Specter Goes RINO
Chariman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Arlen Specter has definitively gone into the Republican In Name Only category or RINO for short. Conservatives have long suspected that such was the case as evidenced by the huge outcry over his blunder following the 2004 election when he thumbed his nose at President Bush during his victory statement. See this Fox News Story, dated November 5, 2004. The statement came very close to costing the Senator his chairmanship then, and it is evident that it should have.
Senator Specter has once again joined ranks with the Democrats as related by the New York Times, in this story, Panel Chairman to Press Roberts on Cases. (registration required) The following is what he had to say today:
“In a three-page letter to Judge Roberts, Mr. Specter raises pointed questions about two recent court decisions invalidating legislation Congress passed under its authority to regulate interstate commerce. That power has for decades been used to produce expansive legislation, including environmental protections, civil rights laws and the Americans With Disabilities Act.
The current court has been trimming back the authority, however, and Democrats have vowed to make interstate commerce a big issue in the Roberts hearings. Now Mr. Specter, a Republican who is widely regarded as the panel’s sharpest constitutional lawyer, is suggesting that he shares the Democrats’ concerns.
“I think Republicans have a duty to pursue this line of questioning and any relevant line of questioning,” Mr. Specter said on Monday in a telephone interview from his home in Philadelphia.
He said he was particularly upset that the court, under Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, had questioned lawmakers’ “method of reasoning” in striking down laws.
“Well, that’s just another way of saying Congress is incompetent,” Mr. Specter said, adding, “I’m not suggesting we pack the court, but at a minimum, the Senate is determined to confirm new justices who respect their role.”
As we have noted previously here,
“We write all this to say that the Supreme Court of the United States has over the years ignored the Constitution to create law from the bench, and it has expanded federal power to the point of superceding the authority of the states, and denying liberty to it’s citizens.
The framers put the “commerce clause” in the Constitution to promote commerce between the states, and between citizens. The Supreme Court has reversed that intention to make the “commerce clause” the most regulatory clause ever penned by man.
Could this possibly be the reason we have seen no real movement on the part of Congress to reform the Judiciary? Perhaps Congress is willing to be the benificiary for an expanded Federal Government, and in return allows the Courts disgression for Judicial Activism.”
Today, Senator Specter has made it clear that he has no interest in reforming the Supreme Court, and is willing to forego any return to Constitutionality for the sake of an expanded Federal Government and regulatory power which has been shaped by the misuse of the “commerce clause”.
Perhaps it is time to turn up the heat again on Senator Specter. His office can be reached through the Senate Switchboard number 202-225-3121. E-mail and other contact informtion can be found here.
