The Prophesy of Arlen Specter

Yesterday, Senator Arlen Specter announced he was changing political parties and would exit the Republican Party in favor of the Democratic Party.  Was this the beginning of the end for Republicans?

Unlikely in my opinion but probably the end of being a main stream party with a legitimate chance to govern from a majority position any time soon.  A political party that is ready to eat its own if they should stray from the doctrine is on dangerous ground if it wishes to appeal to a majority of Americans.  “Party discipline” is an oft used term to describe how party leaders attempt to get their members voting in the same direction.  If you cross the leaders, you get the discipline.  Senator Specter faced just such a situation.

Discipline seems to make sense to a point.  What if, however, the majority of voters do not or no longer accept many of the tenets of the party?  How can the party appeal to a majority of voters if it continues to narrow its views to those lying far to the right?

In the short run, Specter’s party change bodes well for the Country and the Democratic Party.  The Republican Party and their pursuit of their conservative goals has driven the country into the ditch.  As a result, President Obama has received a large mandate to put in place other more progressive policies.  With Specter in the Democratic column, Obama should expect much less effective opposition from Republicans.  It is the longer term that I worry about.

America has thrived upon a two party system, largely counter balancing each other, and keeping the ship of state centered over the long haul.  A semi permanent shift to one party or the other for an extended period of time, will not be good for the Country.  We need a healthy (and sane) opposition party.

“Lower or no taxes” as the answer for every situation is clearly as wrong as increasing taxes (that is more spending) in every case.  The abortion and intelligent design litmus tests have no place in sensible governance.  The advent of globalism has opened whole new areas where one party can differentiate itself from the other, and contribute mightily to the future progress of America.  Continuous improvement of all government programs as well as the departments providing them (citizens receiving more services for the same amount of tax dollars) would be a tremendous party platform plank.  Fiscal and monetary responsibility along with a balanced social agenda would be also attractive to most Americans.

It is possible that what is left of the Republican Party is so far gone that it will need to vanish politically before a new opposition party can rise from these ashes.  But we can not begin yet to ignore the Republican Party.  What is left is so ideologically driven, it could easily become a black hole of all the odd balls who do not necessarily know when to stop if their positions are ignored.  I hope this is not the prophesy of Arlen Specter.

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Tags: arlen specter, Senate, switching parties

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