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Specter Talks Stimulus on Hardball
Washington, D.C.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009 -
U.S. Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) today commented on the ongoing negotiations between the House and the Senate regarding the economic stimulus package. Specter appeared in a joint interview with Senator Susan Collins (R-Maine) on MSNBC’s Hardball with Chris Matthews.
Excerpts from tonight’s interview:
Matthews: What conditions have you set in your own mind for what you’ll accept in the conference report on the economic recovery package?
Specter: The Republican moderates worked it out at $780 billion. That represented a $110 billion cut. That’s the arrangement, and that’s the arrangement I expect to have followed.
Matthews: What did you think, Senator Specter, about the President’s commitment last night to try to put more education money in the final package than was in the Senate version today?
Specter: I think we have already struck the bargain; that is, as far as I’m concerned. Look, Chris, this is a very tough matter and we swallowed a big, bitter pill, and we did this only because the economy is in such perilous shape. The current recession may go into full-scale depression like 1929. When we worked this through, we went as far as we could. We structured it very, very carefully and there were a lot of people who were objecting to it. Fortunately, the Chamber of Commerce, a very strong Republican conservative organization, agrees that this is necessary because of a perilous economic situation and because it does a lot to rebuild America and because a substantial part of it involves tax cuts. But if somebody wants to restructure the arrangement, they may end up with no arrangement at all.
Chris, can I give you a simple illustration? The Head Start from the House had $2 billion, and we put up $1 billion, so people come and say that you cut it a billion dollars. We didn’t. If we hadn’t struck the bargain we did, Head Start would have gotten zero. So we added $1 billion to it. We went a long way to coming to $780 billion figure with tax cuts and spending and that’s where we expect it to stay.
Matthews: Let’s go back two weeks, Senators, if we can to the Halcyon days or the very optimistic days of the inaugural period. There was talk then of a possible 80 vote majority to the stimulus package. What happened to that and how did that come apart, Senator Specter?
Specter: There are many people who want to assert a party line. Not one Republican in the House of Representatives supported the bill. On the Senate side, there is pretty much the same attitude. Look here, we didn’t follow the charm and charisma of President Obama; we did this because the economy needs it and because American needs it. But there are a lot of people who want to assert a very rigid political philosophy, and I think we cross the line because of the need to put party second. John Kennedy put it best of all when he said years ago, “Sometimes party asks too much.” There’s no Republican or Democratic way to solve this problem, but there is an American way. We did the best we could and we are going to stick with it.
Matthews: Senator Specter, let me ask you about the Republican party you and I grew up with. It used to be very strong in the northeast; every northeastern state had at least one Republican moderate Senator. Now you’re almost the last of the Mohicans, you and Senators Snowe and Senator Collins. Has the party got to change?
Specter: I believe that there has to be more accommodation to different points of view and not to assert a philosophy which says we’re not going to yield even in the face of enormous problems. Our Republican colleagues in the Senate say that, well, a better deal could have been structured. But we urged them to come in as part of the negotiating process. I wasn’t looking for a role as a negotiator. Senator Collins and I did it only because quite a number of other Republican Senators moved away. So I think there has to be more focus on the underlying problems and a willingness to solve them in a way which requires an accommodation. Everybody can’t get everything they want.
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