Arlen Specter

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Biden Wooed Specter for Years
 Biden Wooed Specter for Years 
Apr 29, 2009 10:49 AM CDT

Biden Wooed Specter for Years

(Newser) - Joe Biden is the Democrat perhaps most responsible for Arlen Specter’s defection, Politico reports. The VP told a crowd yesterday that he had been trying to convince the Pennsylvania Republican “that he is really a Democrat” for more than 20 years. Specter's onetime Senate colleague recently stepped up...

Rendell Gets Machiavellian in Specter Switch
Rendell Gets Machiavellian in Specter Switch
Analysis
Apr 29, 2009 10:09 AM CDT

Rendell Gets Machiavellian in Specter Switch

Senate ambitions may have played role in governor's courtship

(Newser) - Arlen Specter’s party switch was a "seriously Machiavellian" move by Joe Biden and, particularly, Gov. Ed Rendell, writes Eleanor Clift of Newsweek. Biden’s self-interest in the matter is obvious: Specter represents the all-important 60th Senate vote. But the "gregarious, ambitious" Rendell, an even closer friend of...

Blind GOP Drove Specter Away: Snowe
 Blind GOP Drove 
 Specter Away: 
 Snowe 

OPINION
Apr 29, 2009 8:11 AM CDT

Blind GOP Drove Specter Away: Snowe

(Newser) - Arlen Specter’s departure is a “tremendous loss” for the Republican party, made “all the more painful because I believe it didn’t have to be this way,” Sen. Olympia Snowe writes in the New York Times. The party ought to have learned its lesson when Jim...

Newt to Specter: Good Riddance
 Newt to Specter: 
 Good Riddance 
OPINION
Apr 29, 2009 7:18 AM CDT

Newt to Specter: Good Riddance

(Newser) - Newt Gingrich’s take on Arlen Specter’s defection? Don’t let the door hit you on the way out, senator. Specter left the party “in spirit” when he cast his vote for “a $787 billion big-spending bill no elected official had even read,” the former speaker...

Silver: Specter Will Shift Left, But Not Too Far
Silver: Specter Will Shift Left, But Not Too Far
analysis
Apr 28, 2009 9:46 PM CDT

Silver: Specter Will Shift Left, But Not Too Far

(Newser) - Now that Arlen Specter is flying the Democratic colors, his new party can expect a tangible—if modest—change in his voting behavior, writes Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com. "Democrats have ample reason to be pleased," writes Silver, who crunched the numbers of all previous congressional party-switchers. "...

Limbaugh to Specter: Take McCain Family, Too

(Newser) - Rush Limbaugh thinks erstwhile Republican Arlen Specter should take some “other people who aren't really Republicans” to the other side of the aisle, CNN reports. “Take McCain and his daughter with you,” a laughing Limbaugh said today. Though he said Specter's party switch was “ultimately good”...

Specter: I'm Not 'Automatic 60th Vote' for Dems

GOP colleagues 'stunned,' angered by senator's party switch

(Newser) - Newly minted Democrat Arlen Specter said he will not blindly toe the party line, Politico reports. “I will not be an automatic 60th vote,” the veteran Pennsylvania senator said, pointing out recent opposition to a unionization bill. “If the Democratic Party asks too much, I will not...

Defector Specter Just Playing to Pa. Primary Politics

Shrewd senator had no future as a Republican

(Newser) - Why did Arlen Specter defect? It’s tempting to paint Specter as part of a post-Obama ideological realignment, but there’s a much more concrete explanation, Eric Kleefeld writes for Talking Points Memo: reelection. Pennsylvania is a closed-primary state, and between 150,000 and 200,000 registered Republicans switched parties...

Obama 'Thrilled' to See Specter Join Dems

'You have my full support,' president tells Pa. senator in call

(Newser) - Within minutes after Sen. Arlen Specter announced he was switching from the Republican to the Democratic Party, President Obama called Specter from the Oval Office, welcoming him into the fold, Politico reports. We are “thrilled to have you,” Obama said, adding, “You have my full support.”...

Specter Defects to Democrats
 Specter Defects to Democrats 
Apr 28, 2009 11:38 AM CDT

Specter Defects to Democrats

(Newser) - Arlen Specter is jumping to the Democrats, leaving the party excruciatingly close to a filibuster-proof Senate majority, reports Politico. Sources say VP Joe Biden was key to the effort to recruit the Pennsylvania senator. “Since my election in 1980, as part of the Reagan Big Tent, the Republican Party...

