Needed: A few more Specter defections

"The Republican Party has moved too far to the right. I now find my political philosophy more in line with Democrats than Republicans. … I have decided to run for re-election in 2010 [as a Democrat]." And with that, Arlen Specter, the senator from Pennsylvania was out the door – to which I say, "Don't let the door knob hit you as you leave." We thank you for exposing Anita Hill for what she was and is. Thank you for Justice Thomas, Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito. And we won't forget the hatchet job you led against nominee Robert Bork.

Specter is simply returning to his roots. He started his political career as a Democrat, only becoming a Republican because it was convenient and in his best interest pursuant to the power and status he coveted. The key line in his announcement was, "My change in party affiliation does not mean that I will be a party-line voter any more for the Democrats than I have been for the Republicans." Those words sum it up. Specter is about Specter – he is a contumacious and amorphous individual interested only in the retention of his Capitol Hill office. And he is willing to dance with whatever group ensures him of keeping same.

Republican strategist John Feehey said, "[Specter's defection] says … the party [will] have to make a determination on whether they want to be in the majority or whether they want to be intellectually pure. …" He is wrong on both counts. The Republican Party must decide whether or not it wants to stand on morality, the Constitution and the rights of individuals guaranteed there within, or whether it wants to transmogrify into something indistinguishable from the Democrat Party.

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Scott Reed, another Republican strategist, said: "It's too bad that Michael Steele pushed [Specter] into the Democrat Party." Chairman Steele didn't push Specter anywhere, and if Reed doesn't understand that, or feels he must blame someone else for Specter's action, he should become a strategist for another party and take Feehey, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins with him.

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Republicans haven't lost because the party won't change – they have lost because the party has changed. They have become a party that has lost sight of what it stood for. They have become a party where the only thing that matters is being in the majority and liked by the media. For the aforementioned to try using Specter's newfound conscience (which is nothing more than self-preservation) shows how ill-equipped they are to help restore us.

Specter switched parties because he did the math and realized he had no chance of beating Republican Pat Toomey in the primaries. And rather than experience defeat, he did the same thing he did at the start of his career.

I, for one, am tired of being bludgeoned and coerced into supporting a party just to keep the other party out. And to that point, the next coercive attempt will be to convince us that the sky will fall and hell will freeze over if we don't send money and rally against Obama's nominee to replace Justice Souter when he retires.

President George H. W. Bush appointed Souter to the high court, and he became an immediate disappointment. He became one of the most consistent liberal voting jurists throughout his tenure. Accordingly, Obama's replacing him with another liberal doesn't overly concern me. And I am not ready to accept the argument that proposes if Obama selects a strong-willed liberal, said appointee, when confirmed, could/would bully the weaker members of the court into siding with him or her.

It is my opinion that there is no shortage of testosterone, hubris and stiff-necked tenacity on the court. It is a position where the weak need not apply. That doesn't mean that there will not be times when an impassioned interpretation of law that appears to be reasoned and cogent cannot persuade. However, that works both ways, albeit admittedly we witness fewer liberal conversions. Even so, that doesn't mean I am going to dump chum, as the saying goes, and flee to port because of a panic created to scare me into rallying around a party that has lost its compass.

Obama's replacing a liberal justice with another liberal justice doesn't concern me as such. Nor does the Specter crossover. I view one as a wash and the other as something too long in coming – the latter disappointing only because he didn't take more of his kind with him.