How a no-name GOP pol could affect next year's presidential drama
jose soplar
George Will
http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | Like many members of the House of
Representatives, Pat Toomey, a 41-year-old Pennsylvania Republican,
hankers to move to the chamber on the other side of the Capitol. But
he has a wee problem. Pennsylvania already has two Republican
senators. Rick Santorum, 45, is a rising star--he is chairman of the
Senate Republican Conference, the third-highest leadership
post--midway through his second term. The other Republican senator is
Arlen Specter, 73, who next year will seek his fifth term.
Toomey, who term-limited himself by pledging to serve only three terms
and who is in his third, says, with sincere serenity, he will defeat
Specter in next year's Republican primary and then will hold the seat
for the party. The political savants in the White House may think that
Toomey's plan, although undoubtedly stimulating, is something they
could do without. Which is why Andrew Card, chief of staff of a White
House that is not bashful about intervening in candidate-selection
processes, appeared at a luncheon that raised about $100,000 for
Specter--in Toomey's district.
The president's people, remembering the 36-day tussle for Florida's
electoral votes, would rather not do without Pennsylvania's 21 next
year. George W. Bush lost the state in 2000, in spite of his ardent
wooing of Pennsylvanians, assisted by their popular Republican
governor, Tom Ridge.
Today Pennsylvania has a Democratic governor, Ed Rendell, a pugnacious
former mayor of Philadelphia and former chairman of the Democratic
National Committee. Bush has visited Pennsylvania 18 times as
president, evidence that he thinks carrying the state next year will
be difficult enough without Republicans being divided by a Senate
primary fight.
Toomey, unshakably sanguine, says, essentially: Piffle. Pennsylvania,
he insists, is a "swing state" but trending Republican, and his
candidacy will help the entire ticket because he, unlike Specter, is a
full-throated, tax-cutting, government-limiting Republican. Toomey
says his voting record resembles that of Santorum, who has run and won
statewide twice.
Toomey notes that Specter has had primary challenges in each of his
last two races and, although none of the challengers were well-funded
or taken seriously, Specter lost about one-third of the vote. That,
says Toomey, means that one-third of the vote in a Republican
primary--a closed primary; only Republicans can participate--will vote
for anyone against Specter.
Republican activists have--as their party's symbol, the elephant,
supposedly does--long memories. They remember that Specter was one of
only six Republican senators to vote in 1987 against confirming Ronald
Reagan's nomination of Robert Bork to the Supreme Court.
Toomey says, "We've got three parties in Congress--Republicans,
Democrats and Appropriators." When Toomey first ran for Congress, he
criticized his opponent, a state legislator, for opposing repeal of
taxes on toothpaste and dental floss. All this is music to the ears of
Steve Moore, president of the Club for Growth, which supports fiscally
conservative Republicans against Republicans it considers markedly
less so. Moore calls Toomey's challenge to Specter "the most important
Senate election in the nation in 2004."
In his announcement of his Senate campaign, Toomey showed that
"kinder" and "gentler" are not his bywords. He used both the L-word
(referring to Specter's "liberal vision") and the K-word (he said
Specter had "joined Ted Kennedy" in sponsoring a bill to permit
experimental human cloning). Toomey charged that in 1986 and 1987
Specter opposed President Reagan's positions "more than any other
Republican senator" and that "Specter has opposed President Bush more
than all but two Republican senators." The two, according to Toomey's
staff, are Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island and Olympia Snowe of Maine.
But Michael Barone, author of The Almanac of American Politics, says
Specter has been "one of the nation's most durable career politicians"
since being elected district attorney in Democratic Philadelphia in
1965. And Specter's record is more mixed than Toomey's portrayal of
it. Barone writes, "More than anyone else, he defeated Robert Bork in
1987 and, more than anyone else but (then Sen.) John Danforth, he
secured the confirmation of Clarence Thomas in 1991. In 1994 his
devastatingly complex chart describing the Clinton health care plan
played no small part in defeating it."
Toomey notes that Rendell, who got his first job after law school from
Specter, and appeared in an ad for Specter in 1998, may not encourage
a strong Democratic challenger. But such a plan could backfire if, as
Toomey insists, the Democratic nominee will not be running against
Specter. This internecine scrap, in a state Al Gore carried by four
points, could affect next year's presidential drama.