2004 Foe Will Challenge Specter for Nomination

(Newser) - Riding a wave of dissatisfaction with Arlen Specter's vote on the federal stimulus, conservative Pat Toomey will again campaign to be the GOP's Senate nominee in Pennsylvania, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. Although Toomey didn't announce until today, the two have been arguing publicly in the last few weeks. Specter, who...

Specter's Choice Saves Obama Labor Headache
Specter's Choice Saves Obama Labor Headache
ANALYSIS
Mar 25, 2009 10:20 AM CDT

Specter's Choice Saves Obama Labor Headache

GOP senator's threat to kill bill means Dems won't have to pick sides

(Newser) - Republican Sen. Arlen Specter’s choice to oppose a bill to ease unionization will let President Obama and congressional Democrats avoid a tough choice between labor and business interests, Politico notes. Obama had promised to sign the Employee Free Choice Act, but would have infuriated businesses whose support he needs....

Specter's Shift May Doom Bill on Union Organizing

It's a major blow to EFCA hopes

(Newser) - Sen. Arlen Specter said today he won't support the Employee Free Choice Act, delivering a serious setback to the much-watched labor initiative, the Wall Street Journal reports. The bill would allow unions to organize more easily, using card signatures instead of secret ballots. The Republican's support of the measure was...

GOP's Specter Eyes Independent Run in 2010

Embattled GOP moderate rules out joining Dems but not doing a Leiberman

(Newser) - Sen. Arlen Specter isn't going to switch sides and join the Democrats but he won't rule out running as an independent in 2010, the Pennsylvania Republican tells the Hill. Specter, under pressure from the GOP base since becoming one of just three Republican senators to support the stimulus package, says...

Pa. Gov Says He, Biden Have Tried to Lure GOP's Specter

Pa. moderate remains loyal to GOP

(Newser) - The Democrats are still looking for ways to boost their majority in the Senate, Talking Points Memo reports today. Gov. Ed Rendell told a regional TV network he’d tried to get Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter to switch sides, and so had VP Joe Biden and Sen. Bob Casey. “...

Leahy Calls For 'Truth Commission' on Bush Abuses

Republicans say it's a waste of time

(Newser) - Sen. Patrick Leahy called today for a "truth commission" to investigate alleged abuses by the Bush administration in the name of the war on terror, CNN reports. Detention and interrogation practices at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib “have seriously eroded fundamental American principles of the rule of law,"...

Senate Centrists Hold House Dems Hostage

Stick up to Reid, Dems urge Pelosi

(Newser) - The Senate requires 60 votes to avoid filibuster, so the 58-strong Democrats are at the mercy of centrist Republicans Arlen Specter, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins. Politico reports that House Dems, who have no trouble passing bills on their own, are unhappy that their legislation has to run this gauntlet....

Obama Needs Maine Senators
 Obama Needs Maine Senators 
analysis
Feb 12, 2009 3:05 PM CST

Obama Needs Maine Senators

Snowe, Collins are backbone of administration's bipartisan coalition

(Newser) - Maine’s moderate Republican senators find themselves unexpectedly empowered in the Obama era. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, along with Pennsylvania’s Arlen Specter, form the bipartisan wedge President Obama can use to get bills—like the stimulus package—past a Senate filibuster. After years of being taken for granted...

Conservative PAC Puts GOP Stimulus Backers 'On Notice'

Three senators face conservative wrath

(Newser) - So much for bipartisanship. A conservative political action committee is pledging to support primary challenges to the three Republican senators who backed the compromise economic stimulus package, CNN reports. It's the right wing’s latest public show of dissatisfaction with Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine and Arlen Specter...

Senate Passes Stimulus Bill
 Senate Passes Stimulus Bill 
Feb 10, 2009 12:02 PM CST

Senate Passes Stimulus Bill

(Newser) - The Senate passed its version of the $838 billion stimulus bill today, in a 61-37 vote, the Wall Street Journal reports. Three moderate Republicans—Susan Collins, Arlen Specter, and Olympia Snowe—jumped across the aisle to prevent a filibuster. Now the House and Senate must reconcile the differences between their...

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