When you look up the word “asshat” in the dictionary, you should see a picture of Arlen Specter:
Mr. Specter, responding to a question from CBS’ Bob Schieffer over whether he had let down Pennsylvanians who wanted a Republican to represent them, said he thought his priorities were more in line with those of the Democrats.
“Well, I was sorry to disappoint many people. Frankly, I was disappointed that the Republican Party didn’t want me as their candidate,” Mr. Specter said on “Face the Nation.” “But as a matter of principle, I’m becoming much more comfortable with the Democrats’ approach. And one of the items that I’m working on, Bob, is funding for medical research.”
Mr. Specter continued: “If we had pursued what President Nixon declared in 1970 as the war on cancer, we would have cured many strains. I think Jack Kemp would be alive today. And that research has saved or prolonged many lives, including mine.”
So Jack Kemp died, yet Arlen Specter survived. Go figure. God must have one heck of a sense of humor.
This bit of red meat that Specter eagerly tossed to rabid Democrat partisans is comparable to the equally loathsome remark that disgraced former Senator John Edwards made on the campaign trail nearly five years ago: “If we do the work that we can do in this country, the work that we will do when John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk, get up out of that wheelchair and walk again.”
That kind of manipulative demagoguery has no place in serious politics. If Specter wants to further contaminate the Democratic party with that kind of contemptible rhetoric, then good riddance to him. He has no business being a Republican.
