7thriv

There's lots of nonsense being written about how Arlen Specter's betrayal of the GOP is a sign that the ideologically rigid "social cons" have driven the Smart Moderates out of the party. Makes for a nice talking point, but gets the history completely wrong. As usual a blogger must explain what's going on to the professionals in the chattering class: What on earth is J-Pod talking About?

The Spendulous was the final insult. Incidentally, for all of those who claim
it's the crazy social-con monsters in the party who drive us towards
these insanely self-destructive impulses of ideologically rigidity, note the
social con monsters were very dissatisfied with Specter for years and
years, and it's only when Specter crossed the fiscal conservatives -- the "good"
conservatives, in the eyes of blue-state social moderates -- that he finally got
booted by the party. (Well, the booting didn't happen yet, but all polls said it
would.)

So the social cons complained, but it was the fiscal cons who finally decided
to throw Specter to sharks.

I couldn't have said it better myself.