When it comes to engineering Arlen Specter’s switch, all roads run through Joe Biden.
TPM Reader DW:
We may not get one good vote out of Arlen we weren’t gonna get anyway, but today has already been worth it to watch GOP commentators take on that hunched over bitter snarl they all have now.
From TPM Reader JK …
Your reader MF, while hitting my liberal sensitivities, is entirely off the mark. Specter only became a Republican in order to get through the political machinery of the Philadelphia Democratic Party. He circumvented that by registering as a Republican and even then was pretty moderate. His constant allusions to Reagan are meaningless: who DIDN’T vote for Ronald Reagan?
Specter is pro-choice. He’s pro-gay rights. He’s for unions, regardless of his recent right turn on card check when he was still thinking he had a shot against Toomey. He’s supportive of President Obama’s stimulus proposal. He’s in favor of science, against creationism, in favor of stem cell research, and I’ll damn well bet he’s in favor of universal healthcare. Regardless of his recent rightist sensibilities (newfound and soon to be scrapped now that he no longer has to appease the crazies), he’ll soon be back to where he always was: a Democrat.
Frankly, I never understood why he stayed in the party. Call him stubborn.
How much longer can the Democrats keep it a secret that the Club for Growth is a Dem-funded front group? Here’s the Club’s response to the Specter Switch …
“Senator Specter has confirmed what we already knew – he’s a liberal devoted to more spending, more bailouts, and less economic freedom. Thanks to him, Democrats will now be able to steamroll their big government agenda through the Senate.
“This also shows how unprincipled he is. Just a few weeks ago, he stated quite clearly that he was remaining a Republican because he thought he had ‘a more important role to play there.’ And he said ‘the United States very desperately needs a two-party system.’
“This cynical play for political survival calls into question whether Pennsylvania taxpayers can believe anything Arlen Specter says. If his only principle is personal ambition, can he really be trusted with the serious issues that face our country?”
“The Club for Growth PAC enthusiastically endorsed Pat Toomey for Senate in Pennsylvania when Specter was pretending to be a Republican. Club members will be even more committed to Toomey’s candidacy now that Specter has revealed his true identity.”
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Virtually every article about the swine flu notes epidemiologists’ and public health experts’ struggle to find out why the same virus seems so much more virulent in Mexico than it has been, at least to date, in other countries. Frustratingly, though, we never hear that they’ve made much progress in coming up with a clear answer — though it’s frequently suggested that the quality of the data coming out of Mexico is poor.
This article from the Journal suggests not a single answer but an overlapping series of factors explaining the difference. The suggested factors include pervasive under-reporting of infection (making the mortality rate appear higher), substandard health care and pervasive misdiagnosis in the early stages of the outbreak and even the high altitude and air pollution in Mexico City, which according to the article is normally responsible for a high rate of throat and chest infections. Of course, another possible factor is that it’s gone on several weeks longer in Mexico. And the same virulence will become evident in other countries.
To be clear, these explanations aren’t put forward as conclusive — more along the lines of educated guesses or working hypotheses. Being far from any area of expertise and on a topic so weighty, I don’t want to speculate more. But if you’re interested in the topic, I recommend that you read the piece.
Late Update: The San Francisco Chronicle has another take on the question.
Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius sworn in as HHS secretary last night just in time to tackle swine flu. That and the day’s other political news in the TPMDC Morning Roundup.