Toomey: Just Another Political Opportunist August 13 2009
Well, that didn’t take long.
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Pat Toomey has officially become part of the go-along, get-along Establishment that he so vocally opposed over the years. In the process, he has demonstrated that he is just another politician masquerading as a principled conservative.
It is precisely this type of hypocrisy — from Toomey and some of his followers — that can signal the beginning of the end for a political movement.
At issue is Toomey’s statement that, had he been a senator, he would have voted to confirm Judge Sotomayor as a U.S. Supreme Court Justice.
Before the wolves start howling, let me be clear that this is not a commentary on Justice Sotomayor’s qualifications, but on the blatant inconsistency of Mr. Toomey.
You can bet the ranch that if Sen. Arlen Specter was still a Republican, and had voted to confirm a liberal judicial activist — one who has mocked those opposed to legislating from the bench — Toomey and his supporters would have been first in line to decimate him. Anyone who believes differently simply doesn’t live in the real world.
But since Toomey is running for office, he made a calculated political maneuver to “soften” his image by appealing to the “moderate suburban soccer moms” who supposedly decide statewide elections. In the process, he has alienated both his base and the moderates because he has shown himself to be a political opportunist— exactly what he has accused Mr. Specter of being. When will politicians realize that playing both sides gets you neither?
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One of the most important jobs of a U.S. Senator is voting upon Supreme Court nominations. If the senator is a true conservative, he understands the way in which our Founding Fathers, in their infinite wisdom, initiated this nation with three branches of government. The legislative branch makes the law, the executive branch carries out the law and the judicial branch interprets the law.
Yet it’s not a stretch to say that the greatest ills facing the nation—abortion, forced busing, quotas, deprivation of individual rights — haven’t come about as the result of laws passed by the legislative branch, but by court decisions that are nothing more than judicial legislation.
From the New Haven firefighter case, in which Judge Sotmayor ruled that there was nothing wrong with white firefighters being denied promotions because no black firefighters qualified for advancement, to Sotomayor’s statement that a Hispanic female could rule better than a white male, there are clear indications that she is, and will continue to be, a judicial activist.
Voicing his opposition should have been a no-brainer for Toomey, and, had articulated his reasoning and stood on principle, he would have gained new-found respect as a man of integrity, and in the process, his campaign would have undoubtedly benefitted.
Toomey’s decision is bad enough, but to have some of his supporters justify it with political doublespeak is even worse. These are the same people who, time and again, talk about standing on principle, political consequences be damned. They cite a lack of moral leadership as the primary reason for America’s problems, and always claim to support only those leaders with the highest standards of honesty, integrity and candor.
So where’s their outcry on Toomey’s latest Washington Two-Step?
Conservatives who looked the other way because Toomey is “one of theirs” have shown themselves to be the ultimate hypocrites. Ensuring that only strict constructionalists get appointed to the Supreme Court has always been at the top of the conservatives’ agenda. Since Justices serve for life, and control of the Court hangs in the balance, the stakes could not have been any higher.
For conservatives to throw away everything in which they believe to support a political opportunist is shameful.
If a Senator is worth anything, he votes on the basis of who he is and what he believes.
Pat Toomey’s actions have shown that he can’t be trusted, making this campaign one that may be over before it begins.
Chris Freind can be reached at CF@FreindlyFireZone.com
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