yes, he's completely unreliable, but he's at least going to be more often on the correct side now. That makes a difference. After all, he's still going to be a Senator for two more years no matter what. And a lot of important legislation and confirmations will take place during those two years.
People need to stop being myopic about this. I don't like Arlen Specter any more than anyone else, but it is unquestionably a good thing that he defected.
i would never discount the rights inability to have self-awareness. i wouldnt count on them to not act like petulant children when this thing comes to bear. oh, ans as far noc goes, i can be an inarticulate, obscene, internet tough guy too...so go fuck your self.
Its interesting!
Thanks for the post!
Republicans are already planning their hissy fit and Obama hasn't even floated a name yet. Someone reported over the weekend that some Repub (sorry, forgot the name) said that opposing the appointment would be "the first stop on our road back to power." That amazed me. I mean, I know the bastards are cynical, but there's not even a hint of "good for the country" in there. It's all about the party being out of power. Period.
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