Specter's switch shoves politics in front of principle

A political tsunami hit Washington D.C. this week when Sen. Arlen Specter, a five-term Republican from the Keystone State, announced his switch to the Democratic Party. Most Democrats have now enthusiastically welcomed their 59th senator, including President Obama, and most Republicans have wished him "good riddance." I believe Specter lost a unique opportunity by not choosing a genuine independent route.

Specter, aged 79 and up for reelection in 2010, was not coy about his reason for changing parties. He said, "I… observed other public opinion polls and have found that the prospects for winning the Republican primary are bleak." Early polls showed him being crushed by Pat Toomey, an anti-tax crusader who narrowly lost to Specter in 2004. Yes, he mentioned how his philosophy was no longer congruent with the conservative majority in the GOP, and he pointed out that the Republican policies were moving too far to the right. But his overarching goal was self-preservation, and I actually applaud him for his candor. What he shouldn't have done was to try to pad it with other spurious reasons, because now it looks like he's attempting to make his decision more substantive. His poll numbers were bad, and he was going to be ousted. Keep it simple Arlen: You wanted to save your nice job!

Despite Specter's selfish obedience to politics over principle, he is accurate in stating that the GOP has moved too rightward. In a region once dominated by the GOP from the Civil War to the late 1900s, the Yankee Republican is becoming as rare as the dodo bird. There are no Republican congressmen from New England, and only three senators from the party in the northeast hold office. From 2004 to 2008, the Pennsylvania GOP lost 200,000 voters to the Democrats; these were the same people who kept Specter alive in vicious primary fights. I don't know what it is about conservatives, but most of them seem overjoyed about this arrangement. Here's a little secret: in order to win office in an entire nation, you actually need a diverse coalition to do so. Whatever happened to the Reagan Big Tent? The "Great Communicator" himself said that a person you agree with 80 percent of the time is a friend, and right wingers should take that to heart before attacking moderates and cheering when they leave.

I believe Specter missed a unique opportunity to become representative of all the people of Pennsylvania. Like Vermont Republican Sen. Jim Jeffords who switched affiliations in 2001, Specter found he no longer had a home in the GOP. However, Jeffords became an Independent, though he aligned himself with the Democratic caucus. It seems all too often that party label is given preference over personal achievement. Good candidates are forced to chose sides in this two-party dominant country, as they will otherwise be brushed aside as "fringe" by the superficial mass media. While we claim to be a democracy, our "first-past-the-post" system ensures that the two parties will retain their power. Sure, anyone can run for office, but unless you have the backing of the "Big Two," your hopes look as bleak as a snowball's chance in Hell.

Specter could have made a groundbreaking decision by declaring he was going to shrug off the divisive nature of party politics and become an independent in the spirit of George Washington. Our first president warned Americans against political "factionalism," as it would turn fellow citizens into fierce opponents. This was already the case in the early days of the republic, though he remained neutral himself. And he was right! When people apply the name of a party to themselves, they become one with that party. "Dyed-in-the-wool Democrats" and "Red-til-dead Republicans" are both misguided in their devotion to those organizations; citizens of the United States should first and foremost be "Died-in-the-wool-til-dead Americans," and extreme party loyalty only hampers that objective of national unity. Independents currently have no recourse in American politics, and I believe our first president would be saddened by that.

In the end, the senior senator from Pennsylvania didn't, because he is a product of this machine.

As a side note, I hope Sen. Specter is a superstitious man: he was the 13th senator to change parties since 1913. We'll see if fate doesn't have something in store for him for his political opportunism.