Arlen Specter is a shill, not an investigator.

The Bushes have known for at least a year that the domestic espionage issue was going to surface. The New York Times couldn't be trusted to sit on this story forever.

If you believed for a second that the Bushes have been sweating it out for a year, without concocting a plan to deal with this scandal, you are mistaken.

If you believe Arlen Specter reached out and grabbed this "investigation" on his own, before even having a chance to look at the charges, you are mistaken.

If you believe the Judiciary Committee is the one and only logical jurisdiction under which an investigation of this type can or should be conducted, you are mistaken.

Clearly, Arlen Specter was assigned this mission long ahead of time. A deal was cut long ago.

The moment the news hit the wire, Specter was on the job.

Please don't fall for this.

clearly untrustworthy

It is all so sordid.

light as soon as the Bushes got their act together.

They know this is big. Nobody was sitting on hands.

Feingold, Biden and Kennedy are on the Judiciary Committee and they'll be unbelievably vocal if Specter tries to whitewash the affair. And maybe - just maybe - Arlen holds "the rule of law" more dear than his allegiance to the neocons.

of controlling the issue.

Look at what's going on right now: There's almost nobody calling for an investigation. That's usually a huge part of a scandal of this sort, a huge media event, but Specter managed to preempt most of the would-be calls for investigations. To do this, he had to be the first out of the gate.

It's already going well for Specter and Bush.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=5642629

and Congressman Lewis from Georgia said he would sign on as well.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=5643487

The Dems are stepping up to the plate. This won't go away easily without a fight.

But it's been put in black and white terms.

You're either with him or against him. To spy or not to spy. Impeach or defend.

Hope springs eternal....

Five Senators, two GOPer and three Dems., want an investigation:

Republican Sens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Olympia Snowe of Maine joined Democratic Sens. Carl Levin of Michigan, Dianne Feinstein of California and Ron Wyden of Oregon in calling for a joint investigation by the Senate Intelligence and Judiciary Committees into whether the government eavesdropped "without appropriate legal authority."


http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/12/gop-and-dem-senators-call-for.html

Specter is highly regarded. That being said, the mere fact that he has expressed displeasure at the President's actions and called for hearings will definitely go against Bush in PA regardless of the motivation behind it. There comes a point in time for almost everyone when the "line" is crossed. I think for Specter, this may be it, and I am not convinced he knew about it in advance. He was pretty sick for a while.

to be a sure thing.

It would be much more efficient for somebody to call for investigations right away than to wait until a big fuss was made.

Similarly, it would be much more efficient for the so-called president to come right out and admit to what he did as opposed to denying the story, causing people to call him a liar.

This is being handled extremely well.

be to obfuscate the truth. Will we ever be able to have even a modicum of faith in our government?

at least he abstained on the impeachment of Clinton. Name one other GOPer you'd like as head of the SJC!